I am a big fan of Tracey’s Fancy and there have been a few of her projects that made me say “I want to make that!” These gumball machines are one of those projects. And, I thought they would make a great Easter gift for some young ones!

We have all seen these red gumball machines. They are easy enough to purchase from Amazon, but, in my case, I found two on Facebook Marketplace and saved a bit of money.

I disassembled the gumball machine (taking pictures along the way), scuff sanded and primed it with primer I had on hand. Tracey’s Fancy has a blog post on the paints she used for her “Princess” inspired machine. I essentially tried to replicate it using paint I had on hand. I have many cans of surplus paint that I was able to mix into different colors and essentially achieve the same effect. In most cases, it was Sherwin Williams All Surface Enamel/Emerald and I purchased a sample size from Lowe’s in red for the Spider Man gum ball machine. I used a paint pen to draw the black ”webs” on Spiderman. I am more steady with a paint pen than brush for that kind of detail work.

I purchased this mold from Amazon. I attempted to make a mold with modeling clay and it was heavy, not smooth nor pliable. (These needed to be adhered to the curved surfaces of the body of the machine and the glass. In the end, I filled the molds with hot glue. I found if I filled these molds only 50% they were lighter and more pliable. I used a combination of quick set epoxy and hot glue to adhere.

I used clay for Spiderman’s eyes. I rolled out the clay very thin and used a cookie cutter to make the shape. Parchment paper offered a non-stick surface and the ”eyes” dried on the parchment paper laying on top of the glass. So, essentially, I was able to easily adhere the eyes to the glass without bending it. (Score!) I painted the molds prior to adhering.

I sprayed a sparkly spray on ”Frozen” and then poly on both.