Welcome back to Day 4 of my Women in Horror Month Daily Challenge! I hope you’re feeling inspired and enjoyed my short story, ‘Bright Lights‘. There are lots of fun craft things planned for this week and today I’m making ‘poison’ mason jars.
I do feel like I’m cheating with today’s craft. It was my birthday last month and the family said they wanted to give me a Nightmare Before Christmas themed birthday. I wanted to make some of the jars Sally uses in her kitchen, especially the ‘frog’s breath’ and ‘deadly nightshade’.
Creating the jars was probably the easiest craft we’ve done. I collected some clean jam jars and soaked them in hot water to remove the labels. Having a look at other people’s decorated jars, I saw that they used chalk paint which creates a beautiful effect. Sadly, we don’t have any chalk paint here at Beagle HQ and I’m on a self-imposed buying-ban for all craft supplies so thought I’d try and use the Lamb’s poster paint.
I was really surprised at how easily the poster paint went on to the jars. I had assumed it wouldn’t adhere very well, but there were no problems. It went a little streaky during the first application but I didn’t mind as I planned to put candles in, so needed it to be ‘gappy’ to allow the light through. I’m sure if you allowed the first layer to dry, you could easily apply more layers to get even coverage. After they’d dried, I tied some black and white cord around the top for a bit of added ‘Burton’.
I used some white stickers to create the labels. I’m sure you could use paper and glue but I’ve found that using stickers means the labels stick more evenly, with the added bonus of not having to wait for the glue to dry. It was a good excuse to watch my favourite movie and pause it at the scene where Sally is in her kitchen, cooking for Dr Finklestein, so I could copy the labels from her jars. I’ve also saved the ‘Nightmare Before Christmas’ calligraphy sheet on my Pinterest board which helped in doing the writing.
Hope you’ve enjoyed creating ‘poison’ mason jars. Check out my Women in Horror Month board on Pinterest for more inspiration and remember to come back tomorrow for more crafting fun!
While you’re here, why not check out my books, free fiction or shop. Alternatively, you could buy me a coffee!