DIY: Painted Jewelry Bowl

I've been trying to get my makeup table together and styled to share on the blog and I wanted to throw in a crafty project to hold my everyday jewelry.  I found a ceramic bowl at World Market for $3.99 and used a 20% off total purchase coupon.  I also bought three Martha Stewart glass paints and a sponge brush from Michael's.  The paints are not food safe so I wouldn't recommend using them in any project where you might serve food (wrapped candy would probably be ok).  I wanted the bowl to have some sheen and color to it, so I picked a gold metallic, a blue fine glitter, and a white fine glitter.

 

I grabbed a paper grocery bag and opened it up to lay it down to protect the floor and I tested each of the colors to see how much control I would have for decorating the bowl.  I found that I had to use a fair amount of pressure to get the paint to come out, but I got fairly thin lines and I had a lot of control.

I didn't have a real plan for the design, but I decided to do a little at a time and use the details on the bowl to guide me.  I began by making random length gold lines to highlight the details on the edge of the bowl.

I let the bowl dry for one day and then went back in and added blue lines using the same pattern.

After the blue and gold edge had dried, I decided to decorate the rest of the outside of the bowl.  My first attempt, was to put blue paint on the bottom edge of the bowl and spread it around using the sponge brush.  Big fail.  The sponge absorbed the paint and took it off of the bowl leaving just light smears of color.

So, I used the paint tube to apply a thick coat and basically colored it in, which worked much better.

At this point, I was on a roll and decided to add even more decoration.  To keep it from looking too mariachi, I used the white glitter paint to add more subtle decorations with lots of texture.  Again, using the details of the ceramic to guide me, I added a white design with big fat dots.

I also decided I wanted to personalize the bowl, so I added a gold "M" to the inside of the bowl.  You can see on the right side of the paper bag that I practiced two different types of lettering.  I decided to go with the cursive "M", but my first attempt (not pictured) didn't turn out so well.  Luckily, this paint is very forgiving if you tackle your mistakes as you see them.  I simply wiped out the bowl with a damp paper towel, then again with a dry paper towel, and tried again.

Finally, I added some additional dots of white fine glitter to add extra detail.

Here's the final result!  The biggest trick was to let each level of detail dry before moving on to the next so I didn't have to worry about smudging the design.  Originally, I thought I would need to bake the bowl in the oven based on the display that Michael's had for the paints in order to make the paints permanent.  Martha Stewart glass paints don't have a whole lot of instructions on the outside of the tubes, so I looked online for instructions on the temperatures.  According to the online information, the glitter glass paints cannot be baked (there is a wide variety of finishes - satin, metallic, glitter, opaque, etc), so I simply had to wait for the bowl to cure for 21 days.  Luckily, I hadn't been the most productive on this project, so by the time I had gotten around to getting ready to turn on the oven it had already been 21 days.  

The paints for the craft were about $3 or $4 each and I had a 40% off coupon for one of them. So, total cost was about $13.  I have another upcoming craft in store for the glass paints to make some favors for a party I'm throwing in late March, so they will be a good investment!  I think these could be a great way to make shower favors or small Christmas gifts (check out Martha Stewart's Craft Department for more gift inspiration)  World Market has a great selection of white ceramics at cheap prices, but you could also check out Goodwill and Habitat for even cheaper options.  Anyone else tried out any glass paints?