Wine cork trivet

Happy belated 4th of July, everyone! It's been quite a while since my last post, and I was inspired by my friend Jayodita's recently born blog and very adorable Playful PaletTe to keep at this!


Ok so at some point or another we've all taken this solemn oath:

Only to then realize that it's a lot easier to just do this:

So in case you want to fool people into thinking you're not that lazy, here's a pretty quick way to use up 37 of those wine corks into a cute fat lil' trivet*:

*This craft activity best enjoyed while drinking wine**.
**May cause intoxication.

First, stand them all up and trim the end that will go on the bottom so they stand up nice and straight.  You should also trim any that are abnormally taller than the rest.  Cutting board and sharp kitchen knife work just fine for this.

Then, line up all your rows that form the hexagonal-shaped trivet: 4, 5, 6, 7, 6, 5, and finally 4.  I opted for an ombre pattern here, but get creative with the pattern (random or otherwise) that you choose.  Also keep in mind that you want corks with pretty or interesting labels to go on the perimeter, so you can see it after this thing is assembled.

Time to start gluing like a crazy person!  Put your middle row of 7 together first, along a straight edge such as the pictured random notebook I pulled from a pile of conference junk.  I used Gorilla Wood Glue between each pair of corks, which worked out well because the color blends in with the corks, and it bonds really well.  It also turns tacky pretty quickly, which makes the job easier.  Make sure you put some newspaper down to protect your work surface.

Continue building up the rest of the rows, packing each cork with a nice dab of glue closely between its neighbors, and ta-da! Trivet done.  (Please appreciate that I'm trying really hard to not make any nerdy materials science references right now.)  You could also go crazy and make these bigger or smaller, or cut the corks in half for a lower-profile trivet - or coasters!)

Optional: I bordered the whole thing with a scrap of ribbon, also with some light touches of the wood glue and a temporary piece of scotch tape to hold the end down while the glue dried..  Tuck the ribbon in between the corks for a clean look.

Finally, we can't do a blog post without a puppy pic, so I present the following of our sweet Elba for your cuteness enjoyment.  (My friend Christine accused me this weekend of only ever wanting to talk about puppies and kittens.  Guilty as charged?)