Pretend Make-Up Kit DIY

This was a tutorial I actually had planned to do around Christmas time, but then I had a baby. But here’s the story… a couple weeks before Christmas Lamp tells me she wants a pretend make-up set. Her sister has a great one so naturally she wants her own. But I had already spent the Christmas budget and then some…I didn’t want to shell out more money, so I remembered seeing some DIY make up kids floating around the internets. Since this is a great DIY to make for your girlies anytime of year I thought I’d show you my version here. Depending on what you have at home this could cost you anywhere from a few dollars to nothing!

Supplies:
old make-up containers
spray paint (optional)
nail polish
simple bag or make-up case

1. First gather all your used and almost empty make-up containers. You know, the compacts that have a little bit of powder in the corners that you’ve been hoarding for the past 3 years because you went ahead and bought new powder and never finished the old powder, but still hold on to it for fear of being wasteful? Yeah, those containers. Scrape and wash out any old make up and get those containers nice and clean. I wanted some variety, so I choose an old compact with a mirror, a Bare Minerals container and a Stilla lip gloss that still has a brush tip. I wanted to use an old blush compact but it was broken–anything with a brush, or some sort of applicator makes this extra fun for the little ladies. An eye shadow compact with 3-4 colors would be fantastic! Also, ask your friends if they have any old containers to donate to your make up kit.

2. I think the biggest factor in making this extra cute was to spray paint all these containers white, creating the uniform look of a “set.” Obviously any color would work. I used some left over spray paint specifically made for plastic. I removed the sponge and silver tray in the compact, and covered the mirror in tape. I also taped off the top and bottom of the Stilla lip gloss. Personally I love the clean and simple look of the white, but there are so many ways you could customize this–stenciling on a fake make-up brand name, polka dots with sharpie paint pens, etc. Go bananas. (sorry for the blurry pic).

3. Now for the nail polish–which is actually the fake make-up and happens to be the one thing I bought for this project. I wanted a bright pink for a blush looking compact and a more nude color to get a face powder look. Just pour the nail polish in the compacts and set them aside to dry. This will take a couple of days so make sure you put these somewhere up high–safe from little hands and unfortunate spills! Also, the nail polish will sort of shrink down once it’s dry, so I ended up using the entire bottle for both of these and they still look rather sunken in. (Since my bare Minerals compact has holes in it, I just put tape over the holes first so they nail polish didn’t sink down into the lower compartment).

Voila! I used this little bag I found from the dollar bin at Target for the carrying case and done! You could sew a simple make-up bag in a matter of minutes as well.

And while these pics of Lamp playing with her set are totally staged (just keeping it real) she really does love her little set.
Saving money, recycling and creating a new toy all in one! That’s a win folks.