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shala_beads
29 January 2008 @ 08:06 am
101 Uses for Plastic Grocery Bags  
Well, my last call for ideas, 101 Things To Do With An Empty Cereal Box is still at 10 things. But I'm going to try again.

101 Uses for Plastic Grocery Bags
1. Reuse them as bags. Obviously. Who hasn't run to the gym with stuff in a plastic bag because it's convenient? Well, I haven't,because I've got my big happy Hello Kitty bag, but my son takes his sneaks to the gym in a grocery bag.
2. Donate them to your local library or charity, used bookstores can also use them.
3. Keeping yarn pristine while working on a project.
4. Fuse them, fused plastic bags make a very tough material, and with a bit of duct tape for people who don't have a sewing machine, or with sewing, you can make all sorts of neat things, like re-usable grocery bags, or messenger bags.
5. Sculpting, I love this project, and E and I are so doing it. She's a HUGE Simpson's fan, and this is so clever. Plastic bags can be used to bulk up things lightly for all sorts of projects.
6. also by dadcando, a golden snitch using plastic bags for wings.
7. Crochetor knit a bag with them. I don't actually cut mine that way, I lay the bag out flat, and cut completely across in about 1.5 inch wide strips that are loops, then I loop them together like you probably did with rubber bands as a kid to make chains. I like doing it that way, because I can just have a stack of strips and just loop on a new one as I need it rather then dealing with rolling balls of plastic , plus doing it this way also means if you do accidentally rip one, you just have to replace that section without having to tie a knot.
8. A variation of 7, white plastic bags cut a little thinner then you would for a bag and worked with a size J or K hook make nifty weather proof stars and snowflake ornaments. Pick your favorite pattern.
9. Toy clothes. I know, it sounds silly, but they've been used for petticoats, skirts, raincoats for plushies in our home. Usually taped, but I'm going to have E try our Eurosealer as well.
10. About toys? Plastic bags also make good stuffing for amigurumi. I've only handwashed things I've stuffed that way.
11. I haven't tried it yet, but how about a water resistant sit upon? I have made pillows to keep in the car to keep under my back when it's really bothering me, and I like them.
12. Pom poms! My mom used to make these for some of the kids in our neighborhood (I never wanted to be a cheerleader).. iirc, she may have used empty pill bottles for handles. I think she'd cut across the handles, and make vertical cuts into the bag leaving a couple inches at the bottom sealed end, then roll up the ends and glue them into the pill bottle or something like that.
13. Kites! Plastic bags rock for kites because they don't weigh anything. My dad was a cloth kite snob until he found out how easily and high plastic kites can fly.
14. From [info]lupabitch, packing! Nice soft packing for moving, packing pretties you've made for friends to mail et cetra
15. This only uses a tiny bit, but when I was a kid I used them in dioramas with a bit of paint to make campfires, what other modeling uses I wonder?
16. From [info]taimatsu- Use them to stuff a duct tape dummy
17. Also from [info]taimatsu- try making a shower curtain out of fused plastic bags, there is a link to fusing plastic bags above.
18. Crochet a scrubbie

So, leave your suggestions in the comments, or links to other projects!
 
 
Feeling: happy
 
 
shala_beads
26 August 2007 @ 09:16 pm
Recycled Notebooks  
making little purse notebooks from junk )
Check out this post for more ideas or to contribute your own uses for lightweight cardboard boxes.

I also found myself wondering if you could use prong set rhinestones to hold together a little notebook of this sort. Wouldn't that be fun? Bedazzled mini notebooks?
 
 
Feeling: happy
 
 
shala_beads
18 August 2007 @ 07:12 am
I dreamt I was an origami bird commander  
being followed by paper sharks, and when I woke up, I asked Mike how a sheet of paper wound up sheet of paper sized? Because really? It's a neat rectangle. If you fold in half the right way, it keeps the same proportions. If you fold down the top diagonally to make a square, what's left is a dollar bill proportioned piece. He didn't know the answer though. But he did pat my back and tell me the paper sharks weren't going to cut me to pieces.

But that made me wonder what all could you do with a cardboard box? Not the big huge kind you get occasionally, LOTS of uses for thoses, but the lightweight kind like cereal boxes.

101 Things To Do With An Empty Cereal Box
(list in progress, please make suggestions)

1. Cut yourself a set of tangrams.
2. Use to create the skeleton of a duct tape purse
3. Make little gift boxes with it in different sizes.
4. mini notebooks. Seriously, scratch paper or paper that's only been printed on one side cut down and stapled into a little "matchbook" made of cardboard that size is handy in a purse.
5. Make a boat out of it. My daughter has boats out of all sorts of things, she saves her drinking straws from when we go out for the masts.
6. HEY! Cool holiday/movie themed packaging. If you have a spiral binder, spiral bind a small notebook.
7. This stuff? Really perfect for ATCs if you aren't too worried about acid content, but also you can cut a window template with it, where you cut a window out of a sheet that's the size of an ATC, then you position the window on your magazine page or whatever your using and find a piece of the page that looks right. The neat thing about this method is that it lets you look at a magazine page differently, in diagonal or whatever until you find that just right piece.
8. Quilt templates or patterns for all sorts of things.
9. Build an armature for a paper mache piece.
10. Put a cat toy in it, and make your cat paw it out. Hours of entertainment! [info]beaddreamer maybe cut holes in it, and put in a crocheted ball filled with catnip then tape the box shut? A little more challenge?
11. valentine boxes from [info]omega85
12. Stencils, a little sturdier then paper.
13. foil and cardboard go together nicely. Not just notebooks, think crowns and costume accessories as well.
14. This wonderful waller!
15. Weave a placemet
 
 
Feeling: cold