Paint Can Planter with Dowels.

 

Back at it with more dowels, fun!  Today I've got this nifty little paint can planter with dowels and it is oh-so-adorbs super cute!  A home decor project that comes together in minutes!

Mike has a propensity for buying me flowers and little plants which I love.  He always has and hopefully he always will because it warms my heart and brings me smiles.

Recently we escaped the city around the July 4 holiday because Finn, our sweet boy, my Trusty Furry Assistant, is utterly terrified of fireworks.  It's bad.  

The fireworks are excessively, obscenely ridiculous around us.  And by excessively obscenely ridiculous, know that the fireworks start around two in the afternoon on the 4th and go punishingly, unceasingly, incessantly, until five or so in the morning.  The neighborhood is a thick blanket of smoke.  It's horrendous.

Every year, for weeks leading up to the holiday too, it's an absolute nightmare for Finn.

We do everything we can to keep him calm but very little does.  We've tried the Thundershirt* which is a big fat nope.  That didn't help Hailey either, actually.  We reached the point of Trazodone.  Sigh.

However, I always worried the pills made things worse for him.  It makes him dopey but that's it; I could see in his big sweet brown eyes he was still a wreck.  

Pills also take planning too but given our area, ya just never know when some bozo is going to shoot one off in the alley, or remote distance even, and ruin Finn's day.  We have Rescue Remedy for Dogs* in those instances and that does take some edge off.

Awww, he came downstairs to resume Assistant duties for this project!  He looks sad and skinny in this photo but he's completely neither.  He's doing really well actually, thank the heck goodness.

The last time I gave Trazodone to him was disturbing.  I don't know if something changed in his system after his surgery and resultant illness but things were different.  He had brief shivers which has never happened before and when I looked it up, yeah, let's just say that was a terrifying read.  

Into the trash the pills went.  Never again.

He didn't have any other symptoms that warranted an emergency vet visit but let's just say I watched him like a wide-eyed hawk until the pill was spent.

I found these calming chews* which, in my opinion, seem to work way better than Trazodone.  Combined with the Rescue Remedy, he's pretty good, or good-ish, or at least not a total mess nor doped out but still panicked.

This is all to say, we took Finn out of town for the holiday.  We did so the year before and decided to again, this time heading to Wisconsin, aka Land of Cheese, which is a new travel destination for us.  And we are not complaining about our fridge filled with cheese.

Anyway!  Long long roundabout way to say Mike bought me this cute little begonia plant on one of his grocery runs.

I know it's mostly an outdoor plant but I'm keeping it indoors because it's cute and pretty.

The wrapping though yellow?  Ehhh, not so much.  Hence this Paint Can Planter with Dowels to make it cuter!

I spotted this project on Instagram a while back, to give credit where credit is due, but lo, no instructions so I've set out to set that right.

What do we need for this project?

• a quart paint can*
• spray paint, if desired
• seven 3/8" square dowels*
• hot glue sticks*
• hot glue gun*
• stain or paint, if desired

Short, inexpensive supply list, eh?!  Yeah!  Love it!

Ok, let's make a Paint Can Planter with Dowels then.  Seriously, this comes together in a jiff so you can make oodles of them!

The hardest part of this project of course was math.  Oooohh math.  Yeah.  It was circumference, pi, division, multiplication, fractions...oy, math.  Yikes.  But I handled it for you so dive right the heck in.

First, I spray painted the quart paint can with some flat black spray paint.  You can do this, skip it, or pick a fun color though note, very little will be seen except maybe the top.

Second, cut the dowels.  

This paint can is 4 7/8" tall so I cut twenty six pieces at 5" long.  This gave me an eighth of an inch overhang which I planned for the top.

Created a stop on the ol' miter saw so that all twenty six pieces would be exactly the same.

Decide how many you want for the taller footed parts and cut those to length.  I went with 6 1/4" tall and a total of nine pieces of those, three for each leg/foot/whatever.

If you don't have a powered miter saw, a hand saw and miter box* handle the task easy peasy.  

Next, give any ragged edges a quick sanding.  Yesss, sanding is boring but necessary.  Sigh.

Now next, to make my life easier and to eliminate any possible chance of confusion or mistakes, I laid out the whole thing flat first.

This way, I knew where the legs were going to be.  The math wasn't perfect so there are nine shorter pieces in two sections and eight in the third but you'll never know when it's done.  Trust me.

All you gotta do next is power up that hot glue gun and start sticking on your dowels.  Could not be any damn more effortless.

Before you know it, you're done.

Gah!  A Paint Can Planter with Dowels!  Cute, right?!  Omg, so cute!  High-end style for cheap!  Applause all around!

You can stain or paint your dowels any which way you please, or just seal up them up as-is and leave the wood bare.

Lastly, plop your plant in your spiffy new Paint Can Planter with Dowels and bring your home decor to new heights.

Super adorable, right?!  Seriously, you'd pay way more for this in a fancy schmancy home decor store.

My little dollar store dowel vases are hiding behind heh, yet another dowel project!

So cute it went on a parade around the first floor with streamers, fanfare, and cheering!

I love it!  Hope you do too!

 

Hey!  Want to make one but don't want to shop and cut and sand?  No problem!  Purchase the DIY kit direct to your front porch from me!  Fun!  See it here!

*The Thundershirt, Rescue Remedy for Dogs, the calming chews,  are Amazon affiliate links.  The quart paint can is a Home Depot affiliate link.  The hot glue sticks is a general Michaels affiliate link.  The dowels and hand saws with miter boxes are a Lowes affiliate links.  Mwah, thanks!  Please see the "boring stuff" tab for more info.