We now have over 3,000 square feet for bulk item sales, a separate crafting area and a dedicated party room!  Keep an eye on our blog and calendar for class updates for adults and kids!

parachutes toys that sneak their way into our house from party favor bags. 

He is entertained by it.  He climbs to the top of the stairs, and drop it to his sister below.  They giggle and squeal with delight, until.... the strings get tangled and the little parachute man is rendered useless. 

This weekend we devised our own Parachute Jumper using the plastic that wraps our bulk toilet paper purchase. 

It is pretty simple to make one of these at home.   Here is what you need:

• Large piece of plastic packaging material.
• Scissors
• A large round bowl or lid to use as a template
• Permanent marker for tracing, and colorful markers for decorating (optional)
• A figure or type of weight for the bottom.  We made a little man out of beads, telephone wire and a tiny spool
• Thin string
• Hole punch

First, open up the plastic, cutting the melted corners off. 

Next, trace the large circle on the plastic.

Decorate it however you would like with permanent markers.  Cut the circle out carefully.

Hole punch a hole, about an inch in, on "four corners" making large rectangle with the hole punches. 

Tie the string onto the 4 corners, and attach to your Parachute Jumper, two on each hand.

Finally.... climb up and let it fly down!

Materials Needed 

For this craft, you need:

• a bowlful of eco-friendly packing peanuts.  (The kind that dissolve when you get them wet.) 
• some washable markers, if you want to color them.
• a wet sponge in a small bowl
• scissors

To create, simply dampen the part of the packing foam you want to attach to the other piece of packing foam, and touch them together.

We learned a few things from making our crafts:

• You can roll the foam between your hands, and the moisture on your hands will condense the foam.  This helps if you need a smaller piece.  Also, cutting pieces to the shapes you would like works great. 
• A few pieces of year or fabric scraps and be intergrated to this craft quite easily.  Just use a dab of glue to attach. 

Here are some pictures of the art we created.

Don't have any packing peanuts handy?  You can buy one of our Playing With Packing Peanuts Art Kits.    reCREATE is a nonprofit organization.  Our mission is to divert clean, safe, usable materials from entering our landfills... and we use those materials to encourage creativity and art!  Our art kits can be found at:  http://www.recreate.org/art-kits/

We started a camp at reCREATE today called Labyrinths, Catapults and More!  We have a week full of mazes, crafts and fun.  Today the kids made their own Marble Runs.    I love marble runs, but refuse to spend $40 to $100+ one buying an already made one. 

The materials we used for our marble runs were:

• a flat pizza box for the base (you could also reuse a piece of foam core or other big piece of cardboard)
• strips of scrap paper and sparkly tape.
• some L shaped packing edges.  (We cut these down to shorter lengths with a saw)
• paper towel tubes of differing lengths, pained bright colors
• craft paint for painting the background of the marble run (the pizza box)
• hot glue gun for putting it all together
• glitter, stickers, etc. for decorating
• two egg holders from an egg carton

We started by having the kids paint their flat pizza box.  

Then we started laying out the marble course.  We would glue down a new piece, test it, and glue down the next thing.  We learned quickly, that it was more exciting if it went back and forth more than just straight down, right away. 

Here is what some of the finished marble runs looked like:

And here is one in action!

We are looking for some people that will allow us to share their creativity on our blog.  Our vision is to have a hoppin' blog packed with great ideas and tutorials of crafts made from reCREATE items.   Our Creative Team will also post crafts that  promote our classes, products and reuse concepts at reCREATE.

We offer you an exciting opportunity to participate in our mission to inspire others with your projects, encouraging them to find their inner artist, get creative and have fun!   We will rely on our Creative Team to help us tell the region about the great treasures we have at reCREATE.  We hope that participation on this team will generate friendships and camaraderie among like-minded creative types helping build the reCREATE community.   What type of creative talent are we looking for?  Sewing, knitting, crocheting, sculpture, child crafting, wire-work, jewelry making, mosaic, collage, trashion, you name it – we are game if you are reusing materials!

