Wednesday, May 18, 2011

Bean Balls

If you loved the Bean wreath I showed you last week you are going to double LOVE (x10) this idea! The thought of doing a whole wreath might be a tad overwhelming if you've never wasted your time patiently sat for hours hot gluing 945,000 bajillion beans (don't quote me on the number it could be more) to a piece of styrofoam.

But this? THIS you can do! Easy shmeesy. And the possibilities will shock you. Seriously...read on my friend.


First find some beans-mine are old from food storage and apparently Gus Gus (our furry, uninvited, can-not-trap-to save-our-lives, definitely smarter than a 5th grader, mouse) found my beans and had his way with them.


Gross. I almost didn't even do this project because I couldn't get the gag out of my throat.


Ewww. Let's get started. This project is CHEAP. You can buy decorative balls at the store anywhere from $10-15 (at least) and this will cost you less than half that!

Price breakdown: I bought a pack of 6 styrofoam balls from Michaels for $2.99 (using a 40% off coupon) making each ball .50. If you don't already have beans you can pick some up at a grocery store for about .78-1.58 a bag depending on the type of bean you use. You'll probably use a little less than 1/4 of a bag per ball. To do all 6 balls it will cost you about $4.50(or less)!

First you'll want to spray paint your styrofoam with a light coat, the same color of the bean your using. No matter how close you put the beans some white will show though. It doesn't look terrible this way so if you don't want to buy spray paint (about $3 a can) it'll still turn out ok. I'm just OCD a little picky.


I like to start in the middle of my ball and work down. Put a small strip of hot glue across...


and start laying down your beans. One by one by one.


Until you reach back to the bean you started with making a full circle.


Start the next row by placing the bean in the middle gap of the 2 beans on top of it, like so:


I burned my fingers a few times and I'm pretty sure I cursed in 3 different languages, so heads up...watch your fingers. See how I got your back?


Half way done!


Once you've completed that half flip it over and start gluing the bottom half.


(and of course it helps to have a handsome helper)


Almost done!


WaLaa! And can we all notice that I used every bean I had poured on the plate at the beginning minus one. YOU are lucky to be my friend because that makes me pretty awesome.


Now get ready to have your mind blown pretty ladies. Endless possibilities await you in the form of a can. Spray paint will change your life. I had done black, red and green colored beans for my kitchen, but I wanted some brown ones for my living room. After searching for a dark brown bean and coming up empty-handed I opted to do an all white bean...


and cover it with this rich chocolate brown color (not the actual name of the paint). Um love.


Are you understanding what this means? How awesome would some gorgeous turquoise balls be for a fun pop of color in your living room/bedroom, or silver and red for Christmas, or HELLO red, white and blue for 4th of July, or Hot pink for a little girls room?!?! I can barely breathe I'm so excited!

And the fun doesn't stop there! There are million and one ways you could display these! Like in a cool bowl...




Or how bout a glass pitcher?! (ps this totally blew my husbands mind...he could not wrap his brain around putting a decoration in something we drink out of. pshh.)




Or maybe stacked up in a tall vase (pronounced v-A-se not vaaaa-se because I'm not classy like that).




Fun right?!?! NOT overwhelming right?!?! Go! Make some! I really think you'll love it and if you do take the plunge PLEASE let me know because I would be tickled pink to have you copy me so I could show you off!

So my dears, I leave you with this piece of wisdom...keep calm and glue on. Next up for you...PASTA!


Have a SWEETLY LOVELY day today! Thank you thank you for stopping by, and don't forget to stop by and check out my first GIVEAWAY!

Linking up to the parties in my tab above as well as:
UndertheTableandDreaming

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