Make this! Wooden pencil holder diy with gym rings

I recently discovered a ton of different sized gym rings lying around. When I buy crafting materials, I tend to over-buy and then forget about them. Are you the same? What do you have in your stash?

I decided it was time to do something with these beautiful wooden circles and came up with the idea of a wooden pencil holder diy. As I had more gym rings in different sizes, I also made some smaller trinket trays for paper clips and other bits and pieces.

I did consider painting my pencil holder and mini desk organisers white, but then I decided to leave it natural. I might paint it a different colour if I want a change after a while. You can of course paint them any colour you like. Here’s how to make the wooden pencil holder diy.

Wooden pencil holder diy + mini desk organisers

Materials (per pencil holder):
8 small gym rings
popsicle craft sticks* (UK readers find it here)
wood glue
craft knife
scissors

1. Measure, mark and cut your popsicle sticks to make the base. The best way to cut these is to score the cut lines several times with a sharp craft knife and then snip off using strong scissors.

*Note: There are other ways to make the base like cutting a circle from thick card or cork. I used popsicle sticks for the pen holder as they are strong and the pen holder will have the heaviest stuff in it. But I used thick card rounds for the shallower trays which are holding things like paper clips and washi tape. If you have power tools, you could even cut circles from thin plywood.

2. Glue the cut popsicle sticks to the base of one of the gym rings. Leave to dry as per the instructions on the glue.

3. Glue the rest of the gym rings on to each other – I left each layer to dry for about 15 minutes before I glued on the next layer. Leave to dry.

I then used various different sized gym rings to make some mini desk organisers to go with the wooden pencil holder. The shallower ones are great for holding little things like tape, paper clips, pin tacks and any other little bits and pieces.