Easy Mason Jar Snow Scenes
/The girls and I had a "craft day" over winter break. Christmas flew by in a blur and we still had a lot of craft projects that were still just big ideas and a pile of supplies. Honestly, some of the supplies were several years old because this seems to happen every year. One of the things that I wanted to make was a "waterless" snow globe decoration. The little plastic deer and bottle brush trees kept disappearing on me over the past year or so. Some of the deer didn't make it because their legs were chewed on. :( I picked up a few more things when Christmas shopping in early November, so before we had any more casualties, I wanted to make this one a priority.
We used some "mason-type" jars. The "real" mason jars I use for canning, but there were some smooth sided jars mixed in my supply I didn't mind forfeiting.
The first one was the easiest. It is a little ceramic fox family and bottle brush tree from the Christmas village section at Walmart. I just stuck them in the jar and my 5yo added epsom salts. I did use a vintage lid and tie some baker's twine around the neck of the jar just to add a little more detail.
The deer scene was probably the hardest. The supplies came from Michaels last year, so they were not in good shape. I made a snow mound out of clay and stabbed the trunkless trees and plastic deer into it. Getting those deer to stay in place was a pain and I needed pliers to push them down in firmly. Then, we also poured in some epsom salts, but I should have let the clay dry first.
The snowman was made out of clay with wire arms, a play-doh orange nose that fell off, a jute scarf, sharpie dotted buttons, and a hat borrowed from our Monopoly game. There is a lollipop stick (unused) to hold all of the layers together, including a rounded base underneath the snowman. Unfortunately, I did not let the clay dry first and the moisture as it dried caused the epsom salts to crystallize up the sides of the jar. I had to take the whole thing apart and redo it. So, if you are making these, have a little patience and wait a few days for the clay to dry.
These were really simple to make and the kids like them! It is a nice decoration that I can leave out all winter long.
After the meeting, I found composition books on clearance SUPER cheap, so I got some more. I had bought another pad of paper for myself because I loved the prints and colors. So, my daughters helped themselves to my craft supplies and made their own journals. Apparently, this makes a really easy kids craft, too!
