Reusing old jars

Wash the jar and let it dry. I can't remember what this one held but I think it was some or other spice or sauce.

 Paint the lid in chalkboard paint. Give it a few coats and let it dry.

 Spray the back of a stencil with contact adhesive or use stencil glue. Wait the recommended time according to the manufacturers directions.

Place the stencil on the jar. I taped the top and bottom down because my stencil was a little big for the jar.

 Follow the bottle directions on the etching cream to apply the product to the jar. Wait the recommended time. Mine said to wait 2 minutes but a previous product I had worked with said to wait 30 minutes so I decided rather safe than sorry and waited about 20 minutes. PS: Don't forget to wear rubber gloves and protective clothing.

 Wash the cream off (not forgetting your protective gear). Remove the stencil and tape. Give the jar a good wash with warm soapy water or running it through the dishwasher.

 Once it's washed and dried then find a nice use for your "new" pretty jar.

Personalized jars

We have these nice glass jars that our coffee comes in that I did not want to throw out. Instead I decided to pull the labels off and paint them with chalkboard paint for reuse around the kitchen and house.

Materials needed:

coffee jar

contact paper

Design of your choice 
permanent marker
craft knife 
Brasso metal polish 
alcohol swabs
Tape
contact adhesive 
chalk board paint

Instructions:

Soak an empty and nice coffee jar in water to soften and remove the label. Some elbow grease may be required. Let it dry.

Stick a piece of contact paper onto the bottle. 

Pick your design and trace it onto the contact paper. I just outlined it with a permanent marker.
Using a craft knife cut out the design and pull the piece off the jar. Keep in mind that where you cut out and pull off is where the paint will go.

I didn't get off all the gooey sticky label glue and murphy's law that showed up in my cut out design. So I just wiped it off with a bit of Brasso metal polish, ( I don't know why that works but it does) and wiped it off with an alcohol swab when I was done. Needless to say only use the Brasso on the outside of the bottle.









Tape off any remaining exposed areas.
Spray a layer of contact adhesive and wait about ten minutes until it is dry (or however long your contact adhesive tells you to wait to achieve a permanent bond). Don't forget to work in a well ventilated area.

Did you notice how the contact adhesive seems to crack? I didn't know how that will influence the painting part of the project and the final outcome so I decided to wipe it off with another alcohol swab and try again.

This time I stood further away when spraying the adhesive and only added a thin layer.
...wait for another ten minutes...

Spray on a layer of chalk board paint. I stood at about the same place I did when spraying the second coat of contact adhesive. It felt like far away. I also only sprayed a thin layer. I could still see the back of the bottle. I figured a few thin coats would be better than one thick one.

Let it dry and repeat as needed.

After I painted the third coat I almost immediately pulled the tape and contact paper off and left it to dry properly. 

Once properly dry; wash the bottle, dry it off properly, add a pretty ribbon if you like and find something to put in the re-purposed bottle.

Painted wooden Rusk / biscuit box

I painted this Rusk box. It is the perfect size to hide the (ugly) rusk box. Admittedly I bought the box at a craft store and just painted it to suit my own personal style.

I used a gift tag to size and trace a contact paper sized tag which I then cut out and placed on the box. I also used my punch to punch holes in the scrap pieces of contact paper and used the circle confetti parts to stick on the box as the “ribbon” of the tag. 

I stained the box with a rosewood colored wood stain and waited the appropriate amount of time for it to dry. I then pulled off the contact paper tags and “ribbon”.

I then sized and traced a smaller tag onto contact paper and cut out the inside of it to form a stencil. I placed the contact paper on the box, making sure the cut out sections fit nicely into the wooden tag parts already there. Any areas not covered with contact paper I covered up with masking tape.

On the one side of the box and on one of the tags I then placed stickers to read “rusks” as I would use the box most often for those. I placed the stickers within the area not covered by the contact paper.  I left the other tag free of stickers so that when I was done painting I could write the flavor of the rusks on it. The other side of the box I left free from stickers for when I used the box for anything other than rusks.

Once all that was done, and I was sure that all the areas of the box that I did not want painted with chalkboard paint was covered, I spray painted the box with chalkboard paint. I gave it two coats but it’s probably best to read the instructions of your spray-paint if you are going to give this project a try.

When I was done painting but before the paint completely dried I pulled off the contact paper and stickers. The nice chalkboard tags were left behind with one of them already labelled rusks.

I left this box to completely dry and then waited a few more days to make sure that the paint smell was gone. I did not paint the inside of the box but I wanted to make sure that I would have not the ugly paint fumes seeping through to my rusks. Now I just place my favourite store bought rusk box into my nicely painted box and keep it on the kitchen counter; right next to the kettle for easy and pretty access for when I want coffee and biscuits. 

A little boy's chalkboard

My godsons birthday is coming up. He is turning four. Last night inspiration struck and I decided that I would make him his very own chalkboard. He has started expressing an interest in drawing (they just look like squiggles at this stage though) but thought this gift would be perfect to help him develop his artistic talent.

This is the finished product

Here are the basic instructions, very plainly put as I'm not feeling 100% today...

Materials:
Piece of wood
Colored background paint (craft paint works better than spray paint) & chalkboard paint
Picture of a car
Contact paper
Craft knife
Paint pen
Chalk

My rough idea from last night when inspiration struck

1) Sand down the edges of the piece of wood. I used an A4 piece of Masonite in landscape.
2) Paint a base-coat or spray with a primer.
3) Wait for base-coat /primer to dry.
4) Paint background color. Mine is blue.
5) While waiting for the paint to dry, print out or draw a picture of a car.
6) Copy/trace the picture onto the back of the contact paper (the paper side) with a piece of carbon paper. The image on the board will be in mirror image to what is copied onto the back of the contact paper so if necessary print out your image in mirror image.
7) Cut out the car design with a craft knife.
8) Place the contact paper with the cut out car onto the wood and cover any exposed areas with scrap paper. Ensure the contact paper sticks firmly to the board to prevent as much chalkboard paint as possible from bleeding through.

9) Using the blackboard/chalkboard paint, paint the silhouette or picture of the car. A few coats may be necessary, especially if you used spray paint.
10) Remove contact paper and scrap paper and allow the paint to dry completely
11) Trace the image of the car with a paint marker to cover up any areas where paint may have bled through or the contact paper removed bits of background paint. This also just produces a clean finish to the car silhouette.

12)  Using your paint pen write "vroom" or any other personal message on the board. Not on the chalk-boarded car as you want to keep that space open for the fun drawing with chalk that this gift will hopefully inspire. I chose "vroom" because my car suddenly looked more like a skew beret than a car to me and I didn't want my 4 year old godson or his parents to ask me what it was supposed to be a picture of.
13) Add detail with a piece of white chalk to the car to ensure there really is no confusion that it is a car. This also just finishes the gift nicely. Yes it is chalk and will come off when he cleans his chalkboard but by then he will know it's a car and will be to busy creating masterpieces to really care.