A winter memory jar

I just posted a couple of photos of this project on Instagram, so thought I would quickly describe how it's put together.  This huge glass jar is actually the jar from a churn that belonged to my grandmother.  It had a hole in the cover for use as a churn, but my grandmother, once her butter-making days were over, used a Mendet

Found this on Google images! I thought it was spelled "Mend-it".

 to seal the hole.  She then used the jar as her doughnut jar.  When she taught me to make doughnuts, she gave me the jar.  It's been used for doughnuts and also for cookies in the past, but probably 20 years ago I put a string of white lights in it and have never looked back.  Sometimes it's just the lights, but at Christmas I usually put in some faux greenery and berries, and silk leaves in fall.

Last year I saw several ideas for this type of jar and tried to make one.  I put some snowflakes and a pinecone or two  in the jar along with this photo, which is just an enlargement of a vintage snapshot, printed out on card stock.  The branch of glittery leaves is in there too but it's behind the photo.  It all looked okay but wasn't exactly the look I had hoped for.

This year I decided to try again.   I arranged the photo and snowflakes in a slightly different way to their best advantage, and tucked the green leaves in on the side where they are more visible.  I decided some red berries were necessary, so added a spray of those.  It all made a difference.

I'm much more pleased with this jar.  It's a memory jar in more than one way.  Not only does it contain a memory of my cousin, brother and me and a wintry snow fort, but the container itself -- my grandmother's churn -- is also a memory.  Best of all, we can enjoy its light on our kitchen counter all through February!