Life as a LEO Wife

Can you believe it’s already time to turn your lantern into a summer lantern? For me lanterns are the perfect decor item. You can use them all year long, changing the bow and the things you put inside. I will show you how I’ve changed mine for the season, and hopefully give you a little inspiration for yours.

For my summer lantern I used:

• lantern
• sand- I had some teal that we didn’t use for our wedding years ago. It’s been sitting around since then. It needed to be used!
• seashells
• candle
• satin ribbon and thick twine

Prep the lantern.

First you need to clean the lantern. Remove any spring items that you aren’t going to be using for the summer. Sweep it out then clean the inside and the outside of the glass.

Now it’s time to cover the bottom of the lantern to hold the sand. I didn’t want the sand pouring out if I need to move it. It will also make it easy to clean out before the next holiday or season. Glad Prep-and-Seal is the best product to use. Tear off enough to cover the bottom and a bit for the sides.

Place the press and seal on the floor of the lantern, then press it up all sides. Fold it back down on itself to make sure it holds. Mine has a small lip of wood on all sides. If yours does as well, press it down on there as well.

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Dress up your summer lantern.

With the bottom of the lantern covered, you can now safely cover the bottom with sand. For this project I used a teal colored sand that was for our wedding but didn’t end up using. It’s been waiting patiently in my craft room for six years! I think I’ll probably change it out one day when we go to the beach. I poured the sand around the bottom before I put in the candle.

After pouring a bit, I decided it would be better if I put the candle in and then poured around it.

The final thing I added to my lantern is seashells. We live really close to the beach so sand and shells aren’t hard to come by at all. Dollar Tree also carries several different types. I began spreading the shells thin, with only one layer. After that I began adding the shells to the places where they looked the best. When adding them, turn them so that the best side of the shell will be showing through the glass. Once it looks like you want it, close the summer lantern door.

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Embellish the outside.

My lantern has a circular handle on top of it for carrying purposes. To add a little nautical splash, I wound a thin rope around it like you would an anchor. I got the rope from Michael’s in a grab bag special. It’s thicker than twine, but not a thick rope type. Check the picture at the top showing the supplies.

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I added a dot of hot glue where the handle goes into the lantern. That has kept the handle standing up to show the rope. Next I added a pop of color on the top. I used a 1″ satin ribbon in robin’s egg blue. Make a regular bow, but leave tails long enough to reach the top of the glass in front. I made a bow out of the rope that is just a little wider than the satin bow. Glue the rope bow to the satin bow using hot glue. Add a dot on the back of the bows then glue it just below the handle. The hot glue will come off easily when it’s time to change the decor up.

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And that’s how you turn your lantern into a summer lantern! I hope you will work some of these ideas into your lantern this summer. Can you believe that the lantern the same size as mine from Pier 1 goes for $149 on sale?! I’d rather redo mine every holiday!

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I’m sure you may have figured this out by now, but this post is for the bloggers’ A to Z Challenge, letter L. L for lantern! After you’ve read this, check out the other posts for this years challenge. Again- I didn’t know about the yearly challenge just as time ran out to sign up. Talk about great timing! But that meant I didn’t start until the letter E.

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That’s it, ladies and gents. I hope you’ve had a blessed day! Stick around and check out some more great DIYs. Follow me on Pinterest to see what I’ve found from the plethora of talented people out there! Like, share, and follow me on social media using the buttons below. Enter your email address in the box at the bottom of the page or on the side panel to get an email whenever I upload a new post. You’ll never miss one that way! Thanks for stopping by!!