Hostess with the Mostess - wine stoppers

While I'm not the greatest hostess, I do like to try new, cute projects for such occasions.  Every once in awhile I will pull them out at a party and use, but I am generally just as likely to give them to a host/hostess when I go somewhere or maybe even sell them to friends to do the same.
I did this around Christmas time this year, selling wine bottle koozies as the local handmade store and ended up at a party where three of us brought the same koozie!  I laughed for awhile on that one.  Thankfully I rarely make more than 1 or 2 patterns with the same fabric, so at least they were a bit different!
I still need to work on updating my koozies to include a carry-handle, but in the mean time, I created some bottle stoppers.  I have looked for wine bottle stoppers for awhile - and found that while there were lots of cute options, they were all EXPENSIVE!  Even ones with cork bases (which were hard to find) seemed high.  So, I made some.  Easy Peasy task!



I went though my saved wine corks to find the ones that were tapered (the non-tapered ones are just too difficult to get back in the bottle.  (That was my test - I had an empty bottle on hand and used the ones that I could get back in the neck).  After I found this worked and I wanted to make more, I just couldn't keep up on drinking enough wine :)  I ended up buying some #7corks to supplement this latest obsession.
I went to the local crafty shop and found vintage looking drawer pulls.
Two options at this point:
1) get hanger bolts (looks like a screw with the head cut off, although if you look close it has a sharp side and a flat tip side with threads going in opposite directions) from your local hardware store.  I did this option first.  I used the pointy side down and used a pair of pliers to turn the threads into the cork.


2) After I got these new corks, I found they were too short for the hanger bolts I bought.  Because I could not seem to find any of the diameter that I needed that were under 1", I ended up using a hack saw (shhh, don't tell my hubby that I hijacked his from the garage) to cut off part of the threaded dowel that came with these knobs.

Finish turning the threads until they are all the way down (careful not to go through the bottom of the cork depending on how long of screws/bolts you use) and VOILA.  You have yourself a custom, adorable wine stopper for MUCH cheaper than you could buy.
I did notice that most places that sell them use the stainless steel stoppers (the cone shaped ones that have the rubber rings).  Those are of course more expensive to buy than corks, but can be done.



I now can't stop myself. More knobs, more corks, more wine must be drunk to keep up!!






More pics to come.