I’ve been seeing crafters use the tall Dollar Tree candles and melt them to create new candles in pretty containers. I had everything I needed to try this out. I am thrilled with the results. In fact, I shared the one I made for myself on my Facebook page and already have a request to make another.
The candle in the glass holder is from Dollar Tree. I ordered wicks from Temu and I had this wooden bowl. I love thrifting wooden bowls so I had several to choose from. The fragrance oil is “Egyptian Musk”. I love the fresh clean smell. I found it on Amazon.
I had seen many crafters stand the candle in a pan of water and put it on the stove on low until it melted. Today, though, I saw a technique of placing the candle on a cookie tray in the oven at 300°. It took about 18 minutes to melt mine.
I hot glued the wick to the bottom of the bowl while the candle was melting and got it ready for the wax.
It is ready to pour.
After I poured the wax into the bowl, I added two capfuls of my fragrance oil and stirred it around a bit with another skewer.
I should have curled the extra wick around a skewer and laid it on top of the bowl to keep the wick upright, but didn’t remember to do that until after I poured the wax. Next time I will do that before pouring.
I then let it cool and trimmed the wick.
I love how my candle turned out! I can’t wait to make more!
Still busy creating so I haven’t had time to post how we did some of these projects. Here they are, though, for inspiration for you.
This is a vignette I put together for winter decor. I had a Christmas transfer on one side of this pitcher and a winter one on the other. I turned it around and added some branches from a tree in my yard then added lights. I made the snowman last year and added the Winter sign I’ve had for a long time.
Danny cut this cute gnome out of a scrap piece of plywood, drew the details and painted and sealed him. He added some stakes so we can put him in the pot’s dirt.
I crocheted another bunch of hats to sell to a friend’s daughter. She adds them to the baskets of herbal remedies she sells.
And more crochet… which begat more crochet that I’m still working on. I made a couple of gnome towel rings. I had made some boho type ones for a couple of friends and then decided to find a pattern for making more. I’ve sold 10 so far of them.
And then I saw a post for a group called Random Acts of Crochet Kindness and cute little worry worms to make and spread around town so I had to make some of those. I plan on making more later on. But I figured out a way to make a cute Valentine one for kids and ended up with 86 orders. Still working on those.
Then my cousin sent me a video of someone crocheting a woven heart. I had to find the tutorial and make one. Then I saw a video on making a heart with wine corks so I had to do that, too. And then someone else told me about decoupaging on a candle with wax paper. Yep! I had to do that, too. I’ve used the hot iron method with parchment paper before, but not on a candle. Worked like a charm. And the little tag- I wrote love on it with a s or h marker and burned it and then painted it. That worked, too.
Whew! I’m getting tired just typing all we’ve done so far this month. But wait! There’s more!
And then came a couple of jewelry boxes. I have a huge stash of them but haven’t painted any in awhile. These sold quickly so plan on painting ring more soon.
I saw an idea for a date night jar on Pinterest. This is my version. Jar from Dollar Tree. I painted the glass lid. If you spray glass with a clear sealer first, chalk paint will adhere well.
I don’t have staged pics of this beautiful library table. It is going to one of our booths this week. Danny sanded the top. I stained it with a w at teenaged stain. It has five coats of Varathane Crystal Clear Water based polyurethane in matte finish. The rest is painted with our Missouri Limestone Paint Company “Cupboard Green” and sealed. I love how it turned out.
Danny created this white washed hanging rack from a vintage ladder.
Another project is this gorgeous half table console. This is a long description but hopefully will inspire those who like boho with some ideas. I think this is one of my most favorite projects ever. I had so much fun with it.
We’ve had this table (and matching lamps) since soon after we built our house in 1985. Holy cow! That was 38 years ago!! The other day, I decided we didn’t need them anymore so decided to paint them. Danny suggested painting the top with our Missouri Limestone Paint Company “Bourbon Street”, a dark teal color. I thought Rustoleum metallic gold on the metal legs would look good with the teal. I also painted the metal on the lamps with it. They all turned out gorgeous!
Then, when I showed the table to a friend, she said I should style it as a boho piece. I agreed.
So pretty much all day today, I have been creating items for it to sell from things I have in my supplies:
1) Picture frame: gifted by a neighbor- funny thing, my mom had our pictures in frames almost exactly like this growing up. The back is velvet. It can still stand up, but it makes a great tray, too. This frame is old! 2) This awesome fabric which was once valances with bead trim, was gifted by a friend. I’ve already used it as a curtain, as you can see, to hide Danny’s power tools and to create a little boho hanging. Lol I simply put a piece of the fabric under the glass of the picture frame for an instant boho tray! 3) A bowl of boho goodness. I had all the ingredients including this cute wood bowl I thrifted. I just added the beads around it for a true boho style. It took me a good bit to figure out how to do it to look finished, then decided to rip it out (it was sewn in with nylon thread). But when I got it all out, it was attached to this beautiful piece of fabric tape in this awesome color! I just hot glued it around the bowl! 4) Picture frame: gifted by the same neighbor: I did a line drawing on the glass of similar leaves in the table and put a piece of scrapbook paper behind it in a coordinating color and now have a boho print! 5) Bottle of peacock feathers: the bottle I think came with fragrance oil and bamboo sticks at some point. I did paint the lid that sits around it metallic gold this morning. I’m pretty sure I picked up the peacock feathers at a yard sale.
And then, we came up with a few more boho accessories.
And when we found this mirror shopping, we knew we had to get it! Danny painstakingly covered all the mirrors. I painted it metallic gold and then he removed all the tape. I cleaned it and….it is just stunning!
We also found this cute little kid’s drawing table. We added a couple of stools to it and took it to our booth at Sweet Repeats in Sullivan.
The wood base on this candle holder is a bed riser I turned upside down and painted. the dish for the candle is a vintage ashtray.
Coming up…. Danny is working on a new project. We are busy figuring out a way to make a table top for it. Stay tuned!
You probably wouldn’t want to use both lamps on the table, but maybe in the same room would be perfect!
You learn something new every day. I bought two of these wire rustic forms at Goodwill. One for me and one for my friend.
They were called lampshades. But Danny and I couldn’t figure out how they could possibly work.
They appeared to be new and they had about 6 of them. I was wishing I would have bought more because we figured we could cut the wires out of the bottom and make cloches. One had a bigger hole and I was able to wedge a candle wreath holder and candle through it. 😬
Danny just now went to cut the wires and called me to come take a look. He tugged hard and pulled on the bottom out and Folks….we have a lampshade. 😂😂 I wonder if the original owners wondered what kind of lampshades they had gotten and sent them off to goodwill. They were hard to pull out.
Anyway, he did cut the bottom wires off on one because it fits perfectly on a charger plate and will look beautiful decorated French Country style for my friend’s dining room table.
The other we are leaving for now because I’d like to try it on my pendant light in my kitchen. I think the top hole is too small for it, though. Maybe Danny can figure it out. If not, I will spread it flat for a different kind of cloche.
Danny, the inventor, is at it again. He’d been reading up on glass blasting. He has a vintage table lamp he wants to restore. So….
He found a little desk he thought would be the perfect stand. He removed the top (I’m sure we will see it again somewhere) and built this little contraption to keep the glass beads contained and caught, as they are reusable, while he blasts a piece of the lamp with glass beads. He found the beads on Amazon.
The gray container is the hopper that hold the glass beads.
He finally got everything together and is testing it out today. He even found a booster for his air compressor at a yard sale that he wanted. The only thing he didn’t have was ear plugs and a mask for the first test run. He did have safety glasses and leather gloves on. He has them all now.
He needs a tarp, though, to catch any that escape. There seems to be quite a bit on the patio, but he did drop the pan that collects extra when showing it to me. Oops.
I thrifted this wood container and did a black distress over it using our Missouri Limestone Paint Company chalk-style paint in Coal Shovel. I added some filler, fall foliage, a pinecone, a couple of pumpkins, a gourd, and this beautiful green silk sunflower to create a unique fall centerpiece that looks finished from front and back.
We recently thrifted a vintage cabinet. One drawer was missing a box so the front was just nailed to the cabinet. The cabinet had at least 3 layers of paint on some places, others had only one. It was falling apart.
The top was awesome. It was a vintage metal top, a cream color with farmhouse green edges. I don’t think it was the original top as it really didn’t fit.
Danny took it all apart, and rebuilt it from scratch. He created another door from the fronts of all 3 drawers and added a bottom and a shelf on one side. He also added hardware to keep the doors closed. He added a wood box type thing to the top of the cabinet to raise it up to cabinet height once the metal top was added. He also added a pallet board rack.for hanging tools, etc. There is lots of storage for soil, pots, etc.
He sanded the paint that was loose and I painted it with a mix of our Missouri Limestone Paint Company chalk style paints to match the green edges of the metal top.
