Today I’m sharing with you how I made DIY Christmas bells made from upcycled glass shades.
I have has this image saved on my Pinterest for ages! This year, I finally figured out how to make them and now I want to share how with you!
I happened to have some glass globes…weird, I know but what can I say, I have a hard time letting things go 😆 I believe that they were the original shades on the original fan in our living room when we moved in. We updated and I never tossed the old ones. However, if you’re normal and don’t have glass gloves on hand, I see them ALL the time at thrift stores.
Supplies Needed
The other supplies are
•wooden candlesticks Hobby Lobby
•wooden ball knobs Hobby Lobby
•wooden final dowel caps Hobby Lobby
•skinny velvet ribbon Michaels
•optional- paint, stain, or wax if you don’t want the wood to remain natural. I used Waverly antiquing wax
You will also need a hot glue gun and a drill with a bit.
The goal is the string the ribbon through the three pieces of wood, with the end result looking like this:
How to Assemble
You will need to drill a hole through the candlestick holder and the wooden knob. The size of your bit could vary depending on your ribbon, but I would try to use the smallest one that still allows you to throes the ribbon through.
Ignore the knot above- I tied it premature and needed to undo it later.
You will want the loop that the bell will hang from, then the round knob, then the candlestick. this is going to be the top of the bell.
It will hold itself through the opening at the top of the glass shade like you can see here:
I tied a thick knot at the bottom of the candlestick so that all the pieces would stay where they needed to. Then I tucked it inside the shade to help determine how much ribbon would need to hang down to hold the “clapper.”
Once you see how much you need, tie another big fat knot in that spot as well. then fill the inside of the dowel cap with a ton of hot glue. Push the ribbon down inside of it.
This is what it’s going to look like:
At first, I left mine natural and went ahead and hung my bells. But after a few days, they still just seemed unfinished to me.
I took them down and used antiquing wax to “stain” them.
They looked much better to me now!
This was such a fun, easy project! I love that I was able to upcycle something and give it new life.
Would you try making DIY Christmas bells Made from upcycled glass shades? Let’s chat in the comments!
