I used a cheap silicone mold to upgrade basic string of mini LED lights into lights that are perfect for a summer party! Using resin in a silicone mold allows you to create translucent decorations in nearly any shape. I chose to make a set of colorful pineapple string lights, but you can use this same technique to perfectly match your party theme.
COLORFUL PINEAPPLE STRING LIGHTS
WHAT YOU WILL NEED TO MAKE RESIN PINEAPPLE STRING LIGHTS
I used a dollar store silicone mold and cheap mini LED lights to make my string lights. If you can’t find these products (or would rather decorate your lights with a different resin shape), you can use any small silicone mold. It is important to use LED lights which don’t heat up when they are turned on, however.
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- dollar store pineapple mold or Amazon pineapple mold
- Envirotex Lite resin
- mixing cups and stir sticks
- transparent resin dyes
- mini LED lights
- glue gun and hot glue
MAKING THE RESIN PINEAPPLES
If you have never mixed resin before, don’t worry! Envirotex Lite is very user-friendly. Wear gloves, protect your work surface, and follow the directions in the package carefully. It’s especially important that you follow the directions for the 2-step mixing process to make sure the resin is fully mixed. Resin is not scary at all, and you can make so many cool DIY projects with it. This project only uses a few ounces of resin, so you will have plenty left for other projects.
Once the resin is properly mixed, divide it into small cups so you can add resin dye. I chose to mix up five summery candy colors, but you can color your resin however you would like.
Make sure your work surface is level. Then pour the dyed resin into the cavities of your silicone mold. I was able to make 10 pineapples with 4 ounces of mixed resin.
Use a long arm lighter to pop any bubbles that may rise to the surface of the resin, then cover the mold and allow the resin to cure for at least 8 hours.
When the resin has cured, you should be able to pop the resin shapes out of the silicone mold very easily. Look at those beautiful colors!
MAKING PINEAPPLE LIGHTS
Now it’s time to turn those colorful resin pineapples into summer string lights! I find that the mini LED lights on a wire work the best for DIY string lights like this.
Put a small drop of low temp hot glue on the back of each pineapple, then press the light right into the glue. This is why you want to make sure you are using LED lights that don’t get hot.
Keep gluing the lights onto the pineapples until you have a full strand!
FINISHED DIY PINEAPPLE LIGHTS
The lights are pretty cute even when the lights are turned off…
…but they are even better lit up! I think these lights would look so sweet strung on a BBQ table or drink station. Where would you use these summery pineapple lights?
You might like these other pineapple DIYs:
[…] COLORFUL PINEAPPLE STRING LIGHTS […]