FANtastic Beer Steins on my $0 budget

I can't believe I can say this...I have not spent a penny in 1 week! We had some returns to do from Christmas gifts this week and we were fantastic to return the items but did not buy anything after. Even the kids returned a couple of items and they took the money and have saved it for another time. I would like to say they are learning to save, but I know this is not 100% true. I have to admit that teaching my kids to save and value money has been one of the toughest things we have been trying to deal with lately. If anyone has any suggestions I would love to hear them. Please share how you have taught your kids to value money.

We have already noticed that the amount of time we spend together has increased. We spent today as a family playing outside (our weather is ridiculously warm), reading in the sun, doing a couple of crafts and taking down the last of the Christmas decorations. My husband and I both commented how wonderful today was because we didn't run around shopping.

I made my own bread and hamburger buns today and used up a few small items in the freezer (we had hamburgers and hot turkey sandwiches for lunch) but we are starting to run out of fresh vegetables and milk, so I will have to stop by the grocery store quickly tomorrow.

How are all of you doing? Are you saving a few dollars? Are you also spending more family time?

Here is my $0 budget post for today.

Have you seen the NFL beer steins on Pottery Barn's site? They are FANtastic (hee hee hee) and if your football team is in the playoffs it makes you want them even more. Well at $24.00 EACH!!! they would have to have some gold content in order for me to feel they were worth buying. But as soon as I saw them, I knew I could make them for nothin.

Source Pottery Barn

Source Pottery Barn

I should now share a picture of my husband's beer stein collection but I won't because it might make you think he has a drinking problem, which he doesn't :). Well he has lots of beer steins! So I grabbed 4 of his favorite shaped steins and snuck away to my craft room.

I designed the team logo using Sure Cuts a Lot and cut it with vinyl I had left over from my marble tiles. Yes, I could have used contact paper but I really didn't want to mess up one of the beer steins so I used my good vinyl.

To be honest with you, the larger steins with the handles would work easier than this shape since it was difficult to get the vinyl to lay flat on these.  But these did work out great, I just had to cut the vinyl and overlap it carefully to create the circles.

I used a flat knife that I have to cut 4 straight lines to quarter each of the circles. You could use an exacto knife or a pair of scissors to do this too.

I used my painters tape technique to transfer the vinyl to the glass.

Be sure to lay the logo down first and then carefully the circle around it. Remember the circle will be bunchy, so you will need to carefully separate the vinyl where you cut it and overlap it. You can get a perfect circle this way, just be careful not to damage the vinyl otherwise the etching cream can creep under.

You can see the outer part of the circles are bunch and bubbly but that does not matter. You just need to make sure the part that will be in contact with the glass and etching cream is flat and tight on the glass.

Lay the glass on something to prevent it from rolling. The etching cream can run, so you want to make sure the glass doesn't move.

I used Armour etch to etch the glass. My instructions are covered with a million warnings so I have had to learn how to use this from trial and error. I now stir the etching cream before I apply it. This seems to make it give a more even etch.

I apply the cream using a cheap foam brush. I apply it really thick and evenly over the entire area to be etched. Be sure to not get any on the other part of the glass. It will etch almost immediately.

I recommend letting the etching cream sit on the glass for 20-25 minutes. I don't know what the jar says to do, but I did 4 of these glasses, 1 for 15 minutes, 1 for 20 and 2 for 25 and I found the 25 minute ones looked the best.  Once the time had elapsed, I scrapped the etching cream back into the bottle. I was told to do this by a fellow blogger and it seems to work. I then take the steins to my laundry sink and run them under warm water to get off all the excess etching cream.

 Peel off the vinyl and wash the glass with dish soap and you are done.

They took some time and were a little finicky to make, but they turned out great and cost me zero dollars, so well worth it.

 

What do you think? Not bad for nothing!

Have a great spend free weekend.

Stephanie