Handcrafted Thanksgiving Turkey Using Ornamental Grasses and Pinecones

11 Materials
$5.00
Easy
Recently I was looking at some ornamental grasses in my yard and thought the shape resembled a very lush turkey. So naturally when I get inspired like that, I really have to act on it and make something! What I came up with is an adorable handcrafted turkey made with natural elements like ornamental grasses, pinecones and a few other things I found in my stash.
I started by cutting a Styrofoam ball in half using a hot wire cutter and then cutting the half ball diagonally (body) with the same tool.
Next, I cut a faux pear in half for the head and neck. You can also use a craft knife to make the cuts.
Then, I painted the foam with mod podge and covered it with burlap and let dry. After drying, I glued the pear shape onto the bottom center of the foam.
For the turkey tail, I pulled out bristles from a dollar store brush and glued them on the back end after painting them. Unfortunately, I couldn't get the bristles to stand up like I wanted them to so I ended up covering them up. You'll see how later.
Next, I cut the scales off of pinecones and layered them on with hot glue, starting at the edge of the bristles and adding them around the entire body of the turkey.
Then, I cut off a few stalks of ornamental grasses and glued them on in a fan shape on the back side of the turkey body.
I love the look of ornamental grasses as feathers - they're nice and fluffy!
For the beak, I made a small cone shape out of cardboard that I cut down and covered with hot glue and let dry. Then I cut off the excess glue and painted the beak.
Once dry, the beak and eyes were glued on. Then I added another type of ornamental leaves over the bristles to give it a very dramatic look!
And finally, the grasses were sprayed with hairspray to preserve the fibers and the back end and bottom were covered with burlap on cardboard.
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Gail@Purple Hues and Me
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  2 questions
  • Sherrill Horton Sherrill Horton on Nov 06, 2016
    This is precious, but how much hands-on time did it take?
  • Constance Constance on Nov 10, 2023

    im ten so do you think I’d be able to make it or is it too hard

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