How To Build A Grotto For Statues

A dream of mine when we bought this firm final twelvemonth was to have a statue of Mary in the yard with a little grotto and flowers all effectually her. Not having the upkeep for such a thing, I turned to the place I ever do- our local Purchase Nothing Group.

For those who aren't familiar, a buy naught group is a Facebook based grouping that focuses on community building through a gift economy. If you have something that your family no longer needs, you tin mail a picture of the item, and your neighbors who are interested can permit you know. Y'all then pick who you'd like to gift to, and then they selection information technology upward from you, unremarkably with a porch pick upwards. You can also ask for things- and so if you need a cup saccharide or a teaspoon of an odd spice, you can post a request. You tin can besides lend out- for instance, we've lent a carpet shampooer and borrowed a carseat embrace for a trip.

Nosotros've given abroad lots and been gifted lots in return, and one of the all-time things it has washed is aid us become to know our neighbors and build into our community (purchase cypher groups are town-based, so you can only belong where you lot live). We all have things nosotros don't need or don't utilize, and I love giving ours away to people we actually know who volition really cherish them,

Isn't she lovely?

Anyways, when we moved in, I posted request if anyone had a statue of the Blessed Virgin Mary that they didn't want, and sure enough, there was a family a few blocks abroad who had ane. They had bought a home from a man who was a stone carver and left a beautiful statue of Mary on a limestone pedestal in their thou. They weren't Catholic and were happy to pass her forth to a family unit who would beloved her.

Next I asked if anyone had a ceramic bathtub or some bricks, stones, or pavers lying around unused. And certain enough, another family had simply ripped out a border of these lovely wavy stone pavers equally they redid their yard. Win. I loaded up our minivan and headed home!

My side by side request was for tiles and/or stained glass as I had it in mind to create a mosaic . . . And wow, did my neighbors come through. Lots of people had mosaic supplies that they weren't using and one neighbor even had a collection of stained glass shards left over from her own projects that she was happy to give away.

The colors only brand me smile!

As I looked over the wavy pavers and the stained glass, I knew right abroad that I wanted to create an sea themed mosaic for our Mary. The Ave Maris Stella is one of my very favorite prayers, and I idea I could create a grotto where information technology looked like Mary was emerging from the waves. And then I chose mirror shards and stained glass in shades of blues, greens, and purples and set to work.

The grotto with the tile in place, before grouting.

Nosotros did purchase the glue needed to attach the glass to the pavers, and borrowed a tile cutter so I could become them the right sizes. The everyman level is darkest then the glass lightens upward as it goes up. Information technology took hours and hours and hours and a lot of trial and error to get the vision right, but all that sweat and hard piece of work was totally worth it in the end.

Later on the tiles were placed, I needed to grout them, considering afterward all that piece of work, I wanted this to stand the test of time.

The stained glass after having been grouted and having the haze removed

Grouting is a lot of work, and kind of messy, and it was my first time attempting it. Here'southward what I learned- the tiles that I grouted while they were in identify vertically were MUCH harder to exercise, whereas information technology was a simple process to grout each paver individually before they were built into the grotto. Lesson learned.

I had to pause my grouting process because it got common cold last fall, just I was able to finish it once the weather warmed upwards this spring

Grout leaves a grout haze over the tiles, so I used a toothbrush and a grout haze remover to remedy that- again, super simple.

And and so it was time to put it all together. This was the part that I needed Marking for. He took the atomic number 82 on mortaring the pieces together in the spot that I had chosen for the grotto, and I could non have done it without him (those pieces are heavy and I'm not as patient with leveling as he is).

The next stride was putting Mary in the identify of accolade. She is also super heavy, then Mark took care of that too. Thank goodness though, because it means the kids can't knock her over accidentally.

And here in all it's glory is our finished project!

In case anyone is interested in creating their own DIY Mary grotto, here are the materials nosotros used to make ours:

Amazon links are affiliate links, encounter my well-nigh folio for the full disclosure.

Equally I said above, almost of the materials for our grotto came from the purchase cypher group- the stained glass, the mirror tiles, the tile cutter, the pavers, and the Mary statue. But we did purchase the following,

• grout: I used natural gray, pre-mixed grout.
• mortar and a trowel
• glue for tiles: I used Gorilla Glue in clear because I was using stained glass. Brand certain whatever yous choose is waterproof because your grotto volition be exterior. (You'll as well need a gun affair for the glue.)
• rubber gloves for when you lot're working with the grout and adhesives

The terminal piece of the puzzle will be the flowers that will surround her. It'southward a fiddling early to be planting here in Michigan (information technology snowed today), and so those will come soon, but I am beyond thrilled with the results and so far, and will definitely share pictures once she has flowers.

Source: https://www.elevatortoheaven.com/diy-mary-grotto/

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