Upcycled Design Lab Blog

Upcycled Emergency Travel Kit

Oh Ho Ho!!!  The holidays are fast approaching and as usual I am feeling more than a bit unprepared.  I had planned to make a lot of my gifts this year but as I have not started a single one I may need to come up with plan B.  I fear I may end up being the gift card giver this year which is a fine gift to receive but not very creative or fun to give. 

 

On to this weeks project.  You may remember the Abstract Snowflakes from last week which left me with some empty CD sleeves.

 

 

I don't know where the idea sprang from but it occurred to me that I could make a travel kit with them.  I was wishing for some inspiration on a Christmas gift but this is what the universe sent me.  So I went with it.

 

I didn't get very good pictures of this step but the gist of it is that the top of a zip lock (preferable a used one) is cut off and glued into the top of the CD sleeve to prevent all your stuff from spilling out.

 

 

I decided to use some old cardboard boxes for the cover and some extra contact paper that I had.  It occurs to me now that covering it with an old map would have been a better idea but I never seem to finish a project without wanting to improve on it.

 

 

I used the bottom hem piece from one of my 20 T-shirt to hold my travel kit together.  So I am actually considering this as one of my T-shirt projects.  This might be a bit of a stretch but since I am trying to use up all of the material from all 20 t-shirts I am having to be a little creative :-)

 

 

 

I filled the first pouch with first aid items.

 

 

And the second with sewing items.

 

 

Note:  the safty pin and needle holder is a label from one of my 20 t-shirts. :-)

 

The third pouch I decided to fill with emergency activities for when the battery is dead on your i-pad or smart phone.  In true upcycling form I cut out the Suduko and Crossword puzzles from the paper.

 

 

And made my own set of Dominoes from more of my card board boxes and contact paper.

 

 

It all fits into this small booklet.

 

 

 

Happy Upcycling,

 

 

Upcycled Abstract Snowflakes - Christmas Tree Decorations

 

 

So.....What can you make from this stuff?

 

 

 

Well with a little cutting.

 

 

Ok a lot of cutting.

 

 

You can make Plarn.  And then you can make Pom Poms.

 

 

And braids

 

 

And then with some glue and imagination you can make these.

 

 

Happy Upcycling,

 

A brief history of past projects - Part 2

Two years ago for Christmas I took the easy road and gave gift cards to everyone.  Because I was giving such a plain and simple gift I decided that the wrapping at least should be extravagant.  Here is what I came up with for my nieces.

Wrapping #1 - Upcycled cereal boxes, pop tart boxes, CD, and found objects.

 

Wrapping #2 - Upcycled Cigar Box, Toilet paper tubes, Cardboard and found objects

 

I got the inspiration for this from A fanciful twist blog post "A peek inside the city house".  You have to scroll down to the middle of the post to find the dresser that inspired this wrapping but take your time there is lots of eye candy along the way.

Wrapping #3- Upcycled book, cardboard (I think this is my favorite)

First I removed every other page to get rid of some of the bulk.  Then I glued several pages together and cut the skirt shape.

 
I decorated the pages with some of my favorite quotes and some vintage pictures.  Here are a few of the pages.

 
 
 
 

The last page had a pocket for the gift card.

 
To make the "doll" part I used cardboard and a printed picture.  I put netting at the waist to make the skirt and a strip of cardboard slid into the spin of the book.

 
Here is the complete project.