Bloody Lollipop Prop

      Why am I posting Halloween crafts in April?  Well, a friend of mine suggested doing a costume contest as a fun self-isolation activity, and you know how much I love costumes.  Instead of saving this for Halloween season (roughly mid-July through October on this blog, unless I have a spooky themed birthday party, in which case we're talking late May-October ;)), I figured I'd post it now as an idea for something to do while you're at home.
     While I have a number of costume pieces and props on hand, I thought it wouldn't be fair to pluck something out of my stash.  I already had the clothes I wanted to use for this, so it wasn't completely from scratch, but I decided I'd make all new props.  I'll reveal the full costume as the final post in this series, but until then, see if you can guess what I dressed up as.

Materials:

*Modeling clay
*Acrylic paint in two different colors, such as pink and blue (Alternatively, you could use colorful modeling clay)
*Red acrylic paint
*Black acrylic paint
*Brown acrylic paint
*White acrylic paint
*Thin wooden dowel
*Hand saw or other wood cutting implement (If your dowel is thin enough, a box cutter will probably work just fine.  You may even be able to get away with using scissors.)
*All purpose adhesive

Directions:

*Roll out two long, thin strips of clay.  Roll them together in a spiral formation.  (Note: I originally tried dyeing the clay using food coloring, which is why one of the spiral pieces appears to have a light blue tint to it.  It didn't really work out, so that's why I'm not including instructions on that piece of the project.)

*Cut a dowel to the size that you would like your lollipop stick to be, plus an extra inch or so.

*Insert the dowel into the clay spiral in the location where you would like your lollipop stick to go.  Clay is pretty heavy, so you'll want to insert it about an inch or so into the clay so that your lollipop will be stable.

*Carefully remove the dowel.  Bake the clay in the oven according to the directions on the packaging.  Let cool.

*While the clay is cooling, paint the dowel white.

*Once the clay has cooled, paint the clay in your desired two color scheme.

*Glue lollipop to its stick.

*Mix together red, black, and brown paints to create a crimson color.

*Apply to your lollipop in a blood pattern of your choosing.  I doused my hand in crimson paint and placed it on the lollipop to try to make a bloody hand print shape, but you can't really tell it's a hand print.  A blood spatter effect might work better, which you could create by dipping the paintbrush in the crimson paint and flicking it at the lollipop.