It is always amazing to me what people decide to save and what they decide to make art projects out of. Each year I go to a few arts and crafts shows, just to see what creative things people will come up with. There are so many times when I say to myself why didn’t I think of that. Each sale I go to I see an idea that I think I can duplicate at home, but by time I get home some of the details of how the item looked escape me. The craft shows are getting very particular of how much time you spend looking at the items. They do not allow cameras of sketch pads, so that people cannot steal ideas.

This year there were several crafters that used wine bottles in their projects. I think the popularity of wine has caused people to consider some use for the empty wine bottles. One project involved an amber colored bottle. The label was kept intact. A strand of small twinkle lights was fed into the bottle through a small hole that was created at the bottom of the bottle. The cork was placed back in the bottle and a clump of artificial grapes were hung around the neck of the bottle. When it was plugged in the lights were quite pretty. I was with my sister at this craft sale. She liked the wine bottles so much that she purchased one for twenty five dollars. As we continued going from booth to booth we came across another vendor with the same idea. His bottle did not have the hole in the bottom; instead the plug in for the lights came out of the top. A slice was made in the cork to accommodate the cord. This bottle was being sold for fifteen dollars. My sister learned that even at craft sales it pays to comparison shop.

Another art project utilizing wine bottles used clear bottles. This crafter used a funnel to layer the dry ingredients for cookies into the wine bottles. She then tied a wooden spoon unto to the bottle with a ribbon along with the rest of the ingredients needed to make a batch of cookies. I had seen this same idea using other containers, but this was the first time I had seen it in wine bottles. My sister and I agreed that this was one project that we could remember how to do once we returned home.

On the way back to my sister’s house she stopped at the liquor store and bought a bottle of wine. She said she wanted to get started on her art project, but first she was going to empty the bottle of wine.