A couple of months ago, my best friend sent me a picture of a watermelon elephant and asked “Can you make this for Grace’s baby shower?” It was adorable, and I was up for the challenge. Fast forward to the week of the shower, and I am looking all over Pinterest and Youtube for instructions on how to make this lil cutie pie. No directions to be found anywhere . . . only pictures. So, I bought my watermelon and decided to try to duplicate it on my own. Here are step-by-step instructions for anybody out there who’d like to make it yourselves.
Purchase a nice size watermelon (two, just in case you have problems) and cut it in half. One of those halves will be the elephant’s head. This was when I first discovered there would be problems. The watermelon halves fall open and the red is facing up, so how do I get that little green face to stay up and forward? Hmmm.
Before moving on to that, I scooped out watermelon balls so that no good part of the watermelon would go to waste. Bagged those up and put in fridge.
Well, well, well I tried stuffing the inside with plastic bags and then leaning it up but after a couple of hours it fell flat. Let’s just say my first attempt was an extreme fail! Not only did it fall flat, but it looked like a hideous pig with huge ears. Luckily, I had gotten off work early, and I was determined to not let my friend down. Tim and I went grocery shopping, and I bought a second watermelon. I still used the head from the first attempt, but I corrected the ears and the trunk and came up with a way to make that big head stay up!
Cut a base . . .
Place the head on the base and attach with wooden skewers. I used blueberries for her eyes.
Next slice a piece in half for the two ears.
Attach the ears to back of head with wooden skewers.
Now, check out the back. This is my secret for keeping it all together and upright.
Then I went to work on the trunk. Another hard task! Look at all the watermelon pieces I went through trying to get it just right.
So, finally, I had the trunk “almost” perfect, and good enough for a sleepy woman to call it quits. I attached a bow with a glue gun and put her in the fridge for a good night’s rest.
The next day, I removed the trunk for the drive to Concord and carefully managed to get Ellie the Elephant to the lovely Elephant themed shower for Grace Cabaniss. All the decorations were beautiful, the food was delicious, the turnout of family and friends was incredible, and the gifts were many! Karis Ruth is already a most blessed and loved baby!!
breaking bread together 