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Thrift Store Tinted Mason Jars
Have a lot of old mason jars laying around? How about food coloring? Get some glue and we can color the mason jars into something wonderful! In this post, I will show you my step by step process on how to tint mason jars.
I’ll be honest, this has to be one of my FAVORITE crafts I have done so far this summer. 1) because it was ridiculously easy and forgiving, 2) because it was made using items I found at a thrift store, and 3) because they turned out so well!! I really hope you try this craft soon and send me pictures!
Supplies
- Mason jars with lids
- Spray paint
- Drawer/Cabinet pulls
- Food coloring
- School glue
- Wax paper
STEP ONE – Prepare the Tint Recipe
I’ll be honest, at first I was pretty nervous about tinting these jars. Thank goodness I found a box of 30 jars for $5.00 at Goodwill! I think if I had bought some expensive jars at Walmart I would have been nervous to screw these up. Little did I know this craft was VERY forgiving.
The original recipe for tinting the jars I found called for food coloring, the liquid kind. I searched three different stores for liquid food coloring and could find NONE! I ended my search at Joann Fabrics (my second home) and found a container of gel icing coloring for only $2.50. It will have to do I guess.
My tinting mixture started out as one knife tip full of gel icing coloring, one and a half tablespoons of water, and one tablespoon of glue. I mixed it all thoroughly with a fork (it takes a while for the food coloring to dissolve) and then it was ready to use. Consistancy should be thicker than water, but not sludge like the glue.
**TIP – use warm water to help the gel dissolve. I did not try it with HOT water so… do with that what you will.
The mixture varied as I went through the process because it can be used over and over again. Also, the more dye you use the darker the color will be. Feel free to experiment with different shades. I tinted a total of 6 jars and used roughly two knife tip fulls of dye, one and a half tablespoons of glue, and 3 tablespoons of water.
STEP THREE – Tint the Jars
The fun part! Pour the tint recipe into the jars and put a lid securely on the jar. Gently roll the jar from side to side until the entire inside is covered in the tint.
**TIP – don’t slosh the mixture from side to side. This creates bubbles and they will dry like that!
Once the inside is coated thoroughly, remove the lid and place the car upside down over a container. This will allow the excess tint to drain out and you can reuse it! Let the jar sit for at least 10 min but no more than 15. (Too long and all your color will drain out, too short and you will have a lot of extra tint that will cause streaks later).
Also, look at that color!! It will not stay this vibrant after baking.
As the jar is draining, preheat your oven to 200 degrees Fahrenheit. Line a baking sheet with wax paper.
After 10 min of draining are up, place the jars face down on the wax lined baking sheet. Bake for 15 minutes. Then turn the right side up and bake for an additional 15 minutes.
Remove from the oven and let cool.
Don’t worry too much about the tops being a bit thick, this will be covered by your lids. If you really don’t like it, see the tip below.
**TIPS – for tinting the jars
**TIP – Before you place the jar onto the baking sheet, have a rag ready and wipe the mouth of the jar. This will help if from sticking to your wax paper.
**TIP – Depending on the size of your oven/baking sheet, I would only bake 2-4 jars at a time. Some drainage happens during the first baking round and it is a good idea to have room on your baking sheet to turn the jars onto a clean area.
**TIP – if after you remove the jars and they are really streaky or you don’t like the color, wash them in HOT soapy water. The glue part of the tint recipe makes mistakes easy to clean up! This also goes for cleaning up the top of the jars and any tools you used in the process. This does mean, however, that theses jars are not meant to have water inside them… only downside I found to these beauties.
STEP THREE – Prepare the Lids
In order to attach the drawer pulls to the lids, we needed to create holes in them. Using a ruler, find the middle of the lid. We placed the lid onto some scrap wood to make it easier to drill into.
Next, my husband searched the garage and found me many small screws and washers. The screws need to be small enough so they don’t stick down into the jar, but long enough to hold securely. Here’s a picture for reference on the ones we used.
STEP FOUR – Paint and Glue the Lids
I decided to go with a matte black paint for my lids. This will allow the bright blue to really stand out. I lined an outdoor table with brown paper bags and sprayed the jar lid ring and lid thoroughly. I did this in-between baking my jars. The timing worked out quite well!
After the outside was painted, I glued the lid and ring together. Because I am making the pulls be the tops of the jars, I want them to be able to unscrew the jars. Once the glue was dried I did a quick paint to the bottom of the jars. That way if they are up on the shelf there is no silver or gold shining through.
STEP FIVE – Put it all Together!
Screw the pulls onto the lid and put the lid onto the jar! Decorate however you see fit! Viola!
These are gorgeous! Such a simple and effective idea. Thank you for sharing ☺️
Thank you so much for checking out my crafts!
This was a cool project! I’d be nervous to do this as I’m not very crafty. Great job!
It’s so forgiving though! One quick wash and it’s good as new! Only with my other crafts where that easy…
I wasn’t expecting a cool crafting project when I stumbled on your blog, I thought it was going to be able how you found these cool coloured tinted jars at a thrift store, so it made for a good surprise. The jars look awesome
Glad it was a good surprise!! (Side note I may look into adjusting my title to help with that)
These are so much fun! I really want to have a go at them now. They’d look beautiful on a windowsill catching the light! Love how you have such detailed step-by-step tips (I seriously need lots of help with projects, haha!) Kate x
They do catch the light so well! I want to experiment with some different colors too.
I’m so glad you find these steps helpful! Feel free to email me with questions when you try this craft!
I love that it is so easy to decorate mason jars. The tint is pretty cool to apply. Love how this turned out! The lids look cool with the knob hehe. Thanks for sharing!
Nancy ✨ exquisitely.me
Thank you! I liked how well the knob color matched the jar color. That was the plan, but sometimes these things don’t work out that way. So glad this one did!
These mason jars are absolutely adorable! I definitely need to do some DIY to do this soon 🙂 x
Do it! Send me pictures!
This is incredible! I always figured tinting was a long process, but this post boils it down into simple steps and that blue color is eye-catching. Thanks so much for sharing!
So simple! From start to finish, the tinting process takes 40 min (that’s including the time for the tint to drain and the jars to bake) Depending on how many you do at one time, you can have 4-8 jars done in an hour and a half!
I’ve always considered myself to not be particularly creative but these look amazing and relatively straightforward to do, so I’ll definitely try them out!
They are ridiculously simple! Send me pictures when you make them!
I love this! The accent color in my. home is almost this exact blue. I’m super inspired! Thank you for sharing!
Wow that’s amazing! I’m glad I could inspire you!
Thanks… really nice work
I did something like this just recently but the coloring was uneven :(. But I’m definitely going to attempt again. Great post!
I hope you do attempt again! This one is so easy and forgiving if you mess up (like I did a few times haha)