** Disclaimer: If you are looking for craft instructions, keep searching. I am not an expert! **
When we moved into this house, I noticed the previous owners left a lot of mason jars of various sizes in the basement. I didn’t think a lot of it until I noticed that a few of them were vintage.
I know some vintage jars have value, but based on my research, it didn’t look like these were worth a lot. We had a bunch of scrap wood in the barn. The previous owners left some chalk paint. Maybe I could make sconces?
I’m not a particularly crafty person. I do enjoy crafting on occasion, but it’s not something I claim to be good at. However, I felt inspired to give this a try. After choosing these two jars, I searched through the scrap wood in the barn until I found a board I felt was perfect for the project. (It was also caked in mud, so I had to scrub it clean.)
Then I bought the supplies I would need:
- oil-rubbed bronze hooks
- wire mason jar hangers
- dark wood stain
- matte varnish
- foam brushes
- silk hydrangeas
- stainless steel scrubbing pad
I cleaned the jars really well before I started painting. I did two coats of paint.
Once the paint was dry, I scrubbed the jars with the scrubbing pad (you could use sandpaper, too) — which rubbed the paint off in some places — until the jars looked just how I wanted.
I finished with varnish. Once the jars were completely dry, I added the wire hangers and then put the hydrangeas in them.
So … now it’s time for the scrap wood.
First of all, I needed to saw the board in half. The problem is that our saws are in a corner of the garage that isn’t accessible at the moment. So these jars sat for quite some time.
This weekend, I couldn’t take it anymore and just got some wood pallet plaques from Michaels. Pre-stained … HA! So I didn’t even need the stain I bought.
Now, these plaques are designed to hang horizontally. The twine on the back is just stapled on, so I cut it off and re-stapled it to hang vertically.
Next: I needed to add the oil-rubbed bronze hooks. But I soon realized that the screws that came with the hooks were too long. I checked my toolbox and the only short screws I had were silver.
However, I had mug hooks that would do the trick for now. The pallets have four boards in front, which are held together by two crosspieces in back. I had to wedge the screw part of each hook between the boards at the front of the pallet and then twist it until it screwed completely into the back piece.
As a result, the sconces are not centered, but that’s something I intend to fix as soon as I can replace the mug hooks with the oil-rubbed bronze hooks.
I’m pretty pleased with how they turned out, and I can change out the flowers with the seasons.
Karyn Johnson 