Homemade Skylanders Giants Kaos Pinata

My favorite part about throwing birthday parties is making the pinata. I also like the part where it is really inexpensive to make a pinata at home. This pinata was made for under $4 (since I already had gluesticks and acrylic paint in my craft heap room). I do always insist that the pinata is a villain of the party's theme since it will be, after all, beaten with an object. For my son's Skylanders Giants themed 6th birthday party, we knew the villain would be the evil portal master, Kaos:

This year, I took a few progression photos. If you're like me, you skimmed over all  this text and already scrolled down for the photos, so I'll get on with the pictures. There was no thought put into the photos other than, "Oh, I should take a photo with my iphone," so you'll have to look past the instagram processing. I should point out that this is not a tutorial. You'll learn that the disappointing way in a minute. It's more of an intermittent-behind-the-scenes post with a few tips that can be applied to any type of pinata.

Step One: Take a cardboard box and cut it up into long strips about 1.5" wide. I never know how many I will need since each pinata is different. I do know, that I'll never use scizzors scissors to do this because it hurts! I go for an exacto blade every time. (Please be careful with the exacto blade. If you don't respect the sharpness of that blade, you could easily require stitches. Not only snitches get stitches...not only snitches.)

Least Interesting photo. Ever.

 Step Two: Find your hot glue gun and glue two strips to form a circle in your desired diameter. Then, hot glue more strips onto this first circle to begin to form a sphere. Or an egg, or whatever everlasting gobbstopper shape you end up with. But make a skull type shape and know that it is still malleable in the steps that follow and will, eventually, be smashed to pieces.

In the lower left-hand photo, is a profile view of Kaos thus far. You can see where I cut one of the eye sockets on the right side.

Inconsistent Instagram photos I warned about

 Step Three: Now, normally, I use paper mache for this next part. But I really  just didn't want any mess to clean up. So, I decided to use masking tape. This is where $1.50 of the pinata cost went. After using the masking tape, I don't know if I can ever go back to hot floury glue running down my elbows again.

The masking tape was so great to work with, because I was able to build up facial features very easily by crinkling tape for the brow ridge and covering it with smooth masking tape. Making the raised lip region and nose was a cinch as well. This step is one of those things that is hard to describe my procedure, because I really do just eyeball it. Well, I literally eyeballed it this time. *snare drum*

Just keep taping until it looks the way you'd like

Step Four (& Five & Six?): I don't have any process photos of the next two steps. Sorry. But all I did was cut a half circle the bottom of the head, large enough for my hand to fit through. Then, I purchased one 4" diameter Styrofoam sphere from the craft store for about $2, and cut it in half. I cut the eye sockets larger, taped the semi-spheres in place from behind and added more detail to the brow region. 

Next, I took a few sheets of tan tissue paper that I purchased at 90% off Target Christmas clearance for $0.30 and hot glued them to the structure to, again quite literally, skin the surface. Then I took acrylic paint and painted the details on the face and eyes and mouth. At this point, I decided the result thus far might be a bit frightening so I did not add the sharp teeth.

Definitely would have been too creepy with sharp teeth

Step Seven: After I completed the face, I wished I'd just made it a bit larger, thrown candy in it and called it a day. But I had 24 pounds of candy this villain had to carry. Fortunately, this is the part I always spend the least amount of time on. I've realized that you just need one detailed aspect of a pinata and kids don't pay attention to the rest. 

I folded cardboard and taped it into a box to be the proper scale. Since this box was to hold so much candy, I supported it from the bottom, and ran the ribbon (although I often use thin wire cable) through the head so that it just bobbled atop the base. Then I twisted up some paper and taped it crudely.

 

Step Eight: I hurried up and wrapped the body in tissue paper because the guests had begun to arrive and I was running BEHIND, as always. And there you have it: Gene Simmons Gollum The Evil Portal Master Kaos: