I am SO EXCITED to share today’s project.

I actually finished it about two weeks ago, but never got around to taking photos and writing about it until now.  But I just LOVE IT!

I have been obsessing about all the great marquee lights I’ve been seeing all over the internet, but now they have gotten so affordable and accessible in stores that I never felt like it was worth my time to make one from scratch.

At least not in the traditional sense of making a marquee light.

But then inspiration struck when I was washing out a set of old K-cups (I always save them since they aren’t recyclable and I have had project ideas for them in the past). I was lining them up on the counter and I realized how cool they looked when I started creating shapes. 
Of course, with Valentine’s day around the corner, a heart shape was the first thing that came to mind.

I thought about gluing them down and spray painting the whole thing so it was one color but three dimensional, and then I thought, “WHY NOT LIGHT THEM UP AGAIN?!”

And that is exactly what I did.   This time with pink mini-lights
There aren’t many projects where with each step you finish, you get more and more excited about it.. but this project was one of them:
So how did it come together?

Actually, it was really easy, and took me less than an afternoon.
First I used my kindergarden skills and cut out a bunch of large hearts from newspaper until I got one I liked when I lined the cups up around it.

Next I went around the paper heart and marked the dead center of each K-Cup (so they would be evenly spaced)
I took an old piece of plywood and stained it with some dark stain I had lying around.  (I considering leaving the wood raw but I liked the contrast of the white cups with the dark background. 
It only took me one coat of stain. I didn’t bother to seal it because.. well. Meh. I didn’t feel like it.

When it was dry I put the paper heart down in the center and used an awl to mark where each K-cup should be placed.

You can see my little pilot holes:
Next I used a drill gauge to figure out exactly how large the holes needed to be in order for the lights to poke though.

And the I drilled a bunch of holes:
ta-dah!  At this point I knew this project was going to be awesome. 
Next I used the screw gage again and measured the BULB ONLY,  I needed the hole in the wood to accommodate the entire light string, but I only wanted the bulb to protrude though the bottom of the k-up.  I also used my awl to poke closed the puncture holes left by the brewing machine.  I didn’t want to see the plywood though the hole if I could help it. 
Next I used a glue gun to attach the cups to the board (making sure to center my small ‘bulb’ hole directly in the center of the larger hole in the plywood.  (In this photo you can see how effective it was to push closed that sec on hole.  You can barely tell that each cup actually has 2 holes. 

Finally I slid a bulb into each cup.  I used LED lights so they wouldn’t get warm since they are in direct contact with the plastic, but remember these are HEAT RESISTANT cups.  So even warmer lights would probably be okay.

I love how the cups glow. 
But I thought it still needed something. 
So I used my Silhouette to cut out a large “Love” for the center of it:

And then I loved it even MORE! 
At night I can turn all the lights off in the living room and it fills the room with pink light.

And during the day (or when the lights aren’t plugged int) it still looks really pretty.



If you are looking for another great K-Cup project, check out my Halloween garland project.  Since you can never have enough K-Cups!