Copper & Bronze Chalkboard Trays

There is a lovely lady named Rosie who bought a quilt from me a few years ago and loved all my craft stuff that i make so she asked if she could sell some of my items in a booth she had in a very nice upscale shop in town here.  

I of course was completely flattered!  

like whoa!  

Anywho, she would always keep an eye out for cool things for me at shows and stuff and found me these awesome trays to make magnet boards out of...

Well it turns out these were NOT magnetic so we had to think of a new plan

First, they needed to be cleaned...

So i got busy doing that with just some soap and water first.

scrubba dubb dubb....

So that at least got the excess dirt and dust off, but there was no difference in the tarnish of course, so i turned to everyone's favorite secret weapon....

Google

so I got out some salt and vinegar an old nasty rag and an even older nastier tooth brush

So you just:

1. pour some vinegar on the surface and then sprinkle the salt on top of that, 

2. allow to sit for a minute 

3. then begin wiping and scrubbing it 

4. When you have acquired the desired look simply rinse and dry!

Look here at the side view where the tarnish is just melting away

 isn't that amazing?

I did a little half and half shot so you could really see the difference of before and after.

I simply couldn't get over how gorgeous it looked after!

So here they are, can you believe how different they look from when I first got them??

Like shiny new pennies!

So i got out the trusty ol' chalkboard spray paint and taped off the edges and got busy

Just ignore that board on the left for now, I'll come back to it on a another post. :)

 After they were good and dry I removed the painters tape and had  a look at my work.  

The color contrast between the copper and the black is gorgeous

They say on the can you are supposed to lay a piece of chalk on its side and rub it all over the paint to help it set, so that's what is going on here:

Note:  

Please disregard the extraordinary unorganized mess of the following pictures, 

It was my first craft show and i had no idea what i was doing!

Every year in October there is a craft show in downtown Bartow called "Spier's Turnout"

I purchased a booth for a whopping $20 and threw together just about everything  i had made in the last couple years and made a day of it.  

Bartow is a very small town

(click to see the city-data)

So there wasn't a whole lot of Traffic but i sold a few thing including one of my rag quilts!

Anywho 

I displayed the bigger tray as a breakfast in bed kinda thing

(hence the "good morning beautiful")

and I displayed these as more of a kitchen message board, hung by ribbon, to write down reminders and  little notes 

I still have these and if you are interested comment below 

and I may just throw one into my etsy shop for ya!  

I also have other boards that are magnetic and you can buy my awesome themed assortments of magnets made by me in my shop right here

Take a look at my other Chalk Board project here