New Traditions

With 2016 well underway (oops, almost wrote the wrong year again), I’ve been thinking a lot about resolutions. Personally, I’ve never been a fan of them – they’re meant to be broken. That’s not to say that resolutions are bad; obviously, people usually make them to better themselves in some way. The downfall comes when people try to make too drastic of changes too fast and all at once. I changed my way of thinking about resolutions a long time ago and decided instead to make new year’s goals and new year’s traditions. 

So in that vein, one of the new traditions I’ve decided to adopt for 2016 is wine related. Go figure. 

A couple of months ago, I was talking to a close friend, Tosha, and she told me about a fun thing one of her other friends does with her corks. I’ve been keeping my corks for a long time, mostly because I’m a bit of a pack rat, but also because I have high ambitions and good intentions to use them for crafting. One of my Pinterest boards is full of creative and cute things to do with corks, including making trivets, shower mats, place-card holders, and these, uh, unique shirts.

 

I might have to rethink the… nippular… area.

Tosha told me that her friend writes a little note on each cork about what she was celebrating or doing when she drank it. I pondered this idea for a second, and then said, “So I would write… Tuesday?” She laughed, apparently thinking I was joking. But the idea stuck with me, and a few weeks later I found myself staring at a pile of Christmas presents, wrapping paper and tape in one hand, a glass of red in the other. After tackling present wrapping and only misplacing the tape and scissors a few times, I carefully wrote on the cork.

 

Cat-eaten bows in the background.

And thus, my new year’s tradition for 2016 was born. At the end of the year, I think it’ll be fun to dump out all the corks and look at them, remembering where I was, who I was with, and what shenanigans we were pairing with our wine. 

Or maybe it was just a frigid winter night in.

 

Or a...

 

Tonight, I’m celebrating a fancy new bottle opener, and, more importantly, I’m celebrating that I actually figured out how to use it. It’s much more elaborate than my “bunny ear” corkscrew. And thank you to my friend, Katharine, for the tutorial before gifting it to me.

 

Fancy!

 

Happy 2016, wine lovers! Here’s to new traditions.