Primitive Button Jars

I buy clear glass salt and pepper jars all throughout the year. And well, any jar about that size with a lid. I even buy some larger jars from time to time to just hold my lose buttons until I need them. Like the large canning, glass jar in the back, right side of the pic below.

Sometime around fall, I start making my button jars to sale in my Booth #555 at the Peddlers Mall. I'm not sure why I wait till then, but it just seems to happen each year. Or maybe because it's right after yard sale season around here, and I've had time to collect a bunch.

And sometimes I even find them super cheap, marked down to fifty cents per set. And I'll grab a  few. But they usually have the bright shiny stainless looking caps. And for that I add some Delta Stencil Paint with a sponge. It sets up good after a few days and doesn't tend to rub off. Looks like this after it's on, (but not dry yet.)

These are not great money makers, but they are steady sellers. And they offer an inexpensive item for your booth that anyone walking by would be able to afford. Most of these, unless they are older more hard to find jars, I try to keep them priced at only a $1.99 each. And when I've rounded up the salt and pepper shakers from yard sales all summer, usually along with tons of buttons from auctions and estate sales, I only have a few pennies and time in each.

Here's some more I had just painted:

And here's one of my favorite old rusty topped ones. The top was originally rusty, so I just had to add a pale yellow star and some homespun, along with the buttons.

As you see, there's nothing hard at all about making these cute empty jars into button holders. They are a great item to just "tuck" into that spot where nothing else seems to look right. And they'd look awesome sitting beside an old sewing machine with items such as bobbins and pin holders and maybe a hand sewn doll!

Happy Crafting Ya'll!

DIY GRUBBY VOTIVES AND TEALIGHTS with Homespun

 

Today I turned these plain votives from Biglots:

into these cute grubby votives with homespun and buttons:

(sorry the pics aren't so great, I was in a hurry and had hot wax on everything! lol)

How I did so, coming soon. Right now I need to go clean up my mess lol.
Okay, so back now and everything is cleaned up.

If you want to make these, this is what I did.
(Please be extremely careful, this melted wax can scald your skin!)

1. First off, go buy you a box of cheap, plain votives at Big Lots. Case of 24 for around $6.00 there.
2. Melt you some old candles or wax, any colors, in a candle warmer and have it ready for use.
3. Mix a bottle of cinnamon and bottle of nutmeg in a tin foil pan. The cinnamon and nutmeg usually turn out brownish in the end. So you need not worry about the color wax you've melted to use.
4. Be sure to do all this with wax paper underneath!
5. Now you're ready for the messy part.... CAREFULLY dip some of the hot wax out in a dipper or whatever you can find to fit, and pour it into the mixture of cinnamon and nutmeg.
6. Wait about 45 seconds or so for it to thicken a bit, not much, just a bit, and then start rolling your plain votive around in it. Cakeing the wax onto the lil votive. Sometimes I use my hands, sometimes I use the old spoons you see in the pic. 
7. Just don't get burned!
8. You can repeat this process until your little grubby candle is just how you like it, more or less. In the pic above, you can see, some has alot, and one has very little and is still grubbish~.
9. I then set it over on a new piece of wax paper to dry.
10. Then tied on a piece of homespun and hot glued a cute button on it. And then they are ready to go.

The pic below is what's usually leftover after I make a batch. And be sure to keep these! You can melt them chunks down the next time you go to make some. And the cinnamon and nutmeg left, can also be used next time.

I also use the same process on the tiny tea lights that comes in bags at the Dollar Mart for $1.00.

Here they are:

Here is a few more pics of the votives:

And to finish them up, I put them in a bakery cupcake bag, tied with homespun and finished it off with a grubby hang tag.
HERE is the link to my Grubby Tag Recipe

For a little bit of detail, notice I first stapled on the tag to the bag, then I used a mini clothespin
to make it look like it was also pinned!

See ya'll next time!
~Lisa

Button Collector

I am a button collector!

I save buttons from everything.  And they look great sitting on a shelf, in an old bottle with a bit of homespun tied at the top.

In my booth you can find "button mixin' packages." They would be great for crafts or to start your button collection.

Do you collect buttons?