Beauty and The Beast…. Belle Jar!

So me and my husband Anthony just celebrated our 2^nd year Wedding Anniversary July 19, 2019, yay! And so I am jumping ahead of some of my crafts, I like to blog in order of which is made first, to bring you the things I made him as anniversary gifts!

So 2 years ago our first at movie theater movie was Beauty and the Beast and so I already knew I was making him a shadow box but when I started thinking about our first movie I started looking up Beauty and the Beast gift ideas and I saw this really cool Beasts Belle Jar and I fell in love and knew I could make it and Anthony would love it.

So I went to Michaels where I had seen Bell Jars before and they had one left on top stock and of course Anthony was with me and helped me get it down but I didn’t tell him what it was for and with me he knows I make tons of stuff so he just got it down but when I got the red rose with water droplets on the petals he knew lol. But to clarify I had known for months what he got me, we are awful at keeping secret gifts lol. So I used a 50% coupon on the belle jar and that helped a lot on the price.

For a base I saw in the Lawn and Garden Section of our Wal-Mart where I work that the 12 inch Cork boards that people put under plants was clearance to $1 which was great so I bought one. I already had Rust-o-leum Frosted Glass Spray paint from previous projects and I was like that would look amazing as if the jar has frost from the cold beasts castle!! I also thought my silver wire LED lights I already had would light it up beautifully! To add a touch of life maybe Belle’s influence I added 2 blue butterflies.

So at first I took the cork and using black chalk paint I painted the front and back of it with about 2 ½ layers of the paint as the cork absorbs the paint a little and set aside to dry. So Anthony wouldn’t see what I was doing I made him stay inside and I took the bell jar out back and used the Frosted Glass spray paint to the bottom half of the jar and it took about 3 or 4 times of going over it at a distance to get the right depth of frost to the glass. I attempted to use it on the cork and butterfly but it only made the cork feel different. It did make the butterflies look and feel slightly chalky to the touch and make them stiffer but not exactly right what I wanted. So the technique didn’t work but that’s ok.

While the belle jar dried I went back inside and I took my x-acto knife and cut a small section more like a dent out of the center of the cork after using a ruler to make sure it was the center as best I could. I brought the dry bell jar in and used it to see how much of the stem of the rose needed to be cut and I did that like 3 times until it was the perfect length. I took my scissors and cut off one of the petals to make it dead. I took a make-up sponge and a black ink pad and dabbing around the edge of the petal I had cut off I made it look as if it had died. Taking the rose now I took some E6000 and hot glue and put it in the indentation I had cut ever so slightly and put the rose there but I needed something to hold in place so carefully I put the belle jar over it so it would keep it in place.

24 hours later the rose was set perfectly and can stand on its own which is awesome! I laid the dead petal on the cork below the rose as if it had fallen. I then took two of the blue butterflies and played around with where to place them before hot gluing them to the side of the belle jar. The last element was I took the silver wire LED lights and strung them around the rose and them placed the battery pack outside the belle jar.

A trick I learned doing this is use a small glass jar of rose scented bath salts, I get mine at Dollar Tree, and place under the belle jar and it will smell like roses and then you can remove the bath salts later. I didn’t do this at first and all it smelled like was spray paint and E6000 two smells that are over powering but once I put the rose scented bath salts in a shot glass under there for a few days it smelled like roses and the scented lingered for a long while which is great.

I have to say this turned out beautifully and Anthony may have guessed belle jar from Beauty and the Beast but he didn’t know how I was going to execute it!

• Belle Jar- $12.49 originally $24.99 but I used my 50% coupon at Michaels
• Red Rose with Water Droplets- $2.49 at Michaels
• Silver Wire LED String Lights- $1 a pack at Dollar Tree
• 12 Inch Cork- $1 at Wal-Mart on Clearance
• Blue Paper Cut Out Butterflies- $1 for a pack of over 30 at Dollar Tree
• Rust-o-Leum Frosted Glass Spray Paint- $3.98 or around that price at Wal-Mart
• Black Chalk Paint- $1.68 for a 2 ounce bottle or $5.98 for an 8 ounce bottle at Wal-Mart
• Black Ink Pad- $1 at Dollar Tree