Hello everyone! Michelle here with a rather short and simple instructable on how to upcycle some old containers into spiffy containers for keeping loose leaf tea. They also make a cute gift-on-a-budget for the tea-lover in your life. :)

Now, you may ask, "Why would I want spiffy containers to keep my tea in?"

Well, for one they're nicer looking and easier to store than awkward plastic bags. Two, they're airtight so you can keep your tea fresh when you get tea from one of those places that gives it to you in paper bags.

You may also ask, "Why chalkboard?"

When I have many types of tea in my cabinet sometimes I'll go a while without drinking one and then when I do go to make it I forget how I liked it in the past. With chalkboard paint, I can write what's in the tin and how I like it right on the tin and simply erase it when it runs out and I put something else in the tin.

Ready to get started? Let's go!

Step 1: Stuff You'll Need

Here's what you're going to need:

~Airtight tins with labels removed (These held grocery store tea bags once upon a time. It wasn't even good tea.)
~Chalkboard spray paint
~Accent color paint (I used gold)
~Paint brushes
~Chalk
~Yummy tea to pit in your new spiffy tins!

Step 2: Paint Things!

I am not an artist by any stretch of the imagination, so if I can paint these you can too.

Using the 'not necessarily correct but I only have spray-paint' method, I painted the lids by spraying a puddle of gold spray-paint in the corner of the box I was painting in and dry brushing the paint on from there. I would have just spray-painted the lids, but some of them had a rubbery texture around the bottom I didn't really want to get paint on. Honestly, I could have just masked it off with tape but the tape was down two flights of stairs. It didn't seem important enough to go get at the time.

For the actual tins, follow the instructions on your chalkboard paint. I've only read the Krylon, but I imagine other ones may be different. The Krylon chalkboard paint didn't require primer, but did require two coats and twenty-four hours to dry in order to be used as a chalkboard.

Once everything is dry feel free to decorate your tins with the accent color. Once again using the puddle-method I wrote 'Tea' on my tins, probably a little larger than it should have been. You can decorate however you see fit, or not at all. You could have even painted the lids with chalkboard paint too, if you liked!

Step 3: Chalk Time!

For the Krylon chalkboard paint, and I would assume most others, you have to cover the entire area in chalk and then erase it in order to prime the area. Though I'm not really sure how this works, it does make it significantly easier to write on.

Step 4: Finished!

Then all you have to do is fill your tins and remind yourself what you've got in there and how you like it!

Thanks for reading, everyone! Hope I inspired you to make yourself some nifty tea storage. Just remember: You can paint them however you like, whether you want them to match your kitchen, to stand out, or just keep them in the cabinet. I know there are instructions out there on how to make custom color chalkboard paint as well, so don't feel limited to black!