Magnetic Spice Jars

Well. It's dinner time.

Again.

I swear--it catches me off guard EVERY. NIGHT.

I'm stressing out trying to get it done one time, and that cursed spice cupboard is slowing me down.

I mean, COME ON!

WHERE IS THE PAPRIKA!?

Sound familiar?

I thought that getting a cute 'lil spinning spice rack would help.

Well, it made them easier to find, sure. But I only used something like 20% of the spices included, and lots of my recipes called for spices NOT included in the rack, so I ended up back where I started. 

I had seen some magnetic spice jars in magazines, but I couldn't justify the price tag. So I decided to try my hand at making my own! 

Out of baby food jars.

Before any of you gourmets get up in arms about the whole "spices need to be kept in the dark" thing--these jars really only hold a few tablespoons. I would assume that if used regularly, you will cycle through the spice before the light could really do that much damage...

Wanna make your own?

Here's the How-To:

Materials Needed:

Babyfood Jars

Scrapbook paper/cardstock

Distressing ink

Magnets

Hot Glue & Gun (or superglue!)

Mod Podge

Spices

1. Feed your baby lots and lots of baby food. :)

2. Remove labels and wash bottles and lids in the dishwasher--don't stress too much about that little sticky spot from the label. You'll be wrapping the jar with paper anyways, so it's not a huge deal.

3. Choose your color scheme and paper. To make my job easy, I picked up the Latte Stack at JoAnn's, along with its coordinating solid pack. These go on sale all the time, and there are always coupons floating around. But anyhoo--whatever paper you choose, cut it into 1" wide strips, and make sure they are long enough to wrap around the jar and overlap a little bit. You will need to cut out circles for the labels, as well--two for each jar. I don't have a fancy paper cutter, so I went about this the old-school way. I pillaged my box with old coins, and found two that were about the right diameter. I think I used a silver dollar and a quarter? Maybe? Once I cut everything out I distressed the edges with brown distressing ink.

4. Fill in your labels with your spice names. I wrote mine by hand, but you could also use your printer before cutting them out.

5. Get some magnets. I used some 1/2 inch diameter earth magnets I got on ebay. Because I'm a cheapo I used two of these smaller diameter magnets per jar, but if I did it again, I would spend a little more per magnet and use one per jar instead. Something like these:

I just searched for "earth magnets" on ebay. These ones are 1" x 1/8".

6. Now it's time to assemble your spice jars! Use the Mod Podge to adhere the strips around the jar, let dry, and then cover the strip with another coat to give it a nice even sheen. Use the same method to adhere the labels on the end. Glue the bigger circle first, then the smaller one with the spice name, then cover the whole shebang with a final coat. 

7. Glue your magnet(s) to the lid using hot glue or super glue and you're good to go!

Enjoy! 

I originally posted about these HERE, buuuuut I have since taken new photos for an article I was featured in on HGTV.com. You can find it HERE!