Recycled Jam Jar

Hi everyone, it's Sarah here with a project that I have made for this months Wow challenge; Altered or Recycled...

I started with an empty jar of jam... I will have to promote a specific product now as I don't know of any other jams that use this beautiful shaped jar but I knew when I bought this that I would be using the lovely glass jar for something... (oh, and by the way, the jam is yummy too! ;)

First things first... Peel the label off and run the glass jar under hot soapy water to remove all label residue. Make sure the jar is completely dry before heading onto the next step...

I had already selected the stamp that I wanted to use... since Wow introduced this beautiful wild flowers stamp as part of the Wow 'Collage' stamp set, I have been waiting for the perfect use for it and decided it would probably work quite well on this project.

I thought about leaving the glass clear and stamping the pattern onto the glass but decided I would use the end product as a candle holder and would prefer not to see the little mini candle inside. Although, I wanted the glass to allow the light from the candle through so I selected a couple of translucent embossing powders to cover the glass and create the base colour. I started with a layer of Orange Pearl Embossing powder which I heat embossed and then added a layer of Gold Satin Pearl Embossing Powder over the top to create the desired colour. When inking the glass jar to create the solid background, try to ink it all in one rather than inking and embossing in sections as this will create a smooth finish. If you ink and emboss the jar in sections, the areas where the ink and powder overlap the previous section will layer the colour and create a patchy effect.

The next step is the tricky one... take the wild flowers stamp from the Wow Collage stamp set and leave it on the film clear backing so it can be used as a flexible stamp. Lie it flat on the table and ink using clear versamark. Carefully position the stamp over the area of the jar that you want the pattern to be and carefully press it onto the jar following the curve. Now you can sprinkle over the embossing powder. (A handy tip... Once you have sprinkled the powder over, you can see if you have missed any area's of the pattern, or if they have become miss-aligned or double stamped and before you heat emboss it, you can wash it off and start again with the pattern stamp without messing up your base layers).

For the flowers pattern, I knew I needed to use an opaque powder to block the candle light from coming through and highlight the pattern so I decided to use Vanilla White Embossing Powder to compliment the gold pearl base colour. Once the powder is heat embossed, it does create a slightly 'crackled' effect layered over the other powders but personally, I think this adds to the effect. :D

The final stage is adding the ribbon trim to hide the screw lid section. I used my favourite lace pearl ribbon and attached it using super sticky embossing tape.

Here is the completed candle holder. It's pretty without a candle inside but with it, you can really see the effect of the pretty pattern in the opaque powder...

I'd love to try this idea on a larger Glass jar that doesn't taper using the Wow Vintage Wallpaper stamp as I think this would look stunning... I wonder which other stamps would work well? Take a look at Wow Embossing Powder website to see the range of stamps and see which you think would look good... and if you try the idea out, don't forgot to share your creations on our Wow facebook page as we love seeing your creations.

Happy Crafting. :D