I am a reasonably intelligent woman, but for some reason that intelligence doesn’t ‘activate’ until a day after the fact.
I have to share my concrete projects with you….
I found this pin on Pinterest and decided “looks easy enough”.
Click image for link to pin
I got out my rubber gloves, my Quickcrete concrete mix and got to work.
I stuffed them and shaped them and set them out to dry.
Looks like it’s got potential right?
Except I forgot to agitate the concrete to get the air bubbles out.
Oh, and I forgot that once the fingers are cemented together, it might not be super-easy to remove the gloves.
As it turns out, if you leave a lot of air bubbles in your concrete it isn’t as hard as if you had removed them. Then, when you attempt to rip the gloves off of the hands – the fingers might fall off:
Not quite as attractive as the inspiration photo is it?
NAILED IT!
Lost a pinky and two thumbs before I quit trying to cut the gloves off.
At this point I’m tempted to break off all the fingers except the middle one – just to make a statement about how I feel about this project.
Okay, let’s not be a Debbie-Downer here – I still had concrete left and another inspiration photo to work with:
Click on image for original pin
It’s a coaster.
How hard can a coaster be?
I didn’t have the crushed glass, but I did have marbles so off I went.
Pour the concrete over top and AGITATE WELL.
Do you see my flaw already?
First off, that tuna can is almost 2″ (5cm) tall…. and yup, I filled it almost to the top.
Secondly, what might happen if you agitate the liquid concrete around the marbles?
I’ll show you:
NAILED IT!
The marbles become engulfed in the concrete and you can’t see them at all.
Had I thought this out, for even the briefest second, I might not have filled the tuna can – so that the tops of the marbles would still be above the concrete line. Yup, that’s what an intelligent person would have done.
Not me, I decided I needed a 1.5″ coaster to put my drink on.
No many people can claim to have to reach UP to put their glass on a coaster.
I can.
And I can say that there are beautiful marbles inside it – that you can’t see – but the happiness comes from knowing they are there…
somewhere.
UGH!
I have a couple of unattractive paperweights if anyone wants them?
These “Nailed it” type projects happen far more than I let on on the blog.
Have a great one!
Oh my goodness this is hilarious and totally something that would happen to me! :) a Good attempts!
You should have heard the swear words! This was my 2nd (of three) attempts at concrete pieces – and while it was worth it in the end, all the failures leading up to the success were frustrating. Does this mean you want an ugly paperweight? lol Thanks for taking the time to comment!
Unfortunately there are often “craft fails” on the road to the successes. I must say though, the broken fingers kind of made me laugh a bit. SORRY! haha. I hope you give it another try though because those hands look amazing!
I’m off the ‘hands’ roster, but I did two more attempts at concrete and did eventually master the planters. I’ll be showcasing the step-by-step (of a successful version) in my upcoming e-book… any chance you’d consider being a pre-release reviewer?
[…] Perhaps you remember my glove planter? […]
That was a fantastic read. Thank you! Actually kinda refreshing to read a crafty blog that’s not perfect :)