DIY – Bean Spheres – For Your Patriotic Decorating

Hope you are enjoying a wonderful Memorial Day! Me – I love the three day weekends. I always feel like I get so much done!

Right now, I am on a mission to get my summer decorating done. I have been working on various areas throughout the house.

I wanted to use some decorative spheres in one vignette, but was having trouble finding just what I wanted to use. I thought it would be something easy to find but after looking in all of my “go to” shops, I just couldn’t find the right thing – just what I get for already having a picture in my mind of what I wanted. Have you ever had one of those times? Frustrating! I knew I had seen these before, but of course, when I wanted them – they were nowhere to be had.

So I decided to make them myself and found they were really very easy!

What you will need to make “bean spheres”:

Dried beans – I used red beans, black beans, (they look navy), and great northern beans, (they are white)

Styrofoam ball in the size you want your sphere

Glue – I used E6000 Adhesive

Begin by spreading a bit of the glue over an area of your Styrofoam ball. Work on an area about the size of a half dollar. Let the glue stand for a few minutes to set up and become a bit tacky. At first I started this project with regular white glue. This worked, but really didn’t set up quickly enough. I then switched to the E6000 Adhesive and it made the project go much easier.

Once the adhesive had set for a bit, I began placing the beans on the glue. I worked in a random pattern, as I didn’t want a patterned look to the spheres.

After I had covered the area where the glue had been applied, I set the Styrofoam ball on the top of a drinking glass to dry. Once in a while the beans would work loose a bit and I would work them back together as they sat on top of the glass. The tacky E600 adhesive was helpful in preventing this problem.

Once I had worked on the first step of the bean sphere, I moved on to the next color of bean for the next sphere, following the same procedure. I had three different Styrofoam balls in the process at the same time. This allowed the beans to set before I moved to the next area on each sphere.

Working in small areas around each ball, I slowly began to cover each entire sphere. The more beans on the balls the easier it was to work with.

Once all of the balls were covered with beans, I let them sit and dry on the top of the glasses.

After the balls had dried, I wanted to add a touch of something different to some of the bean spheres. I couldn’t quite come up with something until I remembered the threads I had saved from the burlap runners I had made. You can find that post HERE.

I took a thread and glued the end to one of the bean spheres and began wrapping the thread randomly over the ball. Once I had the thread where I wanted it, I simply glued the end to the ball.

And there you have it! Bean spheres. Just the look I wanted to add to my red, white and blue vignette.

I am still working on this vignette. This is just a sneak preview. Stop by in the next few days and I will reveal the total look!

I thank those of you who have been patient with me as I have been dealing with the broken comments portion of this site. I worked over the weekend and I think I have finally figured out what the problem was. Bear with me – I am a “newbie” at blogging and every day I am learning something different!  I kind of like it that way – I hope I never stop learning!

Take time to drop me a comment – Because now I finally can hear from you!

If you like this post don’t forget to pin this to your Patriotic Pinterest board! You can see what I am pinning HERE!

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