Spread the Word

As 2010 comes to an end, I'm feeling pretty optimistic about the new year! There are so many project I want to pursue; so many ways I want to spread the word about repurposing! I see so much waste out there. And I want to make everyone aware of it and help them learn how to make less waste and learn how to repurpose or recycle what they have! We can surround ourselves with beauty and function without spending a fortune or even going to the mall. Recycling, reinventing gives you such a feeling of satisfaction. Make something old - new again; it's fun, it feels good and it helps the environment.
And speaking of being satisifed, my husband and I gave everyone on our Christmas list - chalkboards! We made chalkboards out of repurposed mirrors and frames and blackboard paint. I think everyone that received a chalkboard was pleased. We used elegant and fancy frames; we wanted the chalkboards to be functional art; we didn't want them to look like "school". The blackboard paint is very cool! We used matte black, even though there are many colors to choose from; red, purple, green. I have so many ideas; I saw a globe painted with the black and used as a memo pad. I want to get an old sled; paint the seat part with the chalkboard paint and hang it on the front porch and use it to post seasonal greetings. The blackboards are very functional and practical. They are a good way to communicate and save paper. They can be used in the kitchen, the office or almost anywhere.
With the close of this year; my thoughts are also on the past. I've been thinking about what a huge influence my mother has been on my passion for recycling and repurposing. My mom was recycling before it was popular or cool. She was very "crafty" and frugal. I remember collecting cattails, milkweed pods and thistles; spray painting them gold and making Thanksgiving centerpieces. I also remember the year she made the whole family robes out of towels. They were functional and groovy! We even wore them to the public pool over our bathing suits. Mom found quite a few ways to repurpose used plastic bleach jugs. She made cute, little buckets to store curlers and similar items. She made bedwarmers for those cold winter nights. I remember hesitantly putting my cold toes on hot water filled jugs at the bottom of my bed.
Mom is still pretty creative, she made a quilt out of T-shirts from her travels. She recently made a handbag from a man's tweed jacket. We often share ideas for new materials for handbags and quilts.Thanks, Mom, for the creativity gene.

So Much Stuff, So Little Time

There are so many recyclable materials out there and so little time. I don't have to go out searching for stuff - it just appears somehow. I'm not a hoarder - really! But I have acquired a lot of nice old stuff. So my project box is overflowing. That's the fabric and vintage linens box. There's a headboard for a single bed out in the barn; I want to make a bench. There are a few old single wooden chairs out there too. A chair is always a chair it can't really be repurposed into something else. But I love to rescue old wooden chairs. They seem so lonely when they're by themselves. Oh yeah, I guess I feel the need to rescue old upholstered chairs too. I have a great memory of rescuing an old upholstered chair one Thanksgiving day. The whole extended family got involved, we had a blast! And spent the whole day planning what would become of this chair. Well, it got covered with an old quilt that I got at an auction for one dollar!
There is also a box of old trophies in the barn too - something wonderful could be done with them - but what? Maybe a hood ornament for the car? Top my bed posts with four little bowlers!

And speaking of bowling, I don't bowl, but I love vintage bowling paraphernalia. I have bowling balls in my yard as lawn ornaments. They look like gazing balls and add a little color to a winter garden; and the dogs love to play with them. I have a really cool pair of yellow and green Japanese bowling shoes. I don't wear them often; I don't want to ruin them; they are sooo cool! I carry my ice skates in a vintage bowling bag. This causes a lot of stares at the ice skating rink!

I'm making purses right now, I have been commissioned to make some special ones for the holidays. As I work on them, my mind is full of ideas for new ones. I've been really thinking about these awful velour rug/wall hangings I somehow acquired. I think they would make funky, sturdy totes for the winter season. I have made really cute bags and purses out of vintage tablecloths, vinyl tablecloths, table runners, and old pillow covers. I made a really cool bag out of a souvenir Niagara Falls pillow. My sister claimed that one! My go-to most reliable material for handbags is upholstery fabric. It is sturdy and comes in a lot of real fun patterns. I picked up rolls of it at a local fabric outlet.

