How to make an advice jar

If you are planning a wedding or other event that gathers a large group of people together for a good cause, this is a great idea to get people involved. An advice jar sits on a desk with a pen and is always ready for anyone to write down their thoughts and give advice. It's very fun to read the advice afterwards as people often write whatever they want. I had one of these sitting on a table at my reception and we had some hilarious bits of advice to read that night.

The materials required for this project are: paper in the color of your choice (at least 20-30 8 x 10 sheets), sharpened pencils, white eraser, craft knife, self-healing cutting mat, Glue Dots, marker, scissors, a stamp and stamp pad. A ruler is also useful for marking dimensions of the paper and sign.

The Jar:

I created a sign to label my jar using white paper. I cut it out in a rectangle then I labeled the sign using a good brown Sharpie and glued it all to a very large pickle jar using Glue Dots (available in Michael's).

(sorry, I thought that I had a better picture of it but apparently I don't)

The advice papers:

Next, I had to make the actual slips of paper that people write advice on. For mine, I marked 3 x 3 inch squares with pencil on 8 x 10 sheets of cream paper and I cut them out using a craft knife on a self-healing cutting mat (that would be way too much cutting with scissors). I erased all of the pencil marks then stamped one side of the papers with a large stamp in sepia brown ink (one of my wedding colors). Now they are ready for advice!

Estimated time for this project: labeling the pickle jar took about 20 minutes, but the advice papers took a few days as I made over 100 of them. It was a lot of minuche so I took days off between steps (marking, cutting, erasing, stamping).

Ideas:

• This is a great craft for a group of people. If everyone has one of the tasks or steps then it could conceivably be done in one afternoon. 
• Use any color marker or ink pad colour of your choice, same with the choice of stamp. If your wedding is purple and white, try using white paper with a brilliant stamp in purple ink.