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Upcycle

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My husband B has spent a great deal of time trying to come up with different projects for upcycling.  Ultimately, his dream would be to salvage wood from old, falling down barns and make it into furniture.  Since the flood that all but destroyed our other house 2 years ago also took out his wood shop, those ideas have been put on hold for the time being.  Enter phase two...

What is upcycling?  "Upcycling is the process of converting waste materials or useless products into new materials or products of better quality or a higher environmental value." en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Upcycling

With my dedication to learning to sew and quilt last year I got a nice sewing machine for my birthday.  B learned the basics of sewing when he was a kid and brainstormed the perfect re-usable bag (not a new idea) out of our chicken feed bags (his idea).  This is his project 100% and I'm so proud of him! He made a prototype bag as a gift for a close friend at Christmas.  It's completely sewn and very sturdy.  Last week he spoke to the feed manufacturer whose assembly person was more than happy to talk to him and give him information on how they ensure strength in the bags.  So what does he do in a blizzard?  Work diligently on the handles and forms of 8 bags that we can use to hold produce for our farm box families! 
Upcycle
What Ideas do you have for re-purposing everyday stuff??

3 comments:

julochka said...

what an awesome idea for your produce boxes!! so completely in the spirit of what it's all about. and sewn by a boy to boot. i'm swooning.

Anneli/Bockfilz said...

There's so much to recycle in everyday life if you keep your eyes open: re-using boxes and containers of all kind, chopping up textiles and sewing something else out of it - and definitively re-using paper - for note books, pads, bags ... (I wrote about it in a recent posting).

To me, it seems this is the year where recycling is finally becoming a big subject for lots of people!

Jude said...

I love this! What a fantastic idea! Bravo!