Shake up old bulbs for fab salt and pepper pots
Our Christmas tree has finally arrived at Shiny Towers, and I was looking for instructions on how to make festive light bulb baubles when I stumbled on this fabulous idea for re-using old-style lightbulbs. Dead bulbs are just the right shape and size for making salt and pepper shakers and all it takes is a little wax, some soda bottle tops and ordinary household tools to make a pair of your very own.
The shakers, which you could also decorate using one of the many tutorials for making bulb baubles, are great fun and remind me of Weebles - the toys that wobble but don't fall down. Follow the jump for step-by-step instructions.
1. Wearing gloves and goggles, use the hacksaw to cut through the metal base of the bulb, approximately 1/4" from the glass-metal contact point. Use care and cut all the way around each bulb, but not through the inner core holding the filament. (Cutting through the metal is relatively easy; the glass under it takes longer.)
2. Remove and discard the inner core, then gently rinse out the bulbs.
3. Place 6 hex nuts inside each bulb to help weigh down the base. Make sure the nuts are distributed evenly in a single layer so that each bulb stands upright.
4. Melt the wax in a double boiler (or in a small pot set over a slightly larger pot of boiling water) and pour half of the melted wax into each bulb so that the nuts are mostly covered. (You might not want to use your favorite pots for this as wax can be pretty hard to remove.)
5. Keep the bulbs upright and allow the wax to cool.
6. Add salt to one bulb and pepper to the other. Fill each to the point where the bulb remains upright even when tilted.
7. Drill holes through the top of the soda caps. 8. Screw a bottle cap onto each bulb and shake it!
[Tutorial via Ready Made]
