Monday, April 2, 2012

CRAFT: Earrings from Recycled Plastic


Can you guess what these were in their "first life"??

So, I was tossing the inspiration for these into the trash one day (before they had a recycling program here where I live), and I thought "what a neat pattern".  I decided to experiment a little and this is what I came up with.  I took the plastic and cut out the interesting portion.  I kept trimming it until I ended with this design. It was clear, so I grabbed the pointed end Sharpie (permanent) and started to "color" from behind.  Shortly, I had a nice black and red "snake skin-like" dangle.  I searched through a box of broken jewelry and found a pair of sterling screw-backs that were incomplete--so I removed the old pieces and attached the dangles to the backs with a couple of jump rings.  Voila!  Earrings from a--did you guess where the plastic came from?--a bottle of Wish-bone® dressing!  I don't even eat salad dressing...but my husband does.  
I'm not even sure the bottles are made the same way now.  The point of this exercise is to remember to take a look at what you are throwing away or tossing into the recycle bin.  Can you see some other use for it...can you give it a second life?  If you love to craft, you can certainly turn your trash into treasures!

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