One of the plights of part- time parenting (well one of many 😉 ), but one of the plights in the summer –  every so often the fun stops in one parent’s house so the children can go be with the other parent.

We are in just such a time frame in our summer of fun – let’s call it the Summer of Fun Pause Button! Yes, I think I like that. Don’t worry, the fun doesn’t end, it’s just the family summer of fun activities are paused for a bit, but they will resume soon.

I know you’re on the edge of your seat, biting your nails in a tizzy of anticipation!!

ME TOO!!

I do have some really good stuff today though.

A friend and I decided to tackle a Pinterest project *gasp*

We couldn’t pick an easy project, oh no, it had to be cutting a wine bottle with string using fire and water of course!

There are literally tons of sites that tell you how to do this

Here’s our take on the whole project

Here’s what you’ll need: wine bottles, string/yarn, scissors, acetone/nail polish remover with acetone, lighter, small container for the acetone, large bucket/sink of ICE COLD water

Prep: Fill a large bucket/sink with ice cold water.

What we learned: We bought a bag of ice and used it a little at a time to keep the water cold

Step 1: Remove the labels. As you can see, we chose not to do this step. Guess that means you can chose not to do this step too. (here’s a great idea for removing those bottle labels if you were to choose to do that)

Step 2: Wrap the string around the bottle and tie it off, cutting any excess string after tying

What we learned:

• The bottle will actually break about 1/2 an inch ABOVE the wrapped string. Keep that in mind as you’re wrapping.
• Yarn burns better, longer, and hotter than string
• Wrap the string/yarn at least 3 times around but no more than 5 times
• Wrap the string/yarn very snugly around the bottle. You want little to no slack in the string/yarn 

Step 3: Remove the tied string/yarn from the bottle and soak it in the acetone/nail polish remover

Step 4: Put the string/yarn back on the bottle

What we learned: 

• It’s actually easier to soak the string first; then wrap it snugly around the bottle.
• Make sure all the lines of wrapped string/yarn is squeezed together (touching) and are on the bottle straight
• Cut the end strings at the knot as close as possible. The knot is thicker than the single wrapped lines and will burn longer. While it’s burning longer the rest of the string and bottle are getting too cool for the bottle to crack

Step 5: Ignite the string and rotate the bottle; just as the flame goes out, submerge the bottle into the ice cold water

What we learned: 

• Simply rotating the bottle does not do it
• You have to get that bottle spinning as fast as your little hands can go.
• Spinning the bottle at a faster rate allows the string/yarn to burn longer which causes more heat.
• It’s the heat hitting the cold water that ‘shocks’ the bottle, causing it to break.

Step 6: Sand the rough edges with fine to medium grit sandpaper

Making glasses out of wine bottles was our ultimate goal. It looked so easy on all the websites we read and viewed. This is just NOT SO

Will this be the ultimate Pinterest fail? I dunno….

Lets give cutting the bottoms a try

The steps are exactly the same except you’re wrapping your string at the bottom of the bottle instead of the top

What we learned:

• Wrapping the bottom works better and actually makes a clean cut that simply needs sanding to be smooth
• It’s much, much easier to spin the bottle holding onto the neck; you can spin it so much faster; which we learned creates more heat and gives a clear ‘shock’ when submerging

Just a word of caution and a gentle reminder: Even the fumes of acetone are flammable (go ahead, ask me how I know this)

What we Learned:

• Don’t try to save yourself steps. Keep the acetone soak away from the ignition/flame site. We had ours right next to the sink and the fumes caught on fire (I’m okay, the blister will pop soon). Keep the soak on an opposite counter top

• Keep that container of acetone away from the lighter and flaming bottles

In the end, we decided we were not going to give up on making glasses, but we’ve yet to perfect it. Watch for it, because I’m certain we will figure it out.

For now, we are completely content to have our bottom cut bottles, labels and all (we may remove those at another time).

Till Next Time,

♥ Robyn

Have you had an epic fail or success with a Pinterest project? Tell me all about it!!