For avid readers, altering a book’s cover or pages in any way may feel sacrilegious. But do you really honor your books by letting them accumulate dust on the shelves?
If you feel like putting your books to use after you’ve read them (maybe more than once), then give these creative, beautiful, functional projects a try. Even if your home bookshelves aren’t packed to the gills, you can check out the collections at used bookstores and still take advantage of all the benefits these DIY projects have to offer. And don’t worry: A few of these projects actually keep all the beloved pages intact.
Don’t chuck that broken umbrella! by TheGoodLifeIf your umbrella has detached from its metal spines, tie or sew it back together with waxed floss, which will endure longer than regular thread.
If it still doesn’t work, repurpose or upcycle! Here some ideas:
Halloween Chandelier– maybe upcycle a broken umbrella and use dollar tree lights? (not original source) [ Right click on link to open in new tab ] https://www.pinterest.com/pin/22306960627727209/
Hi! This is an update for DIY: Upcycled Mother’s Day Gifts ideas. Click on the link so you find ideas for crafts and tutorials [Images]. This year ecogreenlove created a YouTube playlist for more Mother’s Day gifts tutorials [16 videos]. Every year will be updated. If you have an idea or tutorial you want to share with us, please comment below or send us a message with your link.
Mother’s Day is [a nation’s] greatest guilt holiday: mothers brought us into the world, raised us, or even both, and we can at least buy them brunch and a handful of tulips, right? Of course! Stuff isn’t a proxy for love, but the National Retail Federation tells us that Americans plan to spend an average of $172.63 each on Mother’s Day festivities this year.
Mother’s Day isn’t about buying stuff for only our own personal mothers, of course, 6,285 people took this year’s phone survey, and they named some other people who they celebrate on that day. These included wives, sisters, grandmothers, daughters, friends, godmothers, and “other relatives,” which probably includes stepmothers and aunts. Shoppers said that they plan to spend about $8 on cards for the holiday, and 80% of them planned to buy at least one card.
67% of shoppers plan to buy flowers: while Valentine’s Day is the biggest holiday for giving flowers, Mother’s Day is the biggest holiday for having flowers delivered from afar.
Other odd bits from the survey? 44% of participants plan to give their mother figures gift cards for the holiday, and 14% plan to give them some kind of consumer electronics.
I think is always better if you make something by yourself to give as a gift. Is personalised, is unique, is made by your own hands, you put your time and effort on it… and the advantages is that your recipient (in this case, your mom) will love it for all of these reasons, besides that you spend almost no money, you don’t go with all of the flow and buy a card something that many other moms will get 😉
Remember, is more significant when you give something personalised you made by yourself, avoid consuming!
Once a month here in Germany there are some “Sperrmüll”, although I looked for it and there is no direct translation, is a day when garbage truck come and collect things that people signed up to throw away (big things, furniture, pieces, material,etc. that is not thrown away to the regular recycling bins). They ask to leave the stuff on a collection point (changeable, depending on the demand of the area) at least 24hrs before the collection day. When I first arrived to Germany, it was shocking all the stuff (specially on summer) that people throw away! This does not happen in Mexico (as far as I know, correct me if I’m wrong).
So every month I casually go for a walk around my neighbourhood to see what people doesn’t need anymore. You can even see stuff three days ahead. And really you can find so many things, in good conditions! There is people that already knows and arrive with a van to collect the stuff, probably the re-sell it or who knows what. We have collected many things from the “Sperrmüll”, i.e.: our bed side tables, a stool for our entrance hall, bookshelf, drawers… very useful and in great conditions, really! We saved a few euros: travelling to the nearest Ikea = 15kms (much of the furniture is bought there, convenient), time and money actually buying it.
But something that is very common to see are bed frames, which are very similar to the baby cribs rails. When searching for ideas to repurpose bed frames (I already have two, one as a shoe rack and the second still on its way to turned into a towel hanger), the bed frames I have are not precisely like the ones showing, so I searched instead for baby crib rails, and that looks more likely! So here are a few ideas to inspire you, all in one place, is a good combo I must say, enjoy!
(click on the picture to go to the original source/tutorial)
Kids’ Tent / Reading Nook (could be made with crib’s rails or bed frames)DIY Wall Chore Chart From Upcycled CribDIY Bike Rack from a Crib Rail!
Urban Agriculture is a movement towards growing and raising more food within densely populated areas of major cities. Today, about 15% of the world’s food is now grown in urban areas. Since space is limited in big cities, you may have noticed city gardens sprouting up in smaller spaces (like rooftops or apartment balconies). Another green benefit to urban gardening is that you can re-purpose old recyclable milk jugs or woven baskets and use them as containers for new veggies. Vegetables that are ideally suited for growing in containers include tomatoes, peppers, eggplant, green onions, beans, lettuce, squash, radishes and parsley.
Have you already been practicing urban agriculture and balcony or patio gardening? We would love to hear about it! What tips can you share on how to have the greenest thumb on the block?
![Creative ways to Repurpose Old Books [Infographic] | ecogreenlove](https://ecogreenlove.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/092515_repurposebooks.png?w=888&h=360&crop=1)
![Creative ways to Repurpose Old Books [Infographic] | ecogreenlove](https://i0.wp.com/www.custommade.com/blog/content/uploads/2015/07/books-embed.jpg "Creative ways to Repurpose Old Books [Infographic] | ecogreenlove")
![Urban Agriculture [Infographic] | ecogreenlove](https://ecogreenlove.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/02102015_urbangardening.png?w=888&h=360&crop=1)
ecogreenlove 