Vintage Spoon

As you read this post, I will be on my way to California to visit my family...my Aunts, Madi, and my sister-in-laws (well brother-in-laws too)! I am super excited and can't wait to see everybody. So instead of rushing a post, I decided to share our 1st post as 'Snippets of Creations'. 

Enjoy the recap (if you have already read this post) and if you haven't...enjoy for the first time. 

Welcome to Snippets of Creations! We are excited to begin this journey of sharing our ideas and creations of projects, home décor, food, and gifts. 

For our first post, I (Julie) want to share this fun project with you.  I saw a post about 'How to make a Vintage Spoon Key Chain' on Facebook.  It was from Eclectically Vintage (one of my favorites).  So I thought...I think I will try this, seems easy enough!  Well, I am one that does not read instructions, so I just jumped in and had issues with the first one I made. 

Of course I had to involve my partner in crafts...Tabatha (she also happens to be my best friend).  We headed to one of the antique stores in town & bought some spoons!  My daughter was getting ready to leave for Baking & Culinary school soon, so I wanted to make her something special!  Since my kids were little we have always said, "I love you to the moon & back," so I thought this would be a great way for her to remember that her mom will ALWAYS love her to the moon and back!  This first picture is of her finished spoon. It wasn't as easy as I thought it would be (maybe because I didn't read the instructions) & by all means, it is not perfect, but is still special to her!

  

When Kerri and I decided to create a blog together, we wanted to have an easy project for our first post and what's easier than pounding on some metal?  So here it goes!

 First of all, you have to get some antique spoons, or any kind of spoon you like! 

 

Tabatha and I headed to the antique store for more spoons.  They are only $2.00 each at one of our local antique stores!

 

Next we gathered our tools: spoons, sledge hammer, regular hammer, metal stamp letters, some sort of masking tape, sharpie, key rings, and ribbon (if you want to decorate them).

 

Here is a picture of the spoons I found for our 'Snippets of Creations' spoons (Kerri & I wanted to represent our blog by having matching key chains)! 

The first thing you need to do is pound out the roundness of the spoon.  I am lucky because my new craft room has concrete floors, so I don't have to go outside (in the heat) to pound on the spoons!

See the difference of the regular spoon and the flattened spoon.

Then you need some type of tape (I used the blue paint tape), to make a straight line for the words. This also helped keep the spoon in place while I stamped the words on the spoons.  I wrote out the words so I wouldn't misspell them (hence the stolen paint card with our blog name on it)! 

After you are finished stamping the words on the spoon you have to use the sharpie marker to darken the letters (I forgot to take a picture of this step...rookie mistake).  Then I sprayed a little glass cleaner onto a rag and wiped off the excess ink. 

Next, you need to bend the handle to make your loop for the key ring.  I had to go out in the HOT garage for this step!  My husband has a vice grip attached to his workbench, which I found to be the easiest way to start the bend in the spoon.

 Once you get the bend started, you can take it out of the vice grip and finish bending the spoon with your hands and a hammer (to flatten the bend).

You can see here how the spoon's handle tip is flat and pressed up against the spoon.

After you have finished bending the spoon, you need to attach the key ring (another picture I forgot to take...sorry!).  Then you can put ribbon on it to add a little detail! I put a little dab of hot glue to help it stay.  Mine is the one with the mustache ribbon and Kerri's has the green ribbon (Kerri's ribbon fell off, even with the hot glue).

 

 I hope you enjoyed our first post and come back for more 'Snippets of Creations' in the future!

Since this post, I have made several different spoons and have some for sale in my Etsy shop (tab at the top of the page)...you should check them out! I even painted some.

~Julie