Halloween Sidewalk Lanterns
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Light up your walkway with these adorable (and fun to make) Halloween Sidewalk Lanterns. All you need is plastic cups, glue, tissue paper and battery powered candles!
Halloween Sidewalk Lanterns
We live in a neighborhood with no street lights or sidewalks. It’s a very pretty setting and normally I like the lack of light pollution, but not having street lights makes it extra difficult for trick-or-treaters to find their way to our house!
We turn on all our lights on Halloween, but I still feel like have to encourage the trick-or-treaters to stop.
I’ve always loved the look of Sidewalk Lanterns and I thought that a DIY Sidewalk Lantern would be the perfect way to go.
Paper Mache Lanterns
Can I just say, you can never go wrong with a paper-maché type craft?
The kids just love getting their hands messy and I love that they stay occupied for at least a good hour! (Obviously, I love paper-maché too. We’ve got paper-maché Christmas Trees and paper-maché Piggy Bank crafts on the blog already. What’s one more, lol?)
I brainstormed a few ideas for the sidewalk lanterns… First, I thought about using mason jars and spray paint like I did with our little luminaries from last year, but I was afraid they might get kicked or broken by small children, plus I wanted more light than the opaque spray paint would give.
I spotted these plastic cups at the party store and knew they would be the perfect vessel for our lanterns.
The process to make the lanterns was super easy and in no time at all, the kids and I had made 14 little sidewalk lanterns. (Amazon has a 24 pack of these tea lights/flameless candles w/ replacement batteries for around $12.)
If I have time, I might even make a few more.
Would you like to make a few sidewalk lanterns? Here is how it’s done:
Materials Needed for the Halloween Lanterns:
- Plastic Tumblers (any sort of clear plastic cup with no lip would work great)
- Tissue paper (I used orange, but yellow or white might be nice too)
- Modge Podge
- Luminaries/tea candles
How to Make Sidewalk Lanterns
- Gather your supplies.
- Pre-tear your tissue paper into large and small pieces.
- Use your finger to spread glue all over the cup and cover with a large piece of tissue. Keep adding tissue and glue as needed.
- Let cup dry.
- Use an nail file to file off any excess paper hanging over the edge of the glass. I found that trying to rip the tissue made the edges ragged and not as pretty.
- Add a flame-less tea light and your sidewalk lanterns are good to go!
They even look pretty during the day and with the lights on.
TIP: If it’s windy out, just put a few river rocks at the bottom of the cup, under the the tea light to weigh the lantern down!
Aren’t they great? I will be saving these to use for night-time parties or maybe at Christmas time too!
Want more fun Halloween Projects?
Be sure to check these out! (click the title not the photo to visit the post.)
Wall Bats (free pdf and svg template)
Halloween Nightlights from a Foam Cup 
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What happens if it rains, will it hold up?
Did you also place tissue paper on the inside of the cup?
I did not put tissue paper on the inside of the cup. If it rains they will get wet, so do not leave them outside in the rain.
Great idea. I’m surprised a little tea light can emit so much light. We have a very long, dark driveway. I might do this. I wonder if they would blow over though.
It might, maybe you could put some rocks or dirt in the bottom to weigh them down.
These are so cute and it's such a great idea!
Thanks for sharing at Artsy Corner link party! You were featured this week!
These are adorable and a super great idea for dark neighborhoods!
Those are really cute.
Those are really cute! We have plenty of street lights, but I use some old glass chandy shades (we replaced a bunch), glue some ghosty faces on, add tealites and they look so cute!
Great job!
Great idea…and easy enough to make for every holiday! 🙂
Very nice work. Thinking about Christmas… Linda
These are really cute! Thank you for a great idea! Julia
How cute! The tissue paper really lights up well with the lights inside. I can see having different colored ones around for all sorts of different holidays. Great idea!
These are really lovely – and simple! Sometimes I think we get carried away with over-Halloweening everything, but these are applicable and reusable during other times of the year. Thanks for sharing!