To create the chippy look all over, I first painted the whole thing a light yellow like most of it has been painted. I let that dry and then rubbed it all over randomly with a candle, focusing on the edges.
I then painted it with the green paint I had mixed. I allowed some of the yellow to show through on places. Once that was dry. I took packing tape (and sometimes used duct tape) and applied it. I used a plastic scraper to adhere it, then quickly ripped it off. It took up some of the paint in small areas and a lot of paint on the areas I had applied wax.
Color is a little off due to lighting.
Color is a little off due to lighting.
Color is a little off due to lighting.
The newly finished potting bench turned out great and sold very quickly as did the basket of fall flowers and leaves and the sunflowers.
Sometimes just a small change can perk up my kitchen. I thrifted this metal bowl made of stars several years ago with the intention of painting the stars red, white, and blue for patriotic holidays.
I did a few stars then got bored and quit. So this morning I decided to finish just around the top. The metal was already distressed from age so my paint job looks a little distressed, too.
🙂 But hey! It makes a great holder for the extra fruit we always seem to have on hand. And it’s just in time for The 4th of July!
Last night I made a simple macrame boho wall hanging….while I watched TV. It was fairly time consuming so I recommend TV watching while you do this. 🙂
I had a dowel 16” long by 3/4” diameter. A slightly smaller one would work as well. A cut down plunger handle from Dollar Tree would be perfect.
I unraveled the whole nautical rope from Dollar Tree. It made 3 strands. Then I cut those strands in half and I had 6. Then I cut those in half and I had 12.
I know had 24 strands to unravel. The time consuming part was unraveling all the strands until I got the look you see in the photos. Take your time and do just a few strands at a time or you will get it all knotted at the end. Trust me… I know. I did use a dog brush I bought at Dollar Tree for macrame projects and brushed the strands out as much as possible after I separated them. Then I trimmed the bottom a little trying to go at angles toward the center.
I attached a flower and foliage with hot glue. I bought four flower pots with a variety of high end flowers and foliage through an online auction for just $8.50 for all four after fees. They were originally priced at $10 each! What a bargain! If you haven’t tried online auctions, you should!
I then used some of the burlap trim from Dollar Tree to make the hanger. I wrapped some around a small metal book ring from Dollar Tree, hot gluing it as I went around. I took the length of one of the pieces in the package and cut it in half. I wrapped one end of the piece completely around the dowel rod, securing it with hot glue. I did the same for the other side. Then I brought the ends together, put them through the covered ring and hot glued them to the ring on the back side. I did that twice to make them very secure.
I took photos hanging from my fireplace and French Door. I especially love how it looks hanging from a fireplace for summer!!
I have this bookend I thrifted some time ago. Originally the flower part was painted with various colors and outdated. I gave it a second life and painted the whole thing white.
Then today, I thought I would change it up a little more and give it a third life. I found this rub on transfer at Dollar Tree and applied it to the back. I also sprayed a little bit of metallic gold spray paint on a paper plate, then used a brush to apply it to the arrow.
What a difference!
If you haven’t fallen in love with rub on transfers yet, then try the ones at Dollar Tree to practice with before committing to the expensive ones if you are wanting to see how they work. I guarantee you will become addicted.
Meet Agatha, my yard angel. After making some other yard decor yesterday and seeing some cute angels in a garden group I’m in, I knew I had to have one. So I made her this morning…. all by myself …. with materials I had here and my husband’s power tools. Ok … his battery drill with a screwdriver bit. But “power tools” sounds better.
Head and neck: a thrifted cutting board Halo: a grapevine wreath from Dollar Tree Hair: bed springs he cut off an old mattress he found on trash pick up day awhile ago. It kept him busy for two days cutting them off. 👍🏻 Necklace: I made gold bells out of big pill bottles for a wreath I made at Christmas. Agatha wanted them for a necklace. Body: a wonderfully rustic shutter a friend gifted me. Arms: braces from an old chair Wings: leftover pieces from my son’s new deck. They were already triangles. Bag of flowers: tote bag from our trip to Amsterdam several years ago. Flowers from Dollar Tree. I will be changing that out to a watering can soon but I wanted a photo before the rain and the watering can is In my booth for sale right now. Lol
I gave her wings and arms a touch of paint to blend them in.
I screwed the pieces on (I even found that metal stuff with holes in it to attach the wings) and placed her on the hill by the pond.