Makin' Magic

I easily do my most shopping/store stalking not on the day after the consumption of much north american fowl or on the day we don't call boxing day but may as well. Instead it is that week leading up to All Hallow's Eve when my husband and I circle and stalk party and costume stores trying to weed out the weakest link and whatever cheap/super on sale props we think we can alter.

Enter the staff. I found this for real cheap at a Party in the USSR store, one horn on the side of the stupid looking skull was broken off but it didn't much matter as I had plans.

For last year nothing too exciting happened to it, there simply wasn't time. Instead he got chucked down next to our mage (or wizard, I'm not picky) who was a bit slow in casting a spell against the dragon.

But now it was finally time to make a much better staff for the unsuspecting pile of bones.

The first step as in much of anything in life was removing the head. It's still kicking around in the basement somewhere, crying out at night wondering just where it went wrong.

To the top I added instead one of those plastic christmas bulbs you can decorate from a hobby store and painted it with an enamel paint for that translucent glow.

The little tendrils/branches to hold it were a bit harder. I rolled up sections of tin foil and taped and shaped them around the bulb. Once I had it how I wanted it I cut the duct tape and retaped it around a workable piece of PVC to begin the exciting latexing part.

That's where one takes small pieces of paper towels and dips it into liquid latex then, making a huge mess all over the floor/your pants/the dog drapes it around until it hardens into a sturdy shape.

One that was dry I unstuck it off the pipe and added it back to my staff base and latexed up the bottom so it joined.

The next day I pulled out more of the evil drippy goo and finished latexing up the rest of the staff so it would blend:

Now time to stain/paint. I used a simple deck stain to give it an undercoat to begin working with. It's basically the same as corpsing which I assume no normal human being out there does so if you have no idea what I'm talking about just nod and agree and look at the pretty pictures.

But I wanted more color so out came the paints and using my sponges I turned my little branch more brown. It's actually really hard to screw up painting something that comes pre-textured for you.

All my little mage staff needed were a few touch ups, some black wrappings (actual tennis racquet tape I had to paint black as they only had white) and a bit of ribbon to finish off my preferred mage staff.

And as per-tradition once I finish something large I made my dog pose in front of it.

And that's how to make a really kick ass mage staff.

Oh I better go. I think the head got itself locked into a corner again.