DIY : Reclaimed Ribbon Organizer

Make Wrap Time A Snap

Looking for a way to bring order to gift-wrapping chaos?

This DIY project take mere minutes and less than $2 to create a useful tool that’ll make you fast and fashionable in the wraps department.

Tips:

  We scored our wooden box from our local liquor store. Some wine producers are still shipping their spirits in wooden boxes which are often discarded. We made friends with our local spirits aficionados who gave us several boxes for free.

  With $1.58 we purchased our wooden dowels at our local crafts store, which yielded enough real estate to make four rods which could easily house over 50 spools of ribbon!

Materials: 

1  |  Wooden Box or Crate
Size Length To Fit  | ¼” Wooden Dowels
1  |  Hand Drill

What To Do:

1. Once you have your wooden box measure it to determine how many dowels you will need. Our box was about 13″ wide x 11″ tall x 7″ deep which was large enough to hold comfortably hold four horizontal rods.

2. Group your ribbons by color or size depending on your preference. The size of the ribbon spools will help you determine placement of your dowels. Make sure and leave enough height and depth between the dowels so the spools will fit and spin on the rods. We placed the front rods about 1″ lower than the back rods to help us view the ribbon once the organizer was filled. 

3. Using your hand drill, make your holes. “Measure twice, drill once,” as they say. I drilled from the outside of the box and made the holes just large enough to insert the dowels so they fit tight – yet they were still able to be removed to reload ribbon. For oversized spools of ribbon we included two additional vertical rods on top, as shown.

4. Once you’ve tested placement of the dowels load them up with your ribbons; to do so I inserted half of the dowel from the outside of the box and loaded it with the spools from the inside of the box then inserted and secured the rod on the opposite side.

That’s a wrap! Now it’s time to marvel at your time-saving, eco-friendly creation!

~ Joe Paul Reider

Home Style Austin Founder
Austin Realtor®
Keller Williams Realty, Inc.

DIY : Succulent Planter

Succulents are to Austin as much as breakfast tacos and live music. So let’s amp-up the container presentation for our succulents by looking for some inspiration commonly found sitting on our pantry shelves … the good ole soup can!

Ingredients:

1  |  Succulent Plant (we found ours at our local Walmart)
1  |  Empty Soup or Tomato Sauce Tin Can (we repurposed ours from going into the trash)
To Fill  |  Miracle-Gro Cactus, Palm and Citrus Soil (found at our local Austin Home Depot)
A Few Spoonfuls  |  Aquarium Rocks (also at Walmart)

What To Do: 

1. Remove the label from the soup can and rinse well. Punch a drainage hole in the bottom of the can using a hammer and nail.

2. Fill most of the can with the soil. Insert the succulent and pack well and add more dirt, leaving about 1/4″ of dirt from completely filling the soup can.

3. Top the soil with a few spoonfuls of aquarium rocks for a colorful splash.

You just made an artful, eco-friendly and dy-no-mite presentation for your succulent plant! Our total cost? Under $3. You can even root succulents yourself and save even more.

Tips: 

  Choose a from a wild assortment of different cans to accentuate the unique personality of your succulent … big cans, small cans, ribbed cans, smooth cans … silver or gold cans. Have fun unwrapping empty cans to find the style you like.

  These make great gifts for friends and family … you can even plant these ahead of time and enjoy them in your home for a few days before gifting them away.

Have fun gardening!

~ Joe Paul Reider

Home Style Austin Founder
Austin Realtor®
Keller Williams Realty, Inc.