The purse on the left is made out of a wall hanging!
I am also making lavender sachets out of old linens. The lavender is from my garden. It's all organic. And they are for sale! Each one is one of a kind. I keep a sachet in my car, my suitcase, my desk at work. Lavender is sooo calming!

Repurposed Ties

As I suspected a man's necktie serves no practical purpose. Ties are strictly nonfunctional. I even went so far as to research it. But I've always loved men's ties. Men started wearing ties literally hundreds of years ago. The tie got skinny and fat, long and short and back again, they've never been out of style. They have always been worn for strictly decorative purposes.

Impractical as they are, I love ties. A lot of men grumble at the idea of having to wear a tie, and call it a noose and other names along that line, but these men have to admit they feel dressed up when they put on a tie. Occasionally, they make an appearance in women's fashion; I even wore ties in the eighties! And hey, all you men out there that I have commented on your tie, I'm not flirting with you, I really am interested in your tie!

Ties are complicated pieces of craftsmanship, layers and layers of material. Even cheap ties get pretty complicated, I should know I've deconstructed quite a few. My first repurposed tie project, a quilt, started out as a vest. I got so many ties and was so excited by the project, it became a quilt. I just sewed the ties together, I didn't take them apart, so the quilt is really, really heavy. It used to hang on the wall. We joked that it would kill us if we put it on the bed. After that project I learned to deconstruct the ties. There is a lot to a tie, no wonder they can get expensive. Some of them even have foam in them. A couple of them were folded up so complicated it was like origami. I've made many bags, and purses and etc. from ties. I have made a few bags for friends from ties from a deceased loved one. The people who receive these bags are always so pleased, because they have a beautiful, functional item that reminds them of their loved one. I haven't got tired of making stuff with ties yet, I have a whole box of newly acquired ties, from the 1950-60's, just waiting to be made into a vest or another quilt!

The infamous very heavy tie quilt -

Here is the dress I made out of the 1970's bedspread, I bought the bedspread at a yard sale for 50 cent! How awesome is that! I'm ready for the office, dinner out or ready for bed!

My latest project is a rug I'm making out of used plastic grocery shopping bags! I'm crocheting it. It's more time consuming than I had thought, it will take a while and a lot of bags to finish it! I'm in no hurry, it's a good TV watching project. I use cloth bags for grocery shopping so I'm not collecting that many used plastic bags and you know, that's okay, the rug can wait.

Shared Passion

My need to repurpose is not limited to fabric and fashion. I am very fortunate to be married to someone who feels as passionately as I do about repurposing. My husband can see new life in old objects that I can't see. He gets very excited about historical and rare building materials. He is very practical and honest, too. If he thinks something structurally won't work, he lets me know and I give up on the idea or find a new purpose. He sees solutions to remodeling projects without the need to go to the chain hardware stores. He often helps me figure out the logistics of some of my decorating/building ideas. If I see a use for something but I don't know how to construct it, he steps in and comes up with a solution or an even better use for it.

A very good example of his resourcefulness is when he remodeled our computer/TV room. When we bought the house this room was totally unfinished, there was just insulation hanging there, no drywall etc. My husband made shelves and paneling out of board from our barn. There were partitions inside of our 100+ year old barn. These walls weren't necessary to the structure of the barn and we really had no need for all the little rooms. So, he tore apart the inside of the barn to make shelves, wall paneling and a desk for the computer. I admit I thought he was crazy, but our computer room is awesome! We painted the paneling and shelves and stained the timber for the desk and some of the bigger pieces of timber - the top of the shelves. He made a ceiling, out of many, many little pieces of wood, so it would look like the bottom of the above floor. I am very proud of this room. We have some old doors, we have to hang yet, but this is my favorite room in the house.

