Upcycled Candle Jar Planter

21 April
Have you seen the cute little faux cactus plants made from rocks? They are all over Pinterest and I love them!

I've been wanting to try making some so when I burned the last of a YUMMY smelling Food Network candle, I knew it would make a cute little planter for some faux cactus plants!

recycled candle jar to adorable faux cactus planter

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Supplies Needed:


The candle jar I had is white ceramic with a wooden lid. I picked out some round river rocks from my landscaping (when you are choosing rocks, try to pick some that are relatively flat so you'll have room for several little plants in your "planter").

Upcycled Candle Jar supplies

Once I had burned the whole candle, I put what was left in the freezer overnight. The frozen candle remnants just popped right out with a butter knife!

cleaned candle jar

You'll need something to "plant" your little faux cactus plants in, I found a bag of white decorative rocks at the Dollar Store.

white decorative rocks

Fill up the candle jar with these pretty decorative rocks.

white rocks for planting faux cactus

Paint the river rocks with different shades of green paint.

painting rocks

If you have several different shades that's great! But if you don't, no worries, you can mix some white paint in for lighter shades and black paint in for darker shades.

craft paints

Add some prickly's to your cactus. I used some yellow paint I had but white would be just fine too.

painted cactus rocks

Once they are dry, stick them down into the rocks. It may take a little wiggling to get them down in there so they'll stand up by themselves. I had to remove some of the decorative rocks and then fill in around the cactus once I got them positioned.

faux painted rock cactus plants

I used a green Sharpie marker to freehand a little scallop design along the top edge of the candle jar just for a cute accent.

green sharpie decoration

Now, for that adorable little sign made with the candle jar lid!

candle jar lid

Paint the lid with the color of your choice, I chose green so it would coordinate with my cactus plants.

painted lid

Print a saying you like. You'll need to play around with the size so it will fit your lid.

I looked up "cactus quotes" on Pinterest and picked one I liked. You can see my printer ink is being weird, that's ok though, I think it works for this project!

cactus quote

Trace around the lid on the paper and cut it out. I used decorative edge scissors to make a little scalloped circle.

Upcycled Candle Jar lid

Use Mod Podge to adhere the printed quote to the lid.

Upcycled Candle Jar lid sign

Isn't that cute? It fits perfectly on the little 4" picture stand!

Upcycled Candle Jar

Add a pink flower to one of the cactus rocks with a hot glue gun.

Upcycled Candle Jar Planter

candle jar to planter

I just love that this upcycle project includes both the candle jar AND the lid!

painted cactus in candle jar planter

decorative cactus rocks

Some other cute quotes I saw were:

Free Hugs
Can't Touch This (MC Hammer anyone?!)
Life is like a cactus, thorny but beautiful

painted rocks

recycled candle jar

PIN ME!
turn a used up candle jar into an adorable cactus planter

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