Hi and welcome to my blog. I love re-purposing old stuff into new stuff. If you do too I hope you will subscribe to my blog and also visit and subscribe to my youtube channel. I post new DIY’s tutorials and videos each week showing creative ways to use the stuff you probably just throw away.

I like to study the shapes of things and sometimes my brain imagines fitting things that don’t go together into things that do go together. Like for instance taking a couple of miss-matched plastic containers and an empty plastic jar to make a mold for a mini bird bath.

If you have a short attention span or you just want the cliff notes here is the whole project in under four minutes.

If you would like more detail. Well, that story starts here, with the top of a plastic take out container, the bottom of an assorted fruit platter and an empty coffee jar.

The first step was to glue the coffee jar lid to the inside of the fruit platter. As you can see in the video I used a hot glue gun to attach the lid. I would not recommend this choice as the glue did not hold and had to be pried out of the cement piece once it was dried. If I were to make this project again I would probably use E6000 glue.

To determine how much cement I needed to mix, I put colored water in the fruit platter and then placed the takeout top in the water pressing it down to imitate the shape I wanted to make. Once I had the correct amount I marked the sides with a sharpie marker. The colored water was then poured into a mixing container and I marked a line on the mixing container as well. To determine the amount for the stand I used the same process.

Once that was done it was time to mix the cement for the top bowl piece, using the markings that I had made on both containers as guides. When placing the lid on top I worked from one side to the other to gently push out the air bubbles. Once the top was in place I added a little bit of weight to keep it secure while the cement set.

I used quick set cement for this project which set up in about a half an hour. During that time I sprayed the exposed edge with some water to keep it from drying too fast. Then I removed it from the mold. Using a damp paper towel and the spray bottle to slow the drying process. As I mentioned before the coffee lid came of the plastic mold and had to be pried out of the cement.

To make the mold for the stand the plastic coffee jar needed to be cut in half. I used some heavy duty cutters to cut through the top and bottom and regular scissor for the middle of the jar. Duct tape was used to put the jar back together. Then the cement was mixed and poured into the jar.

I haven’t worked with cement before and I was surprised how hot it got as it was setting up. Anyway once the stand was set I used a small knife to pry it out of the mold. After both pieces were dry they were ready to assemble.

Happy Upcycling,