How to Tin Foil and Antique a Paper Mache Bunny
What seemed like a quick and easy little project of making this 'Tin Foil Craft Easter Bunny', turned into a five-hour project of gluing! If you remember, last year I used one of these paper mache bunnies as a base for moss. The little moss bunny turned out so cute! It took almost no time and I had an adorable display for the wood and glass lantern, which I placed on the fireplace hearth.
As I was picking up some beads at the fabric store, I noticed this little paper mache bunny, which was marked down to less than two dollars. I remembered seeing a pin from last year showing how to add tin foil to eggs, antiquing them with black paint, and ending up with a really neat vintage look.
Wouldn't this little bunny look amazing with that treatment?
This past weekend, while everyone at home had their own things going on, I decided to start this little project. It was just about noon when I began.
An hour and a half later, this is what the little bunny looked like. I felt pretty good about that, thinking I had covered quite a bit. The bunny is 8-inches tall and about 5-1/2 inches from front feet to the end of his tail.
Regular Reynold's Wrap aluminum foil was used. The heavy duty would not work very well. As you can see in the pictures, I tore small pieces about 1/2" big. As the hours wore on, some of the pieces got bigger. I tried to keep the edges uneven.
Mod Podge was used to adhere the foil to the paper mache form. I tried to keep the Mod Podge on the shiny side of the aluminum foil. The dull side was the side I chose to have shown on the surface and I tried to keep the glue off of that side. A damp paper towel was used to wipe the glue off of the tin foil surface.
The side of a rounded pencil was used to burnish the foil to the form, which helped reveal more of the detail. ( A rounded chopstick or pen would work, too.) The tin foil adhered to the paper pretty well, but rubbing the side of the pencil over the foil smoothed the surface and guaranteed a better bond.
So, here is the tin foil covered bunny after five hours of gluing. He actually looked pretty neat like this. The plan was to make him look old by antiquing him, though.
In the tin foiled egg tutorial, the lady had used black paint. I thought I would try a dark brown antiquing medium instead.
Okay, well, that did not look so good. Ewww... It looked kind of like someone had smeared chocolate on the bunny.
So, I thought perhaps a charcoal paint was the better choice. It seemed to me that the black would be too intense.
Alcohol will take off acrylic paint. I know this because I have used alcohol to clean plastic stencils and my nails after getting acrylic paint on them. I took a cotton pad soaked with alcohol and cleaned the brown off of the tin foil before painting with the charcoal color.
Working in sections, I painted on the Ceramcoat charcoal colored paint, then wiped it off with a soft damp rag. Some sections required a little dabbing with the paint brush until the desired effect was achieved. The charcoal color left a nice soft antique feel, which I thought was pretty pleasing.
The little tin foil craft Easter bunny looks pretty cute and I am seriously thinking about making a few of the eggs to match the bunny. Since you know How to Tin Foil and Antique a Paper Mache Bunny, maybe this will inspire you to create one of your own!
This post was shared on "Fridays Feature Party".
