Start saving
your empty plastic gallon milk jugs. With a few quick snips and
hole-punches, you can turn them into a scary life-sized
skeleton! Small children can punch holes and help tie bones
together. Cutting out and gluing pieces together is a job for
older children and parents.
Remember,
you can keep your Skeleton Man for next year or simply take him
apart and recycle the milk jugs! All you’ll need are the
materials below:
• 8 or 9 clean, plastic gallon jugs
• String
• Scissors
• Craft knife (optional - for parents use only!)
• Glue gun (for parents use)
• One-hole punch
HEAD:
Choose a jug with a pair of indentations opposite the handle and turn it upside
down. In the corner, opposite the handle, cut out a large, smiling mouth, centered
under the indented “eyes.” Make two small slits in the top of head and
tie a loop of string through them for hanging the finished skeleton.
CHEST:
Cut a vertical slit down the center of a right-side-up jug, directly opposite the
handle. Cut and trim away plastic to make the rib cage. Glue the head and chest
together at the “neck” by connecting the spouts of the two jugs with a
thick band of hot glue. Hold the jugs together for a few minutes until the glue cools.
SHOULDERS:
Cut off two-jug handles (leaving a small collar on the ends) and attach them to
the chest section with hot glue. Punch a hole at one end of each shoulder.
HIPS:
Cut all the way around a jug, about 4½ inches up from the bottom. Take the
bottom piece and trim away a small smile shape from each side to make a four-cornered
shape. Punch holes in two opposite corners.
WAIST:
Cut out two spouts, leaving a ½ inch collar on each. Glue the spouts together
and let dry. Hot-glue the waist to the bottom of the chest and to the top of the
hip section.
ARMS AND LEGS:
Cut eight long bone shapes from the corner sections of three jugs (cut into the
curved shape of the jug to make the bones even more realistic). From four of these
bones, cut out the center to make lower limbs (forearms and shins). Punch a hole
through the ends of all eight bones. Use string to tie two arm sections to each
shoulder and two leg sections to each hip.
HANDS AND FEET:
Let kids trace their hands and feet onto the side of a jug, then cut out the shapes.
Punch holes in the hands and feet, and tie them onto the arms and legs.