Humpty ‘Pumpty’ Nursery Rhyme Variation for Hallowe’en Instructables Pumpkin Challenge Contest

Here is my entry to the Instructables Pumpkin Contest. This is my first ever online effort and I have enjoyed every minute of planning and making it. When I was browsing the current contests I saw the pumpkins one and this idea just popped into my head. So here is my variation, in diorama form of the popular Humpty Dumpty nursery rhyme using a pumpkin of course.

Supplies

Here are the supplies and items needed. See what you can source in your area to repurpose as I have. Pumpkin is currently in season here so I got that from a local seller (bought two in case of catastrophe!).

• Sharp kitchen knife
• Hot glue gun, scissors, craft knife or scroll saw
• gloves
• sticks, twigs
• old cat food tray
• permanent marker
• plastic lid from an aerosol can or similar
• I have used some toy eyes I had already but could even be drawn on.

Step 1: Making the Hat

I have a variety of old spray cans from previous craft efforts so I found an empty one and used the lid from that. Make sure to give it a good clean along with the old cat food tray or whatever you use as the brim. Of course you could always design a different style of hat or headgear. Let your imagination flow.

Put on your protective gloves and hot glue around the top edge of the lid and put it onto the upturned dish. When this has had time to grip it’s time to give it some colour. I choose a black spray paint that needed using up. Wait for this to dry, put it aside for Humptys construction.

If you are a bit shaky using a glue gun as I am then for the purpose of this Instructable it doesn’t need to be that neat really so don’t fret about being super slick!

Step 2: Carving the Face

I used a sharp kitchen knife and created a lovely big open smile which is the style of mouth I remember from the nursery rhyme when I was very young. I did carve out a nose……..but it didn’t turn out so well! However I managed to plug the hole I had made and ended up giving him a button nose. I used marker pen to pinpoint where the eyes would go and his limbs would need to come out from. I also drew a pair of raised eyebrows just for fun. Now we are ready for our construction.

*Note* - Please don’t throw away any of the pumpkin waste as this can also be used as I will show at the end of this Instructable.

Step 3: Preparation and Construction

So I have gathered the stick arms and legs and was lucky enough to find a small bag of little stick on eyes in my craft room which I thought would be perfect for this project.

To make the hands I drew with the permanent marker some rather odd looking (I’m no artist) outlines as hands and what I hoped would look like the soles of a pair of boots to go on the end of the legs onto a bit of scrap veneer. There are many other things you could use, even cardboard. My hands don’t work well cutting with scissors so I used a scroll saw to cut out the outlines. They then need to be hot glued onto the respective limbs.

The eyes are the last thing to attach. Mine had peel off paper on the back which was ideal.

Step 4: Humpty Arrives

So all that remains is to either balance or secure in place the hat if needed and Humpty ‘Pumpty’ is born. The next stage is my finished idea for the contest. I added (borrowed from our Grandson’s) toy soldiers, horses and King then sliced and broke up poor Humpty to create my competition idea.

In the true spirit of pumpkin/Halloween season I shone a light from his back to see if he would shine from the inside and it worked so happy days!

Step 5: The Rhyme Diorama

So here is my idea all put together, slightly altered rhyme to boot!

Humpty Pumpty sat on a wall,

Humpty Pumpty had a great fall,

All the Kings horses and all the Kings men

couldn’t put Humpty together again.

Step 6: Waste Not, Want Not!

As I mentioned earlier my passion for repurposing also includes always trying to find a use for what would ordinarily be put in the rubbish bin. There are some great recipes out there for roasted pumpkin or pumpkin soup to use the flesh wisely but I have previously thrown out the seeds, of which there are many. You see I also love to encourage the many small bird species from our local habitat, like the Sparrows, Robins, Blackbirds and Tits. So I decided to rinse the seeds off, as they can be very slippery which the birds would struggle to grasp to eat. I then laid them out on some greaseproof paper to dry off. In a couple of days they had dried right out. Ideal for the birds to peck up and eat.