Tag: Holiday DIY

Turn Empty Play-Doh Containers into Silver Bells

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As we know most kids LOVE Play-Doh and depending on what age they’re at, you can accumulate a lot of Play-Doh containers in one kid’s childhood. As with the L.O.L Balls we turned into ornaments, Play-doh is another toy with packaging that you just hate to throw away. The small yellow containers in various sizes are durable and have lids, so they are still a very useful item.

Save Play-Doh Containers

Being a DIY-er I have saved them for arts, crafts and seasonal decor. Whether you have a few or a bunch of Play-Doh containers this DIY project only really calls for two.

Of course, you could always use this project as an inexpensive alternative to silver bells in a larger setting. Say a Holiday party or school decorations. In this case, you will want a whole bunch of containers.

First, Clean the Containers

First You will want to clean out your Play-Doh containers. This shouldn’t be hard if you let the Play-Doh dry first. You should be able to just scrape out the dry play-doh easily. Just make sure the outside doesn’t have greasy or sticking stuff on the outside. A quick wash with dish soap should get them clean.

Once The Containers are Dry

After, your containers are dry if you had to wash them. Then you are ready to paint them. I used spray paint because it is way easier and they turn out much nicer.

Painting

To spray paint the Play-doh containers get a piece of plastic or cardboard to lay down underneath. Make sure you are in a well ventilated area with no breeze and your surroundings are protected from overspray.

Then spread out your containers so you can still get a good shot of paint on all sides of them, but they’re not too close to where they get overspray on each other.

I used Rustoleum’s Metallic Finish Silver Spray paint. You can get this at Home Depot, Walmart and other hardware or hobby stores. It looks best when you do two coats but if your trying to stretch your paint the rust-oleum will cover it with one nice even coat.

Once The Paint Dries

After the outside layer has dried completely, you can flip the containers over and spay a light coat around the outside brim. The part that was facing down and is still yellow. You can point the spray paint towards the inside of the can and make a few circular motions to cover some of the yellow closest to the edge. This way when you flip them over you don’t see yellow from underneath.

Let all the containers dry completely. If you would like to do another coat you can go ahead following the same process. Just be sure to rotate the containers so they get evely painted. Once the silver is dry you are ready to turn them into bells.

Make Them Jingle All the Way

Put a Hole in The Top

To make your silver bells jingle all the way, you can tie a small jingle bell to the end of the string.

First, you are going to want to put a hole in the top of the flipped over container. I used a nail and just slowly push it through. The plastic gives slowly and your nail will pop through. Then to widen the hole just move your nail around in a circular motion.

Find a string and that is thin enough to fit through the hole, but strong enough to hold your bell arrangement. Make one big knot about half way down a 8″-12″ piece of string. This is to keep the string from coming up through the hole. If you don’t want to tie a million little knots, you can tie on a bead. That’s what it did. It’s a more secure way to be sure your cup doesn’t fall down to hang on the jingle bell at the end.

Add a Jingle Bell or Two, or Three

After tying a bead or knot half way down the string. You can tie on a jingle bell, or as many jingles bells as you would like, to the end of the string.

The Bell That You’re Placing at the End

You want to tie it so that the jingle bell is at end of the string, but still up high enough so when you hold your bell up. It doesn’t come out hanging past the bottom of the Play-Doh container. The bell should still be inside the flipped over cup.

Strictly for Show

If you are using this project for a larger scene or an event production. Say you are just need them to look like silver bells and not sound like them. Then by all means leave it empty inside and just tie a big enough knotto keep the cup on the string. Again you could tie a bead or washer inside to to keep from having to o tie a bunch of little knots.

If you are using this craft for kids and you don’t have jingle bells. The kids can tie beads, washers, or whatever else on to make them make noise. You could also try multiple strings with different sounding beads or charms.

After you tied your knots and added your jingle bell or beads. Then, thread the string up through the hole in the top. To hold the upside down container while the bells and beads hang down inside the cup.

You can tie another knot close to the container to keep the cup inplace. Or go ahead and tie it around the pieces in your bell arrangement.

I Hope You Enjoyed This DIY Silver Bells Project

You can pretty creative with this. Even mix it up with different size Play-Doh containers. We would love to see how your Silver bell project turns out! Visit us on social media to share pictures and please Share this post with your friends!

For now, Happy Thanksgiving and Happy Holidays from the CandyToyBox Family!

Don’t Forget! Tell your kids to check out CandyToyBox on YouTube and Subscribe.

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