Some of my crafty friends and I meet once every six weeks or so to “swap” and our current assignment was to make something out of wood. We've all been busy since the holidays designing and putting the finishing touches on our masterpieces. I'm excited to share mine!
Here's the “journey” of my project. I started out with a cute little wood basket from a local craft store. I brewed up some tea and coffee, put each into a separate cup and let cool overnight. I took a steel wool pad, some ordinary white vinegar and put into a glass jar, leaving the lid off so it would “oxidize”.
Once everything was ready, I started painting on some of the tea with a sponge brush, making sure to cover all the wood. I kept adding tea, and then some of the coffee because it didn't seem to be getting darker. HINT #1: let it dry overnight; you do not want the wood to be wet when you start to paint on the vinegar.
The color still seemed to be light after it dried but I went ahead and added a lot of the oxidized vinegar solution. I still didn't notice much change. HINT #2: the color change happens overnight..when I checked the wood the next morning, oh my goodness…it looked weathered and worn, which was exactly what I wanted!
My husband had a sanding sponge so I used that to smooth off the rough edges and create a more distressed finish. Here's my finished project, complete with cards and envelopes; we can all use more handmade cards, right?
Our next project will involve a mason jar. In some of the other months we'll be doing cards and tags; in those swaps all 12-15 of us will make one for each participant. When our swap involves a bigger item (like our wood project), we just make one and then draw numbers to see which “prize” we end up with. Can't wait to see what I get!
Leave me a comment and let me know how you like my project. 🙂
