decoupage tins

Snow days have us spending a lot of time indoors. What a great time for crafts.

Every year I try to have my son make a gift for the extended family. It has to be something simple and fun since he has to do 5-10 of them depending on if we give one to each person or only one per household.
Last year we did a great pillow for each.

I don’t know about you, but I keep every box or tin that I come across. I never know when it will come in handy. With the snow this week, we haven’t been able to get out to the store, so these were made from things we have around the house.

Materials:
Tins (various sizes and shapes. Could also use glass bottles)
Paper
Pencil
Permanent pens (I tried it with water based and they run a bit – can be a nice look if you want. My son was horrified so we used sharpies)
Decoupage medium (You get it at craft stores. I happen to have a couple of jugs around but you can use white glue in a pinch, though it yellows with age.)
Stiff paint brush (don’t use a nice one, no mater how careful you are, some of the decoupage will dry on it making it stiff)

Directions:
Clean and dry tins
Trace lid tops on paper
Draw images on paper inside tracing
Cut out inside pencil line
Erase any pencil left over
Paint back of paper with decoupage medium
Stick onto tin
Let dry
Cover top of image with decoupage medium
Can swirl paintbrush to make nice patterns in decoupage
Let dry
Add another layer of decoupage if needed.

Wash paintbrush between uses. Do not let decoupage dry on paintbrush.
Can neaten up decoupage medium with wet cloth before it dries.