Have you seen that fabulous pin going around Pinterest showing the multi coloured yarn balls? Seriously, take a look at how GORGEOUS these yarn balls are. So I thought, what a fun twist to turn those little balls into pumpkins! And you know what? They ended up looking awesome!
This post contains affiliate links. If you use these links to buy something we may earn a small commission which helps us run this website.
What type of glue works best for making yarn pumpkins?
EDIT: We used to recommend using dollar store glue, but have found over the years that dollar store glue gives you soft, flexible pumpkins that may not hold their shape very well. When we recently re-made this craft (see our video tutorial above!) we decided to use Aleene’s tacky glue, like we did with our twine ball ornaments. We did a mixture of half Aleene’s tacky glue and half water, and it made the pumpkins strong, sturdy, and resilient! Originally we made this craft with straight white glue from the dollar store. We did not water it down, like a lot of tutorials online will tell you to do. Using plain white glue, the pumpkins still hold their shape very well, but they can be easily crushed if you accidentally put something on top of them (or let the kids play with them…). The balls aren’t rock solid, so you want to give them as much glue power as possible to hold their shape. Other glue options include:
A mixture of corn starch or flour and water. (We haven’t tried this ourselves.) Mod podge, slightly watered down. (Just know that if you use glossy Mod Podge the pumpkins will end up with more of a shiny finish when they dry, rather than the matte yarn finish that you get with white glue.)
Where can I get supplies to make a yarn pumpkin?
I found my yarn at the dollar store, which quite honestly, I thought was a little crazy! I was at the craft store last week, and all the yarn was at least $5 to $7 per ball, and it was all acrylic. I really wanted cotton yarn, because somehow I thought it would dry stiffer (no idea if that’s true?), and I managed to find it at the dollar store! So this craft is entirely from the dollar store – Glue, balloons and cotton yarn… and of course you can get pipe cleaners at the dollar store too, but I had those left over from the pipe cleaner flowers I made.
What colour yarn makes the best yarn pumpkin?
We made orange, yellow, and red pumpkins, and we definitely prefer the orange ones. (I’ll admit that the red one kind of looks like an apple. Ha! Oops…) You could also try making a white yarn pumpkin!
It’s not the quickest project in the world, but I love how they turned out! It took about 20 minutes per pumpkin to wrap the yarn, and then 24 hours to dry. I tried getting the kids to help out, but they lost interest really quickly. My 6 year old didn’t want to get her hands dirty, so she took a balloon and left. My 4 year old looked really enthusiastic until it came time to touch the glue, then she informed me that she wanted me to make it for her. Maybe older kids would do better? These yarn pumpkins are such a fun fall craft idea! They’d make a beautiful centerpiece or mantle decoration, or you could even use them to decorate for Halloween. This post was originally published on September 19, 2016.
Here’s even more pumpkin craft ideas:
Paper Mache Pumpkins
Chunky Yarn Pumpkins
Paper Pumpkin Craft
Our book Low-Mess Crafts for Kids is loaded with 72 fun and simple craft ideas for kids! The projects are fun, easy and most importantly low-mess, so the clean up is simple!
Where to buy:
