Almost ruined my whole fake plant wall with one bad glue choice

I was building a fake ivy wall for my bathroom using leaves from Dollar Tree and hot glue. The leaves kept falling off after a few days, so I figured I just needed to press harder. Then I noticed the glue was actually melting the plastic stems, not sticking to them. That's when I realized I should have been using E6000 from the same dollar store instead. Has anyone else had a dollar store glue fail on a project halfway through?

3 comments

3 Comments

noah9171mo ago

Oh man, I feel your pain! I tried using cheap hot glue on a foam wreath once and it just ate right through the material. Total disaster. What finally worked for me was using a low-temp glue gun with the mini sticks that melt at a lower temperature. That stopped the melting issue completely. Also, I found that roughing up the stems with a little sandpaper before gluing gave the adhesive something to grab onto. Dollar store stuff can be hit or miss for sure, but a few small tweaks saved my whole project in the end!

ruby_lane1mo ago

Wait, you had a fake plant wall and it falling apart is a disaster? Pretty sure Dollar Tree leaves for a bathroom project isn't exactly high-stakes craftsmanship.

simonw411mo ago

Two years ago I would've said the exact same thing. Then I tried to fake a little ivy for my sister's bathroom gallery wall and spent an entire Sunday with stems melting into a glue gun puddle. Dollar Tree stuff has this weird coating that cheap hot glue just slides right off of. I even tried E6000 but it made that plasticky smell that hung around for days. Noah's sandpaper trick is actually genius though, I bet that scratches up the fake leaf texture enough to stop the wobble. Kinda changed my whole view on what counts as a "craft disaster" honestly.