Requirements - Creative team members must commit to the following:

• A school year commitment to membership on the reCREATE Creative Team (September to June)
• Two projects per month made from upcyling materials like those we have at reCREATE. (Probably one child’s craft and one adult craft)
• Having your own blog where you also post your projects would be a plus, including a link to our website for materials.
• Additional projects given by invitation, such as seasonal projects.
• We may also ask you to provide an in-person tutorial up to two times per year, if you have an interest.

In exchange, we offer you:

• A $25 monthly allowance of reCREATE materials
• A 25% discount on ALL classes and other purchases
• The opportunity to help a nonprofit showcase art that will inspire others to make art, not waste.

Entry Details

To apply for the Creative Team for reCREATE:

1.Choose two or three of your best projects.

2.Upload your photos to the reCREATE Creative Team Search gallery on our facebook page.

3. Include a description of what was reused, and include a link if you have a blog or tutorial of the craft.

Entries will be accepted until 11:59 p.m. Pacific August 30st, 2010.

Creative Team members will be announced September 4th.

Take this post... for making Barbie Headbands from a few sequins and the plastic rim of a bottle.  Love it!

http://zakkalife.blogspot.com/2010/07/upcycle-craft-doll-headbands.html

We were out recently at a Vendor fair at Whole Foods and made bracelets from scraps of fabric, inspiried from this:

http://itsahodgepodgelife.blogspot.com/2010/02/rag-braceletall-grown-up.html

We added some faux flkowers to ours and this is what they looked like!

I saw a number of blog posts for recycling crayons recently, and one Make and Take that suggested Valentine's Cards... so we whipped these up for Zach and Sela to take for their Valentines cards. We used the gazillion restaurant crayons that they always HAVE to take, when we leave - which is better than tossing them - but I was thinking we would be buried in Red, Blue and Yellow crayons until this great project came along!

I used a silicone heart baking tray, we broke the crayons in pieces, heated them up to 300, watched them melt, pulled them out, let them cool, and repeated until we have 48 beautiful chunky crayons for their Valentines! Easy Peasy!

Like the idea - but not the mess?  Join us for our Recycled Crayon Class coming up!

Today I made a couple of cards - all from paper samples that were donated to reCREATE. 

The first card I am calling "Headline News."

In this card I use vertical l strips of newspaper behind a reverse die cut (what is left after you get your cutout.  I also took a pink heart, and added paper onto it.  Run your card through the printer for your caption, before you do anything else.  I just glued the newspaper strips on with a glue stick. 

Then I glued the strips on to the coordinating pink heart.  I wanted the pink heart to "pop", so I put a piece of cardboard from a cereal box behind it, and glued it down.

Je t'aime Card # 2

One day while reading the paper, I noticed that the edge of the newpaper has quite a pretty almost ruffled edge to it.  I have made several cards using that edge, and quite like the results.

Again, I used scraps of paper that were donated to reCREATE.    This card is so simple, because it doesn't matter if the p[ieces are perfectly straight.  Just place them howevery you want your card to look.  Be usre to print out your caption, and then glue them down.  I glue them upward, so if an edge needs to be hidden, it is consistent. Finally, trim the edges, and voila!  It is done!

 Oh... if you are looking for a key word... I have two.... "Love is"...

Now... Hop on over to take a look at the beautiful ATCs Sarah has whipped up over at:

http://readnscrap.blogspot.com/

 If you are enjoying our blog hop, please join our yahoo group createitgreen.  We have art lotteries, blog hops, and ceative challenges - it is some serious green artsy fun!

Thanks for stopping by!  If you leave a comment, I will be randomly picking someone for a RAK - goodie bag of scrapbook paper. 

Making a banner from fabric may sound daunting - especially for non-sewers.  We have actually found a way to construct them with little or no sewing at all.  The banners come out beautiful, and Are made from Fabric Sample Books - so the cutting is minimal!

Join us to learn how to make a banner on February 12th from 7pm to 10pm.  For $18.00 you will learn how to whip up a fabric banner and go home with your own Happy Birthday Banner!  To sign up for the class, call 916.749.3717