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  Looking for lots of crafts made from recycled materials? You’ve come to the right place. I go beyond soup can pencil holders here. It is all about greening up your crafting and moving toward a more sustainable way of living. This site is full of eco-friendly crafts for children and adults. Making use (re-use really) of otherwise unwanted materials is good for the pocketbook and good for the environment.

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Tissues made from old t-shirts work really well and they are soft on the nose. Kids will like the fun colorful fabrics and you will like the part about saving money and resources.

Make Your Own T-Shirt Tissues

I set aside some children’s t-shirts that were too worn or too stained to pass on.

How to:
Gather some old t-shirts. Thin, uber soft t-shirts are best. Use a salad plate (whatever size you like) and a rotary cutter with a cutting matt. Cut around the plate. The beauty of this project is that the edges do not need to be hemmed.

Alternatively, you can cut square pieces.

Keep these eco-friendly tissues on bedside tables for use on little noses.

Hankie Hamper: find something around the house or at the thrift store to be your hankie hamper.

Recycle Worn-Out Shirts Into Handkerchiefs
When choosing old shirts to be made into hankies; the softer the better. Pick an appealing fabric if that matters to you. You want it to also have a bit of absorbency. Obviously, stiff fabric is no good for this project.

How to:

Cut strips 7 inches wide (or your preference) with a pair of pinking shears. Next, cut the strips into squares and you’re done. Using pinking shears will help to prevent fraying.

To take with you, fold in half then fold in thirds: it fits nicely in your purse or pocket.

Hankies in a variety of fabrics: My husband’s favorite shirt (blue plaid cotton) was eventually turned into little hankies. It was a soft fabric to begin with but repeated washing only made it better. The kitty fabric was made out of worn-out flannel pj’s.

Be sure to provide a place to put the used tissues or your kids will leave them all around the house.

Altering a dress into an apron requires less work than making an apron from scratch. If you shop wisely, you can easily spend less for the dress than you would pay for new fabric. That isn’t even the best part. The best part is all the really unique styles you could work with. You can be really creative with these. Start looking at second-hand dresses in a new way. The result: a one-of-a-kind apron.
I love vintage clothing and aprons are no exception. I designed this apron to look like an apron from the 1930′s. After removing a stain, I transformed this simple dress into a vintage looking full bib over the head apron.
How to:

Find a dress that inspires you. Search yard sales, thrift stores or even your own closet. You don’t even need to find your own size; it just needs to be big enough to do the job. Keep in mind that you will be wearing your apron on top of your regular clothing. Picking a dress with a print rather than a solid color fabric has the benefit of hiding stains better. The first thing you will probably want to do is wash the dress and iron it. Next, cut up the back of the dress. Remove the zipper (if there is one) and save for another project.

Cut strips from the back center of the dress to use as the apron ties. I cut my strips 3 ½ inches wide which resulted in 1 ½ inch wide ties. (Sometimes it is better and/or necessary to cut a strip of fabric off the bottom of the dress to make the ties.)
Fold each strip with right sides facing and sew along two sides leaving one end open. Turn the resulting tube right side out.

Use scrap cardboard such as from a cereal box or brown paper bag to trace the shape of the top of the dress. Cut out this shape.

Now put the cardboard on top of the dress and sketch on it the desired shape you want the apron. This is your chance to be creative. When you have the shape drawn out the way you want it, cut out the shape. Trace the stencil you have just made. Flip the stencil over and trace on the other side of the dress. Remember to make it ¼ inch larger (for a seam allowance).

Turn inside out (if the dress you are using has a liner) and sew the back edges. If there is no liner you can turn over the raw edges and machine sew.

With the apron right side out, top stitch along the edges; stitch the apron ties on as you go.
Embellish with buttons from your salvaged button jar. If you don’t have one, start one today. Whenever you have a piece of clothing that is ready for the rag pile, remove the buttons. Store all these salvaged buttons in a jar or other designated spot.
On the top of the back of the apron, I attached the sides together by sewing on buttons. If you want, you can make button holes- so the buttons really work. Make sure that your head can get in and out of the apron before permanently attaching.
Sweet!
Now you are ready to go bake something.

My daughter came up with the idea to use a dress to make an apron first. If you would like to see her handy work click here.

Be creative and make your own dove embellished wedding gift wrapping. This white gift wrap is really “green.”
You can find supplies for this project in a surprising variety of sources. Bumper stickers often have a really nice glossy white side and the back is often white paper that you can trace a stencil on. Another thing works well if you come across any is thin white plastic that is stiff yet thin enough to cut. I found a white plastic tray from a game. You can also find white cardboard in packaging from dress shirts to toys. You could go out and buy some white paper/ cardstock but that wouldn’t be a challenge and you would miss the point. I save all kinds of white product packaging and other waste materials and used the best pieces for doves.

The paper I used for this dove was stiff: I wanted it to stand up for a 3D effect that would take the place of a bow. To hold the dove in place: I cut out a rectangle, folded it in half and glued half onto the back of the dove. The other half of the rectangle can be slipped under the ribbon and discreetly glued or taped to the wrapping paper.
I wrapped this gift in discarded office paper (poster size). The other side had last month’s office presentation on it. It was too good to waste.

Use a nice quality ribbon to add a touch of color. It can later be used on another gift or reused in some other project.

Dove gift tags
To make a gift tag, you will need to fold scrap paper and place the stencil along the fold so that the top of the head and part of the wing will be on the fold. Write a message of love and peace. Use salvaged paper that is about the thickness of card stock. I’ve provided stencils of two different doves that I sketched.

This is far from looking like trash.

dove A stencil

dove B stencil

They say necessity is the mother of invention: that is true. My daughter needed a bookend so I did a little brain storming and dug through the house/garage for inspiration. I easily transformed these license plates into bookends.

How to:

Recycle a license plate by making it into a bookend. All you have to do is bend a license plate over the edge of a table. Easy.

I like the vintage look of these plates left as is but you could be creative and paint them for a modern look.

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• Got Questions?

  Are you having any trouble understanding some of the instructions? Feel free to send me a quick e-mail at HesterJane@FunInTheMaking.net. I’ll do my best to answer your questions. Do you have any suggestions regarding a specific post? Maybe you have a better way and would like to share it with the other creative people visiting this site? -Hester Jane