How to fix a mirror that has come out of its frame

Garage sale season is just about over here until next spring, but there have been a few stragglers the last few weekends. I had a little bit of time without Maren last Saturday so I headed to the new Dollar Tree to look for the crows that Shara found. No luck on those, but there was a garage sale on the next block so I did a quick drive-by to see if it was worth stopping.

The sale barely filled the driveway of the single-car garage and the items that the owners were still putting out didn't look like anything special, but one thing caught my eye and I stopped. Over to the side, leaning against the garbage can was an old mirror. Nothing was marked with a price, which is my #1 garage sale pet peeve and usually results in me walking back to the car empty-handed However, I wanted that mirror BAD, so I asked and was thrilled when the owner said it was $2.00. In fact, she said, she didn't think she'd be able to sell it because it had fallen out of the frame and the glass was so heavy and the frame so old it looked like junk. Well, lucky for both of us that's precisely the kind of junk I'm looking for, so I handed over $2, picked up the pieces of the mirror, frame and backing and tried not to skip all the way to the car!

The woman was right, it was in rough shape. The mirror is very old and very heavy--so heavy that someone had twisted a thick piece of rubber-coated wire cable on the back to use as a hanger. The weight of the mirror was such that it had overwhelmed the old nails, causing the entire backing board to fall off so nothing was left to hold the mirror into the frame.

However, I happen know how to fix an old mirror that has fallen out of its frame because I've done it before with this one:
It's ridiculously easy, all you need are these little guys:These are called glazier points and you can find them in the hardware store. There are even instructions on the back of the package to show you how to use them. They're pointy on one end and with the mirror face down in the frame, you just push the points into the sides of the frame. The back of my package shows a special tool for this purpose but I just used a wooden block! I tossed the backing board for this mirror because it was an old, dirty piece of wood and I didn't feel like it needed a backing, but if you wanted you could use a piece of matboard or thick cardboard cut to size and secured with tacks.
It's so hard to get good photos of mirrors but the silver backing is perfectly mottled and spotted with age. It makes a great spooky addition to my Halloween decor!