Novmber Reuse-it Item: Disposable Cutlery

Plastic cutlery: what do you do with it after you've used it? Resist the urge to chuck it in the garbage! Wash and reuse as-is, or try one of the fantastic ideas that our blogger team has gathered from the web.

Mallory

A few years ago I stumbled upon a lampshade made of plastic spoons, and absolutely loved the idea. Here is a way to reuse something designed to be clearly "disposable", and change its purpose entirely so that you could put it up for display in your house. 

As a pineapple fanatic, I am ecstatic about this idea  and can't wait to try it myself! All you need is a mold (balloon, large jar, etc.), plastic disposable spoons, scissors, and a hot glue gun. Then you're good to go!

Nichole
If someone had told me they made a mirror out of hot glue and plastic spoons, this is definitely not what I would have pictured! I am crazy about these chrysanthemum mirrors, which you can paint any colour to suit your needs. I'm in love with the cherry red on white shown in the picture, but I'm envisioning a mirror like this in jewel tones over a bedside table or makeup vanity. You can get free instructions for this particular mirror on UsefulDIY.com, but I also found a wealth of great examples on Pinterest.

Siao

Sculptures don't necessarily need to be heavy or costly to display in your own home. Although the dragon featured by RuthAnn below is indeed intriguing, if you are more like me, there are simpler and still beautiful sculptures to try, such as this pear.

 

RuthAnn

Most of us probably don't have time or the patience to turn our excess plastic cutlery into exotic art such as this dragon, but what a showstopper!

 

One of my favourite uses for disposable cutlery is to reuse them as small garden stakes when I am planting my seedlings. I use the forks to hold the seed packets, and I often just write on the knives and spoons. 

-Reuse Centre Volunteers

Magazine Strip Silhouette Art

This summer felt like it stampeded by, so it was particularly nice to have a free Saturday morning! I ended up blocking it off for a fun project with friends which included coffee, craft therapy, and grownup talk.  The project at hand was to make magazine strip silhouettes, and my goal was to make it simple, modern, and a fun distraction from our routine troubles.

Step One: Print Stencil/Silhouette
In preparation for this project, you'll need to choose your images. We found stencils and silhouettes online, then resized them to print onto a full letter sized page.  Images with more surface areas are ideal. For more intricate images, like the zebra, fish or raccoon-Mario, an alternative is to use the magazine strips for the background, rather than for the silhouette itself. (You'll see what I mean later!)

We had a wide variety of images to work with!

Our magazine stash.

Step Two: Choose Colourful Magazine Pages
Pull out pages with a lot of colour or intricate patterns, which will make the silhouette look fuller.  Try to choose pages with colours that will contrast with the background paper you intend to use.

It's okay to have some pages with words or body parts, since these won't be very noticeable in the cut strips. 



Step Three: Cut Strips from Magazine Pages
Fold the magazine pages accordion-style to create nice, straight cutting lines that are the same distance apart. Alternately, you can use a ruler and draw cutting lines. Note that the thinner the strips, the more gluing you will have to do.

Cutting the strips takes patience, but it's worth it!

Be very careful to cut as straight as you can, because it will help when pasting the strips side-by-side. While cutting, my friend came up with an ingenious plan to use a shredder.  Try it out and let me know!

Paste strips on the back
of a printed page.

Step Four: Glue Magazine Strips to the Back
The fun part! Paste the strips as you please on the backside of the stencil pages. The pattern is up to you. We alternated a variety of strips of different colours to make a rainbow effect.  I have seen some projects done with gradients of the same colour, which has a desirable look as well.

Keep in mind that the strips only need to cover the image, so you don't necessarily have to cover the entire page.  Rotate and place magazine strips strategically, depending on where the image cutout will be.  Some of the strips won't be cut perfectly straight, so just overlay them to ensure no blank spaces are showing.

