Primitive Soap Dish

I am so glad the weather is getting warmer, it gave me an opportunity to go outside and cut out this project.

I bought this at Goodwill for 99 cents, whoever made it didn’t do a very good job of cutting it out, but I liked the rough texture of the wood and had the idea of making a primitive soap dish that I saw on one of the crafting sites.
I traced out this pattern, drew it onto my piece of wood and cut it with my jigsaw. I will include the pattern at the end of this post.

I then painted the board black. After that dried, I topped with an ivory colored, homemade chalk paint. (1 cup of paint, 2 T Plaster of Paris, 1 T of warm water. Mix POP and water until smooth, then add it to your paint.) You don’t have to use chalk paint the acrylic craft paints will work just fine! Sand lightly to distress it so some of the black shows through.

I cut a wooden bowl in half and painted it the same way. The bowl I got at Goodwill for 25 cents; they are wood salad bowls. I used a hand saw to cut the bowl.

I then hot glued it to the board.

Printed a label I found on Pinterest.
I like to tear my labels rather than cutting them out with scissors, I just think it makes them appear older.
I used Mod Podge to adhere it to the board.
Put it on the back of the label, place it on the board, then cover the front of label with the Mod Podge.

After everything was dry, I used a Valspar Antiquing Wax and went over the entire piece including the label to age it.
If you don’t have Antiquing Wax you can also use Old English or you could use black or brown wax shoe polish!!
(not the liquid kind)

I then attached a hanger to back and hung it in my primitive powder room.

I also made some fake soap from a soap mold I bought at Goodwill for 99 cents and filled it with melted wax from old candles. I then covered the wax soap with soap labels I printed on regular white copy paper. Then aged them using distressing ink. You can also cover ivory soap, but you will want something thin and square like Ivory, it makes it easier to wrap. Just wrap it like you would a package, but instead of tape, use a glue stick.
Or, fill the bowl with whatever you want! You could use pip berries and a battery tea light, greenery, old shaving brushes, rose hips to add a nice scent, or rolled wash clothes! I have an old shaving brush I might put in here too, just didn’t get a picture of it yet.