DIY Computer Diskette Pencil Cup

Who remembers using computer diskettes? It doesn’t seem that long ago that these diskettes were the newest thing in technology. Now they’re a historical artifact. Recently I found two boxes of diskettes on Freecycle and immediately I knew wanted to make a DIY computer diskette pencil cup for my son.

I craft for my daughters all the time, but don’t seem to make as many crafts for my son. I’m always looking for craft ideas that he might enjoy. I was also getting together with my crafting buddy, J., who has two boys, so I thought a computer diskette craft would be fun for us to make. If you watch Freecycle or thrift stores, you can find boxes of computer diskettes once in a while. You’ll only need four diskettes, so you don’t even need a full box of diskettes. (Anybody else hear that dial up sound in the background as you look at the box of diskettes?)

J. and I originally thought we’d just hot glue the diskettes together in a square and bam! – cool computer diskette pencil cup done. But, no. It didn’t work out that easily. After much tinkering, we figured out that gluing the diskettes to the box the diskettes came in worked best.

Since there was only one box and we wanted to make two pencil holders, we made a second box out of a piece of cardboard. I simply used one of the diskettes as a template for the dimensions of each side of the box. I cut out the corners and scored the cardboard so that I could fold the sides of the box up.

We used hot glue to attach the computer diskettes to the boxes. Once the diskettes were glued to the box, we used rubber bands to hold everything in place until the glue was cooled and secure.

These pencil holders made from computer diskettes are so very easy to make. Once we figured out the trick of gluing the diskettes to the boxes, making these computer diskette pencil holders took about four minutes each plus drying time. If you can find diskettes on Freecycle like I did, then these pencil holders will cost you nothing to make.

How fun are these DIY computer diskette pencil cups? Not only are they fun, but they’re an earth-friendly repurposed project. Oh, and look pretty cool on my son’s desk.