Wood Slice Painted Pumpkins

This year I need to find quick and small decorations for my Thanksgiving table. It has been years since I hosted Thanksgiving at my house and I want to decorate my table but also have room to seat eleven people very comfortably. These small wood slice painted pumpkins I created last year for my fall mantel, that were actually too small, are perfect to reuse this year on my Thanksgiving table instead.

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To be totally honest, I often run behind on a lot of things around my house. I refuse to even think about the needed cleaning. I know this happens to all of us sometimes where a sickness or long work hours just put us behind. As a DIY blogger, I also fall behind on finishing up projects for the blog. My biggest and hardest critic is myself of course.

This year I am starting early so on some things for Thanksgiving so that I can relax and enjoy the day with extended family. The table decor is just one of those items I will get done early!

The struggle to come up with new seasonal decor is real!

Previously, I made lots of wood slice ornaments for my Christmas tree because we had lots of them. I also made these adorable pumpkins one afternoon that I was going to use on my mantel but they were too small. Instead they ended up on the side table in the dining room. This year they will be part of the centerpiece for the dining table.

Last August when we had a tree cut down, my husband took several different sized branches and cut them in to thin wood slices for me to use. Since the wood was so freshly cut I had to prep the wood slices before I could use them.

Bake wood slices in the oven at a low temperature to dry them and to kill any creepy crawly eggs that may be attached to them.

I baked the wood slices in a 200 degree oven for an hour and a half at least – sometimes more. This helps to slowly dry them out and dry up the sap still in the wood.

Then I let them sit around for weeks to continue to cure.

When I was ready to use them, we sanded them down using a belt sander – which is quicker than hand sanding – and got the surfaces smooth and clean.

I have found so far that the slices are not sticky at all and take acrylic paint very well. So it seems that this method worked to dry them out and prepare them for use.

To make my new faux pumpkins using painted wood slices, I just applied several coats of Harvest Orange paint to one side of the slice. The twigs and leaves details are just from supplies I had leftover in my craft stash from making my owl wreath a few weeks ago.

With a bit of creativity you can make a decorative pumpkin or Fall decor out of anything.

Unfortunately my wood slice painted pumpkins were much too small for my large mantel so last year they were on display in my dining room on the side table. This year they are part of the table display.