DIY Halloween Concrete Bowl

DIY Concrete Candy and Decor Bowl

10/4/2018

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This post is sponsored by Quikrete.

It's October and that means it's time to decorate for fall and Halloween. One of our favorite materials to use for outdoor Halloween decorating is concrete. It's easy to work with and holds up well to hot, rainy Florida weather. It's very DIY friendly.

You may remember in 2016, we created concrete pumpkins that could be used as a flower pot or candy or candle holders. That's an easy project for any beginner. Take a look at that video if you want to create your own pumpkin.

Now on to this year's concrete project. If you're like us, you may celebrate Halloween away from your home. If you're not home, you can just leave a bowl of candy at the door, but there is the very high likelihood that someone will pick it up and dump the entire contents into their bag. Well, with this project, that will be a little difficult!

We're making a concrete candy bowl that can double as October fall decor. Take a look. As always, watching the video is great place to start.

We are using Quikrete countertop mix. It's in the blue bag.

We're using Quikrete countertop mix, but really can concrete mix would work. We had this on hand so that's what we used!

Materials:

Quikrete Concrete (Quikrete)
Ryobi glue gun (Home Depot)
(2) Plastic bowls (Dollar Store)
Plastic fangs (Dollar Store)
El Wire (Amazon)

The Ryobi battery powered glue gun is easy and convenient to use in this project.

This project uses a few readily available supplies and tools. We now have a dollar store between our two homes, so it's easy to stop by and pick up supplies. The orange bowl is from the Halloween section. The black bowl is from the automotive aisle, and is an oil change container. You'll need a glue gun and lots of glue sticks, plastic fangs, and the concrete mix of your choice, as well as bowl and utensil to mix with.

The first step is to randomly hot glue plastic fangs to the underside of the orange bowl and to the sides of the black bowl. Watch your fingers, the glue is HOT. I used the end of a pencil to help push the fangs into place.

Once the fangs were in place, I dripped hot glue down the sides of the black bowl to mimic candle wax that has dripped. This makes a cool effect in the final piece. The hot glue does not stick to the concrete.

Use gloves when working with concrete as well as a mask and eye protection.

BEFORE mixing the concrete put on gloves, a mask and goggles to protect yourself from the concrete dust and mixed concrete. We also use a fan to help direct the concrete dust out of the garage. Mix the concrete until it resembles brownie batter.

Fill the black container half full of concrete then push the orange bowl into place. Weight it down.

Fill the black container to about half full. As you push the orange bowl into place, the concrete level will rise to where it needs to be. Use some kind of weight to keep the orange bowl from floating out of place.

Cover the concrete and let it cure for 24 hours.

We're using vintage irons as weights as well as a concrete doorstop we made. We covered the concrete with cling film and let it cure for 24 hours.

After 24 hours we removed the concrete from the two bowls.

We used EL wire to give the bowl a fun neon look.

The plastic fangs removed fairly easily with a little encouragement. That is EL wire on top of the bowl, which will give the bowl a neon look. We embedded it before we left the concrete to cure.

Use a utility knife to help remove the black bowl.

We used a utility knife to cut the black bowl in order to remove it. Notice the hot glue on the left in the picture. It stayed completely on the inside of the bowl.

The second bowl features a spider web like design made with stringy hot glue.

We made a second bowl with a little variation. We wanted the interior of the bowl to have the look of a spider web. We used hot glue blown by a fan to make it stringy. Watch the video to see the process.

We highlighted some of the features with paint.

We wanted our bowls to have a bit of a gritty, dirty look. We did this using a technique we call, "spit spray." We used oil rubbed bronze spray to achieve the look we wanted.

The bowl is sitting on a live edge wood slab.

We picked up a few decorating supplies to add to the total look. The live edge slab is the perfect stand for the bowl at my house.

Video tutorial! Learn how to use concrete to make a candy bowl for halloween and fall decor! #quikrete #concrete #bowl #halloween

Steph used a stump as the base for her bowl and gathered moss to add to her display.

That creepy spider web stuff sticks really well to the brick outside my front door. I brought in two of my concrete garden orbs for the display.

This was much fun! This is the first time we've used hot glue with concrete. We really like being able to add fun little elements easily to the concrete mold. I think it's a technique we are going to continue to explore.

Now we need your help! Which bowl do you like best? The fang and el wire version at Steph's house, or the spider web and bloody drips at my house? Let us know in the comments below!

Please note: This post is sponsored by Quikrete. We received product and compensation for this project. All thoughts and opinions are our own.

FYI: We are not professionals, and we don’t claim to be. This is what we found worked for our project. Yours may need a little different approach. Safety first!

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