Crafty Wednesday {Hanging Chalkboard Planters}

Three Friday's ago  my friend Rachael  and I had our monthly craft night for our business Branch and Bloom.  We made adorable hanging chalkboard planters and they are so easy to make and I'm going to show you how to do it step by step.    We charged $10 extra for this craft night and did a fundraiser for our local library.  We were able to raise $120 for them!  We are always so happy to do fundraisers and help local organizations.  

Here is the completed project hanging in our dining room.

I have started this post every Wednesday since our craft night but April/May are super hectic for me with my job and end of year reports, activities, events, etc. so I haven't found any time to post lately.  I am hoping that changes when summer comes!!

Anyway back to Crafty Wednesday!  This craft night was a fundraiser for a tiny country library about 10 minutes away from where we live. The library is in the back of an historic home.  They had to build a new room to keep all the books in because the weight of the books was too heavy for the historic home.  I loved the shelf of new releases they had.

We did our craft night in the front rooms of the library.  Before everyone got there Rachael and I set up a station for each person with all of the supplies and an instruction sheet for each person.  We always include an instruction sheet in case people want to make another craft at home.

Step #1 is painting the board with chalkboard paint.  Our boards were two feet long and 5 inches wide.   We had people do three coats of chalkboard paint.  We had them use blow dryers to dry their project between coats to speed up the drying process.  Also people had wine and snacks while waiting on their chalkboards to dry.  People always love snacks :)

Step #2 is seasoning the chalkboard with chalk.  We had people rub the side of a piece of chalk all over their chalkboard to season it.  Seasoning helps prevent chalk marks from staying on your chalkboard after you erase.  If you don't season your chalkboard faint marks of what you have written will always stay on your board.   Here you can see the lady on the left seasoning her chalkboard.  

Step #3 after the chalkboard is completely dry you can add your metal pails.  We ordered our metal pails from amazon.  We got the large size-they were 5 inches tall and 4.5 inches in diameter.  We punched a small hole in the top of each pail with a nail and then used a screwdriver to screw the pail to the chalkboard.  The metal is very thin so it's easy to punch a small hole in. 

Step #4  enjoy your finished product!!  I loved seeing the variations that people did.  I did the sample for the class vertically and I liked it so much I hung it in our dining room.  

Everyone loved their finished projects!!  It was a great night and I am so happy that we were able to do a fundraiser for the hospital.

Happy Wednesday!

Xoxo