A super easy way to fancy up your dish soap so you can get rid of the plastic container.

I decided to hop on here and show you how to make an easy DIY dish soap dispenser since I was changing mine out. You’ve probably seen them around, but I decided to share just in case there’s this thin chance you haven’t.

I decided to change my bottle up this time. You can use just about any bottle as long as the spouts will fit the mouth correctly.

How To Make An Easy DIY Dish Soap Dispenser

It’s so easy and you only need these 3 things.

• Any bottle of your choice
• A bottle spout
• Your choice of liquid dish detergent

I searched around the grocery store until I found a bottle I liked. I found mine on the wine aisle where the ingredients are for mixed drinks.

I looked for.ever before I finally found a suitable bottle that I actually liked. I’m so glad I spotted it because I really am tickled with it. You see that bare mantel back there? I’ve taken everything off guys. Yep, it’s getting ready to go down. I’m in full spring mode right now. I can’t help myself. So be prepared to see some spring stuff soon.

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In fact, I like the label so much that I decided not to take it off, but you can totally do that if you don’t find a bottle with a label that you like.

I always use Dawn dish soap, but the grocery store I was at didn’t have the clear. I bought the only clear detergent they had. I’ll use up this bottle and then refill with the clear Dawn.

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See in this post how I make a set of thrift store-bought wooden salad bowls like new.

Yesterday, I found a set of six wooden salad bowls at our local thrift store. In the past, I’ve never looked twice when I saw wooden bowls like these, but this time a what if thought crossed my mind. What if I could refinish these bowls and bring them back to their glory while showing you How To Make A Grubby Wooden Bowl Look New?

These bowls were free of dirt and grime but still looked grubby due to not being cared for properly. The finish that was on the bowls was coming off in many places. The bowls were discolored and actually had a really rough surface. I’m guessing they were even run through a dishwasher.

Steps to make an old wooden bowl look like new:

• Sand
• Rinse
• Dry
• Oil

I started by laying a garbage bag over to protect the surface. Then I sanded the remaining finish left on the bowls with a 120 grit sandpaper and then finished the last coat of sanding with a 320 grit which made the surface very smooth. When I finished sanding, I rinsed each bowl under running water, gave them a good towel drying, and then set them on the back porch to finish drying. That last step didn’t take long because it is so windy here. We’re under a wind advisory all day today.

When they were all dry, I took a sponge brush and covered the inside and outside of the bowls with my favorite tung oil blend. You can read more about that in my wood countertop post here.

Here, you can see the oil sitting in the bottom of the bowl. It eventually all soaked in. Once the tung oil had absorbed into the wood, I wiped them down with a soft rag to remove any excess oil.

Didn’t they turn out great? I love the rich luster the tung oil gave them and how it pulled out the grain in the wood. The oil does not have any color in it, but it does bring out the natural tones in the wood which can make it look like they’ve been stained.

The pattern that appears to be a water stain is actually part of the wood. That is my favorite of all the bowls. Since the tung oil is food grade they are safe to use with food.

I nested the bowls together in a staggered pattern and put them on my open shelves. I’m really tickled with how these turned out. I only did one coat on these because I wanted to get this post up, but I will go back and apply another coat of tung oil to make sure they are completely sealed. See that bowed shelf at the top there? Yep, we’ve been saying for a year now how we need to fix that. I really need to bump that to the top of my to-do list. And you know what, I’m thinking about going with a lighter stain the next time around.

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Well, whatcha think? That’s my easy, peasy method on how to make a grubby wooden bowl like new. Have you ever refinished any wooden bowls? I’d love for you to comment below.

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Looking for a pretty way to style your fireplace during the summer months? We did this in less than an hour!

Have you ever wondered how to make a stacked log fireplace screen? There are several ways to do them, but we really wanted the real deal, and you know what…it wasn’t hard to do at all.

Pete cut a couple of different size saplings up into short little logs. Then we loaded them into our little handy-dandy garden cart and brought them up to the house. He then carefully cut one end of each log with his table saw to give it a smooth finish. Please be extra cautious and always were eye protection when using any kind of power tools.

Our wood measured 2 – 5 inches across. You can see in this picture how he cut the logs that went along the edges shorter because of the inward angle of our fireplace. Once we started stacking, we realized all of the logs could be on the shorter side, so we went with it.

Then we stacked…

and stacked until all of the pieces of wood fit snugly in the opening. We filled in the large gaps with smaller pieces along the way.

photo credit: Jess Lapp

 We talked about several different ways on how to make a stacked log fireplace screen and decided we wanted to actually have real fire logs stacked in the box as opposed to applying pieces of logs to plywood.

photo credit: Jess Lapp

These pictures were taken about a month after we stacked the logs. You can see that in the months time the logs have yellowed some. They have also cracked as they dried out. But we love it! When you’re standing next to the fireplace you can tell that the wood is truly stacked in place. It is so natural and realistic looking.

photo credit: Jess Lapp

The stacked logs add a nice touch to the space. It’s so much better than looking at a sooty black hole all summer long.

photo credit: Jess Lapp

When we were all done, I dressed it up with a straw bag, a pillow, and a throw. What do you think?

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