Step Five: Cut out Silhouette and Paste Striped Silhouette onto Paper

Depending on the silhouette, you can also turn the original cut sheet into a second art piece, as with the deer silhouette shown below. As I mentioned earlier, this would work really well for more intricate images like the zebra.

The negative space inside the remaining magazine strips still looks neat! 

Cut-out striped silhouette.

Left, we have the striped silhouette on coloured paper, and on the
right, the leftover striped background over coloured paper.

Step Six: Enjoy Finished Art Piece! Frame and Gift at Your Leisure.

I'm really glad that this turned out so well!  We were really worried that this would turn out to be a pinterest fail moment.  I still have tons of magazines left over, so I will have to come up with another craft therapy session soon!

Our finished silhouettes, ready for display.

- Siao (Volunteer)

All photos provided by Siao.

Book Review: Reuse Crafting Edition

I spend more time on websites like Pinterest than I'd care to admit, looking up interesting DIY projects and home decor ideas, yet invariably ending up on boards about cats. I sometimes need reminders that there are these things called books that are also excellent sources of information and ideas on all kind of subjects, including reusing and repurposing everyday items. I recently made a trip to my neighbourhood library, where I found a treasure trove of craft books that feature ideas to make use of everything from empty cereal boxes to wooden pallets. I'd like to tell you about three books, presented here from most to least helpful, for an inexperienced crafter.

The most helpful book of my recent haul is Create, Update, Remake (Transcontinental Books, 2011), from the editors of Canadian Living. Some of the projects which require sewing or knitting are, frankly, beyond the scope of my abilities. However, this book also has some completely simple craft ideas that are suitable even for children, like turning ugly ties into tea cozies, or salvaging the back pockets of worn-out jeans to make a wall organizer. Every craft is accompanied by detailed instructions, and some of the more complicated projects, like wooden bird feeders and window boxes, have additional diagrams in the back. I'm definitely going to be trying my two favourite projects: turning an old china cup and saucer into an elegant bird feeder (p.78); and making wastepaper baskets out of actual waste paper (p.153).

Another helpful find, if a little more geared towards an experienced crafter, is Eco-Chic Home (Skipstone, 2010) by Emily Anderson. One thing I really appreciate about this book is the comprehensive introduction on rethinking how we relate to materials generally considered disposable, and where we can find these items outside of our own homes, such as estate sales and even school libraries (neither of which, I confess, had ever occurred to me before). Every craft is accompanied by wonderfully detailed instructions, which will make projects like the braided t-shirt rug (p.57) that I’ve always wanted to try so much more possible. The helpful instructions even make some of the more complicated projects, like reupholstering chairs, seem less daunting. My biggest problem with this book is that the photography is beautiful, but about fifteen percent of the projects have no pictures, which means that if you’re interested in making them, you have no examples of how it’s supposed to turn out.

Finally, the least helpful book that I brought home is Remake, Restyle, Reuse (Watson-Guptill, 2006) by Sonia Lucano. I should clarify that an inexperienced crafter, such as myself, is kind of out-classed by the skill required for most of these projects. Like Eco-Chic Home, the photography is quite stunning, and every craft is followed by specific instructions. Unlike the other two books, certain projects in Remake, such as the admittedly cool geometric carafe (p. 21), require the use of things like glass engraving tools, which are not readily available or simple to use. Other crafts, like the spring-inspired pillowcases (p.55), require only fabric paint, tracing paper and a steady hand, none of which I possess, but could more reasonably acquire. Overall, I thought this book had some truly beautiful ideas for breathing new life into old things, but they just seem a little too daunting to attempt for a crafter of my skill-level.

All in all, it's important that you find a book that's right for you. A simple book provides no challenge for an experienced crafter, and a difficult book might scare away a newbie before they've even really begun. For my lackluster crafting talent, the books with big pictures and ludicrously simple directions work best. As soon as I read words like "engraving tools" and "turpentine", I start wondering where I can just buy the finished project, which rather defeats the purpose.

- Nichole (Volunteer)