27

Nov

2012

DIY Tutorial: Tea Light Jam Jars

Today’s DIY Tutorial comes from one of our very own Boho Brides. Becki who you all met a few  weeks ago is having a very DIY wedding she has been busy getting her big day planned and getting her craft on. As well as this Becky has started her own stationery business Love Knot Creations.

Today Becki is going to be showing us how to make tea Light Holders out of Jam Jars, but decorated in a very pretty way.

DIY Tutorial - jam jar tea lights

 

DIY Tutorial - jam jar tea lights

DIY Tutorial - jam jar tea lights

 

I’ll pass the Blog over to Becki…………….

Step 1 ) Spend months collecting jam jars from friends and family. Seriously, you’ll be surprised just how many you get given! People turned up with bags full and I was like my gosh what do you eat??
Remove the labels and use sticky remover to get off the remaining glue from the jars.
Wash them thoroughly.

DIY Tutorial - jam jar tea lights

 

Step 2) Next you will need to paint a strip around the top and bottom of your jars and inside the very top also. You can do this freehand or with masking tape to get a definitive line, but I just did it freehand. It’s important to just paint a couple of mm after the bulgy bit of your jar so that you have as much of the middle free from paint as this is where the light from the tea-light will shine through.
Repeat until you are happy that you have a solid finish.

DIY Tutorial - jam jar tea lights

 

Step 3) Pull out the pages from your chosen book. The pages need to be the slightly rough recycled kind, not shiny as it won’t work with those. Trim the top of the page down to the first line of the writing and then measure where to cut the bottom of the page just by holding it up to the jar and judging it. Ideally it needs to sit just nicely in the gap overlapping the paint slightly.
You need to keep the side edges on though for overlapping around the jar.

DIY Tutorial - jam jar tea lights

 

Step 4) Mix 1 part glue to 3 parts water. It needs to be a bit runny, not gloopy and I prefer to use the Hi Tack kind of glue rather than just the normal PVA glue type as it seals the page to the jar much better so when it dries it’s flat with no air pockets.

DIY Tutorial - jam jar tea lights

 

Step 5) Take your cut piece of page and lay on a thicker piece of cardboard or mat and brush the glue over it making sure you cover all the edges. Immediately place it on your jar. The paper needs to be wet enough to be pliable but not soaking as if you get it too wet it will run all over your painted part of your jar and remove some of the paint.
The next piece of page you put on you will need to cut one of the edges off so that the lines of writing overlaps.

Repeat with more pages until your jar is covered. You can either coat your jar with mod podge or leave it as it is.

DIY Tutorial - jam jar tea lights

 

Step 6) Finish your jars with a tea-light in each one and either ribbon around the top or you could stamp an image onto the front or put beads around it.. the possibilities are endless!

DIY Tutorial - jam jar tea lights

 

DIY Tutorial - jam jar tea lights

 

 

Thanks so much Becki. What do you think? Simple yes?

Becki will be back in a few weeks time with more DIY ideas from her wedding

 

 

♥   You can find more DIY Tutorials HERE  ♥

 

 

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Comments

    Becki

    Thank you ladies!

    It’s so simple to do and looks really effective, not just for your wedding but for around your home too. I have a bit of a candle addiction so a new way to use up my hundreds of tealights was definitely a must do project for me!!

    Once they are dry you can do all sorts to make them slightly different, you can stamp over the book pages with rubber stamps or glue buttons & gems to them.

    I’ve adjusted these slightly for our wedding to tie in with the table names, by printing off song lyrics instead of using book pages and I can’t decide between ribbon or string around the top yet for our wedding so the final thing will look so different but still as effective on our tables and the courtyard of the hotel at night.

    xx

    Reply
    Vintage Cute

    I’m making these… for outdoor Christmas decorations! I’m not really a fan of jam but I’ll ask loads of people for their jam jars!
    Thanks!

    Reply
    Rupa

    Such a great idea, will defiantly try this. Can I ask you what type of paint you used? I have tried to paint on glass before, but never achieved such a smooth thick even paint effect, like you have, not very experienced in this type of craft. Thanks

    Reply

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