Clay Pot Holiday Candy Jar

I’m amazed that my Crafting Sistas, after more than nine-years, are still coming up with fun, creative, and useful crafting ideas. You’d think that after more than 108-months together, we’d have done it all by now!

Just in case you don’t already know, a little more than nine-years ago, I invited 10 friends into my home to, hopefully, start a monthly crafting group — with my mother and me, there were 12 of us who sat at my dining room table and made an adorable felt reindeer.

This little reindeer is the whole reason for our first time together, which was in August of 2009. I had been looking for an excuse to make him. Each year for Thanksgiving, my mom would gift me the latest edition of “Christmas Gifts of Good Taste,” books that had presentation ideas for every recipe featured. I love these books and still refer to them today.

Not all of the other 10 ladies knew each other, but they all soon became very good friends. During the past nine-years, we’ve lost a few of the “originals,” but have gained new Sistas. In fact, I’m told there are folks waiting for an opportunity to join us.

How cool is that?

We each take turns hosting a month and coming up with the crafting idea. November’s craft night was just as special and creative as our first one back in 2009.

So, let’s get to it.

Supplies:

clay pot, two saucers (one small and one larger), glass fish bowl that will fit on top of the clay pot when turned over, wooden knob, paint, brushes, toothpick, styro cup, hot glue or E6000 glue

This is really a very simple project that can be completed in no time at all, for less than $10 if you buy your supplies at Dollar Tree and less than $15 if you buy your supplies at any other discount store.

By the way, as you know, I love camping — which is where I was when I started this project. But after I finished painting, my husband and went on a bicycle ride, and I didn’t return to the project until the next day when I got home.

First up is painting all of your pieces.

For this one, my design idea is to make this look like a Christmas tree, so I’ve selected a metallic green. Since the clay pots soak up the paint, it will take two or three coats. I painted my clay pot and the two saucers with the green. To make painting the wooden knob a little easier, I inserted a toothpick into a styrofoam cup and then put the knob on top of the toothpick. It just made painting the wooden knob much easier. I painted the knob with gold metallic — a sort of star on the top of the Christmas tree.

Then I used glitter puff paint to give my design dimension and pizzaz.

My design is meant to look a bit like pine needle clusters with little red berries. Using the puff paint, pull out a dot, then draw that out into a short curve (about 3/4-inch).

Each part of the cluster has at least four needles, then I added the red berries after it dried.

Now it’s time to put the whole candy dish together. You can use either hot glue or E6000; they are both great.

Turning the pot over so that the bottom is up, glue on the small clay saucer, gluing the inside of the saucer to the outside of the pot.

Then glue on the glass fish bowl to the top. I used the E6000 for this, and let it sit for while to adhere before I moved on.

Then it’s time to glue the knob to the larger clay saucer. This is the lid to your candy dish.

Fill with your favorite candy, or in this case, I bought colorful chocolate balls hoping to make my creation look like a Christmas tree completely lit up for the holidays.