GOOGLE SEARCH: recycle itemsHOW TO MAKE RECYCLE ITEMS FROM RECYCLE MATERIAL

Things You Can Recycle:

1. Plastics: plastic bags, bottles, casings, PVC pipes

2. Glass: blue, green, clear, and brown glass, glass orniments, bottles

3. Paper: newspaper, all white paper, cardboard boxes, books, magazines, phone books, brown paper bags

4. Household Items: bicycles, clothing, cooking oil, eyeglasses, furniture, Holiday lights, cleaners, light bulbs, mattress, musical instruments, toys

5. Metals: aerosol cans, aluminum foil, soda cans, hangers, steel

6. Gardening Items: Christmas trees, dirt, fertilizers, mulching

7. Electronics: CDs, DVDs, cell phones, computer monitors, computers, video games, ink cartridges, DVD player, keyboards, televisions, MP3 players

8. Hazardous Items: CFL, explosives, fire exstinguishers, lead, medications, mercury, paint, paint thinners, pesticides, photographic chemicals, pool chemicals, batteries, smoke detectors

9. Automotive Items: tires, auto parts, car fluids, fuel, motor oil, oil, filters

10. Construction: brick, carpet, wood, drywall, carpet padding, linolem, pallets

35 Accessories Made from Recycled Materials3 years ago by Adam Chandler | 17 Comments | Share a Tip

If you read my blog Simply Thrifty, you’ll know I’m all about reusing and recycling. I’m a firm believer that everything has two uses. With that in mind, check out  these accessories made from recycled materials. Please note, all items listed -especially those in other countries fall underfair trade. Here at The List Maven we want to do our part for the environment but not at the expense of others.

1. Recycled glass bottle earrings – Very cool – and enough colors to match everything in your wardrobe.

2. Recycled newspaper market tote bags – Now this I would use, and it would make a great gift too. Very cute.

3. Recycled license plate necklace – Don’t worry, it’s cut down to size – you won’t be wearing a giant license plate around your neck like Flava Flav.

4. Recycled soda can earrings – I think these are great. I’m thinking of getting a pair for myself.

5. This blue recycled glass bottle charm bracelet would be a hit among teens, I think.

6. Remember the old printing press? I can assure you those old letters didn’t go to waste. Check out these personalized necklaces.

7. This clutch is made from candy bar wrappers and features the barcodes! It will make a wonderful conversation piece for a night out on the town.

8. I’m totally digging the popdaisy recycled can jewelry line designed by Heather Ramsey.  It’s reasonably priced as well.

9. You knew it was coming, right? Bottle cap necklaces appropriate for casual wear.

10. Ever wonder what happened to your old vinyl record albums? Perhaps they were made into a bracelet like this!

11. This wine bottle jewelry is colorful and stunning.

12. How about a bracelet or necklace featuring a key from an old typewriter?

13. Are you a Scrabble junky? Then you’ll have to have this necklace made from old game tiles.

14. These chic tote bags are made from recycled traffic signs!15. Great Green Goods is offering some elegant vintage spoon

necklaces.16. Also from Great Green Goods are these amazing recycled pool ball

rings.17. The sk8ters in your life will be touched when you give them

jewelry made from recycled skate boards.18. This unusual necklace is made from recycled chop sticks.19. This beautiful necklace is made by artisans in Kampala, Uganda

from magazine pages.20. The reasonably priced pendant is made from pieces of broken

plates!21. Would you like to get a unique gift for the sexy geek in your life?

Try these cufflinks made from computer keys!22. Here’s a unique piece for your teens – a bracelet made from

recycled sneakers.23. Does the man in your life invest? Maybe he’d like a set of stock

listing cufflinks.24. Winter is almost over, but you might want this recycled silk sari

ear flap hat for next year.25. If you’re handy with a hook, you might consider crocheting

this necklace from plastic bags.26. This necklace, handcrafted in Wales, is made from recycled

aluminum.27. This formal necklace is made from recycled glass.28. This whimsical brooch is made in Kenya from recycled products.29. Who knew beautiful earrings like this could come from recycled

newspaper?30. No one would have to know these earrings are made from recycled

plastic, but it would be a cool thing to tell them!

31. These wonderful necklaces are made form recycled Paloma pottery.

32. Now this is what I call planet art. These earrings are made from real leaves dipped in silver.

33. This assortment of unusual brooches is made from various recycled materials including recycled clock pieces, vinyl flooring, clothes pins and more.

34. This necklace is made from recycled dominos!35. This biker bag is made from recycled tire inner tubes! Nice.

 

Would you like to see more lists of earth-friendly and recycled accessories, clothes and beauty items? Drop a line in the comments and let me know what you think.

 

How to Make Greeting Cards with Recycled Materials

I use recycled materials in my crafting whenever possible and feel happiest when I find ways to use items that would normally get trashed (or thrown in the recycling bin), so I'm happy to show you how to print on grocery bag paper to make greeting cards for this season of celebration! Any normal inkjet printer that can print on 4x6-inch paper will print onto bag paper. Not only is it eco-friendly to reuse your bags, but I also think it looks super cool!

You'll need:

Paper grocery bags (one bag makes up to 12 4x6 sheets) Scissors and/or paper cutter Ruler Pencil Inkjet printer Thin cardboard (like cereal boxes) or recycled greeting cards Glue stick or two-sided tape (not necessary for the machine-sewn

version) Your choice of decorating materials (thread, embroidery floss, yarn,

ribbon, hole punch, needle, buttons, sewing machine, etc.)

I cut my grocery bag paper down to 4x6-inch sheets for printing—I've tried printing on 8.5x11 sheets, but because there are always creases, bends, and imperfections in the recycled paper, the bigger the sheet is, the more chance of it getting offset, bent, or otherwise messed up in the printer. The 4x6 sheets almost always print up fine, as long as you smooth out bends and creases as much as possible.

