These boats actually float in water! Take them out for a sail in a baking dish full of water, or even into the bathtub. Blow on the back of the sails and watch them go. They don’t sit still for very long!

Don’t forget about elastics when you’re making your low-mess crafts. The elastic does all the work so there’s no need for glue, or any adhesive for that matter! They’re a simple way to hold your boat together with zero mess.

Cork Sailboat

LEVEL OF DIFFICULTY 2/5
PARENTAL SUPERVISION NOT REQUIRED

Materials

• Sparkly craft foam
• 1 wooden skewer
• Red electrical tape
• 3 wine corks
• 1 “L”-shaped hook with a screw end (or a regular screw and a screw driver)
• 2 wide elastics (the elastics that hold broccoli together are perfect!)

Tools

• Scissors

STEP 1: Cut a trapezoid or rectangle shape from the craft foam, about 4 inches (10 cm) wide by 3 1/2 inches (9 cm) tall.

STEP 2: Gently pinch the top and bottom of the trapezoid shape inwards to give the sail a bit of a curve shape.

STEP 3: Use scissors to trim the wooden skewer to about 5 inches (12.5 cm) long. If your scissors won’t cut through the skewer, use them to make a deep indent all the way around the skewer, then snap the skewer at the indent.

STEP 4: Cut a piece of red electrical tape about 2 inches (5 cm) long. Place the flat end of the wooden skewer in the middle of the tape and wrap it around the skewer to make a flag, making sure the ends of the tape line up evenly.

STEP 5: Cut the corners off the rectangle to make a triangular flag.

STEP 6: Carefully poke the pointy end of the wooden skewer through the center of the top and bottom of the craft foam sail, about 1⁄2 inch (1.3 cm) from each edge.

STEP 7: Use the screw end of the “L”-shaped hook to make a hole in the middle of one of the corks.

STEP 8: Line up 3 corks side by side (make sure the one with the hole is in the middle), and stretch 2 wide elastics over the corks to hold them together.

STEP 9: Push the pointy end of the wooden skewer into the hole in the middle cork.

STEP 10: Your cork sailboat is complete!

HINT: Wine corks aren’t as common as they used to be, so if you don’t have any wine-drinking family members you can get corks from, you can also get
bags of wine corks at the craft store.