Another major project, that we tackled, is the sidewalk and patio. Again when we moved in to this house (a fixer upper), there was no front sidewalk leading from the driveway to the house. We didn't look very hospitable. We talked about the standard cement sidewalk, but.....my dad told us that they were going to tear up the old Pennsylvania slate sidewalk in front of his house. PA slate is very rare today, especially the big slabs that made up this sidewalk. My husband decided we could use this to make our sidewalk, and I got the great idea to make a patio as well. There was more than enough of this rock. Well, my dad lives some two hundred miles away, so we rented a big truck and went and got this slate. Some of the pieces weighed over 500 lbs. apiece! It was hard work, but well worth it. We have a welcoming sidewalk and cozy patio that reminds me of my family and my childhood home.

Frugality & Creativity

Why the need to make fashion out of odd materials? Mostly because I don't want to dress like everyone else. I want to show my creativity; to be an individual. I admit I like to stand out in the crowd for my funkiness! I am extremely proud of wearing one-of-a-kind fashion. When people ask where I got something, I love to respond "I made it myself!" And to be honest I can't afford to dress the way I want to dress, so I make my own. So it's necessity too!

When I was a little girl I would wrap myself up in curtains and sheets trying to look like a glamorous movie star or an ethereal being. I even wrapped Barbie up in paper bags and tissues! Yes, I LOVE Barbie! I created so many fashionable outfits for her out of found materials. She even lived in a very posh cardboard box furnished with colorful Avon boxes.
And speaking of wrapping myself up in sheets and curtains, I have always been disappointed that I've never been invited to a toga party - I want to wear my fashionably draped sheet in public! But that touches on something else - my love of costumes! Let's not go there now....

A few years ago, I made a dress out of 4 bandannas, and one for a belt! I was a little bit smaller then, but, it was really cute and sexy! And so easy to make. I sewed two bandannas together for the front and than two together for the back, sewed up the shoulders, leaving a hole for the neck, it was a boat-neck. Then I sewed up the sides, leaving holes for the arms. No need to hem. Belt it with a different color bandanna and it's done! Quick, cool and easy! Maybe it would take six or eight bandannas now... but still cute and cheap!

I made this skirt out of an embroidered tablecloth. I love this! It was only $3.00. I like to wear this with boots. I always feel like an exotic gypsy when I wear this!

A Passion for Repurposing

I have a passion for repurposing.

Repurposing isn't new - it's just a new term. I've been repurposing and recycling all my life, and I think I come by it honestly, my mother was a recycler before it was cool. In fact, I was embarrassed by her recycling ways. But not anymore, I got the "making do and making it new" gene. I think I embarrass her now!

Now with the economy being bad, recycling and repurposing is the correct thing to do. It's good for the environment and the economy. It's good for your economy. There is so much waste in the world it gives me a thrill to make something new out of something old and tired. Giving new life to old stuff, it is my creative outlet! I lay awake at night planning what to make with new found materials.

Americans have been recycling, repurposing for years. Some good examples are saving hair to make art, broaches, and etc.; painting tires white and using them as planters in your yard; and the same for old bathtubs and toilets. Tacky, but that is repurposing! An old toilet filled with petunias is something you don't see too often anymore!

I'm on a kick now where I am saving dog fur to make into yarn. Weird, maybe...but it's warm, clean, and soft and there are many good fuzzy memories of lost beloved doggies. That will be a subject for a future blog!

Quilting, of course, is the biggest example of repurposing and recycling. Woman have been making quilts out of old clothing and feedbags for generations, all over the world! I just recently made a quilt out of my friend's husband's old plaid work shirts! One of my favorite quilts!
And speaking of quilting, I am getting into my repurposing specialty.....fabrics, old clothes, old linens, and etc. Not just for quilting, which I love, but to make clothes, purses, FASHION!!

This is a handbag I just made out of old wool pants! Pretty and practical! That's what it is all about making useful pieces out of old materials! I'm so excited! So many more projects..... I bought a old 1970's bedspread at a garage sale for 50 cents! It's fabulous! But it will make an even more fabulous dress!