Start by cutting your bags along the corners, so you have two big sheets from the front and back and two narrow sheets from the sides. Most bags are exactly 12 inches across, so if you cut straight along the sides, you should be able to measure and cut right down the middle for two 6-inch strips. Then use

your ruler and pencil to measure and mark 4-inch sections—you should have a couple inches left unused, so if one side is more bent/crushed, then don't use that side.

Once you cut up all your sheets, you'll have a stack of usable recycled paper to print on! If some sheets are extra bent up, you can use an iron to smooth them a bit—just set it high, with no steam, and go over the back (no printing) side until it's smooth. (That won't get rid of creases, but it should make them smooth enough to print on.) Load the sheets into your printer just as you would 4x6 photo paper (make sure the blank sides are facing the right way).

As for what to print, as is the case with normal white paper, photos with lots of detail will not look their best printed on non-photo paper. I recommend printing either graphic images (solid colors, clear lines, no/little shading, or small details) or plain text. In the photo below, you can see part of a regular photo I printed, with a dark blue background color, which came out a bit faded and not very sharp. So, I edited that same photo to inverse it (make it the negative image) and raise the contrast, so it's an almost blank background now. Also, I have a photo printer, so photographic images still print out pretty well even on the brown paper; if you have a non-photo printer, you'll probably want to stick to simple graphic images and text only.

Set your printer settings to 4x6 size, plain paper, to print on the recycled bag paper.

Now that you have your card images, you can make your actual cards. You can trim the edges off the printed pages if you want, to make the images bleed to the edges, or trim off any bent corners. Cut pieces of cereal-box-type cardboard to size, as wide as your printed page and twice as tall. Choose if you want to add a little for a border, like mine below, or cut it exactly to size. Then score across the center of the cardboard piece to make a clean crease—mark the exact center on each side, hold the ruler down connecting the marks, and run your scissors blade lightly across. Now when you fold the cardboard, it should crease neatly along the line.

Glue or tape the image centered on the card front.

Next, you'll need to cover up the inside so you can write in your card. Cut a piece of bag paper (or white paper or any other paper you want to use) to size and glue it inside. If you are making a bunch of cards, such as thank-you's for wedding gifts for example, then you could stop here and be done (hand-embroidering every single card would take forever!). Press the glued card(s) under heavy books overnight for security, or you could use two-sided tape instead if you prefer. But if you are making one special card, you can continue along with me and stitch it up! In this case, the glue is just to hold the papers in place while you stitch, so it doesn't need to be pressed and dry.

You could cut the inside paper smaller, and the box picture will create a colored border, if you like.

Here you can see how it looks on the inside.

My finished thank-you card!

For my next card, I used recycled cardboard facing the other way, so the inside is blank, ready for writing. So, I cut a scrap of bag paper to cover the back side of the card, and I cut the cardboard exactly to size, with no border. This card is for Mother's Day—I found the image on dryicons.com; vector graphics like this are perfect for printing on recycled bag paper.

The papers are glued down just in the middle, since I'll be stitching it down around the edges.

For this one, I used a hole punch to punch small holes around all the edges, and across the top by punching through front and back layers together.

You could measure and mark dots to be perfectly even, but I just punched mine freehand and messy.

Then I used a yarn needle and thin ribbon to go through all the holes, starting at one top corner and ending at the other, as I show here with the arrows:

I sewed one tiny button onto one of the flowers as a final touch!

 

Here's what the inside looks like.

 

My finished Mother's Day card!

And for my last card, I used a recycled blank greeting card. I am lucky to live near a reuse store where items like blank greeting cards get donated and sold for pennies apiece, but if you're not so lucky, you can reuse cards you've received and cover the insides with blank paper as I did with the thank-you

card.

For this card, I machine-sewed the paper to the card, first with a zigzag stitch around the border, then with a messy straight stitch, scribbled above and below the text.

Don't glue the paper to the card for this method, as it could mess up your machine!

I used blue thread on top and orange on the bottom, so bits of orange would peak through and add color to the card.

Here's what the inside of the card looks like.

I love the look of scribbled machine stitching! Just sew back and forth, moving the paper from one side to the other.

My finished graduation card!

And now for the envelope! Use a piece of grocery bag paper, cut to about 2 inches wider than your card and 1 to 2 inches taller than twice the height (depending on how big you want the flap). The image below shows how to cut

the paper—the bottom section of envelope paper should be a little shorter than the envelope height (about a half inch). First, cut the orange lines to get the rectangle, then cut the red lines next to form the flap and the bottoms of the tabs...

These simple cuts will give you an envelope custom-fit to your card.

...then cut the pink lines, which form the tops of the tabs, and the sides of the top flap. First, fold the bottom flap up over the card to mark the lines. The tab side lines should each go from the top corner of the card, to the edge, lined up with the top of the envelope flap, as shown in the photo below:

The bottom of that pencil line is exactly lined up with the top of the envelope flap.

The exact angle of the top flap is up to you—you can choose to make it curved if you want. Now crease and glue those side flaps in, and your envelope is done! You can close it with glue, tape, or a sticker.

A custom recycled paper envelope is the perfect wrapper for your recycled card!

I made some other envelopes from leftover pieces along the sides and the bottom of the bags, making the envelope size more limited. So, one of them has smaller side and top flaps, and the other has flaps that go around to the other side because of the way the bag was cut. Using what I had left over and making it work meant using up parts that would otherwise be trash—ultimate recycling!

You don't have to follow my exact template to make envelopes that function.

Of course, all of my decorative details are just ideas—be creative and personalize your cards to your crafty taste!

Some papers from the recycling bin and scraps of thread can make for an awesome custom card!