GSL Cuts: Farmer's Market Honey Display

Saturday, November 21, 2020

Farmer's Market Honey Display

Happy Saturday, everyone! This is a project that takes me down memory lane. My husband and I have kept bees off and on over the years and I spent many seasons at our local farmer's market selling our honey (and lamb, eggs, produce, beeswax candles, soap & pottery). The GSL Mini House Room Box 4 Cubbies gave me the idea to make a miniature farm stand display that would make a beekeeper proud. Let me take you through how it came together.

Here are the chipboard pieces laid out. The interior of the house has interlocking pieces that make up the cubby sections.

After assembling the interior, side walls and bottom of the piece using tacky glue, I painted the cubby walls and front edges with off white acrylic paint. I also painted the interior surface of the roof pieces the same color.

The attic section of the house was papered in Graphic 45's Olde Curiosity Shop Parlor Wall, which has a lovely bee pattern. The cubby walls were papered in one of Authentique's Latest and Greatest papers. The floors got a woodgrain paper from Honey Bee Stamps Home Essentials.

The roof got a shingles paper also from the Home Essentials collection. I used a black and gray check paper from Kaisercraft's Looking Glass Collection for the house's exterior walls.

I made some fun things to go inside the display, starting with miniature candles made by dipping white florist wire in melted beeswax from our hives. Once cooled, they went on a small brass hook. I added a few descriptive signs.

I got some UV resin supplies for my birthday and these little yellow bears were my first resin project. I turned them into honey bears by adding lids made from small beads and painted toothpicks.

We never had an observation hive to take to the farmer's market but a lot of honey vendors do. I started with a printed image and cut craft sticks to size. They were glued together and painted brown.

For a hive cover I glued on a small piece of transparency on top.

Once the glue was dried I simply cut away the excess.

Finishing touches include a spray of embellishment flowers in the attic space, along with a bee I made from pom poms and transparency wings.

The honey bears look so cute together! Any self respecting honey vendor has entered a jar or two in the county fair and come home with a ribbon or two (we have!). I felt this display deserved a few ribbons made from brads and blue (or course) ribbon. When I was making the dipped candles I poured the leftover melted wax in a rosebud mold and added a piece of florist wire for a candle wick. The honeycomb candles are made with small strips of hive foundation wax sheets wrapped around florist wire.

These floral candles on the left are simply molded polymer clay fitted with a florist wick. The observation hive cubby also contains resin honey jars.