Upcycled inspirations: My stash of trash

This is my small box of recyclables that I'm intent on keeping because I've just got too many crafty ideas for whats inside, I hope someday I will follow through and turn this "trash", as my husband calls it, into treasures.

For the past few weeks I've been in a major reorganization mode. I'm reading Totally Organized by Bonnie McCullough and trying to get control of my house! (especially the craft room) I've purchased big shelving and drawers from Ikea and I'm almost there. I'll be posting before and after pics at a later date. Through the process I've downsized and assembled my collection of recycleable materials suitable for crafting. Here are some pics of what is in the box:
Of course I have various paper scraps, so hard to throw away! And these candle holders, what should I do with them?

Keyboard innards from our Robot Challenge. Glass bottles that had cool shapes.


The remains of ribbon spools and of course toilet paper tubes!

What am I planning to do with all this junk? I can't get rid of it because I have so many ideas to upcycle it!

My favorite is this:I saw this a while back and started keeping all my Dublin Dr. Pepper bottles, but then there were way to many so I am now limited to the bottles I have until I actually do something with them. Find the instructions here.Bottles also look great with a few coats of brightly colored spray paint, find more ideas at Someday Crafts.
I've been wanting to make tiny flag buntings with my little paper scraps, maybe color them with water color or paint, write a message on them, cute! This one I found on Etsy.This is the coolest thing to do with the keyboard insides, instructions here. Or I was thinking of making a journal cover.... I made these coasters a long time ago with the ribbon spools and foam sheets that already have adhesive on the back, simple and fun! So, of course, now I have to keep all my ribbon spools.
Some of you may remember my post from last October, showing what to do with toilet paper tubes, now I can make a huge one!

But what should I do with those candle holders?

Do you have a bin of "trash" that you can't part with for crafty hoarding reasons? My advice is keep it limited to one box, and only add to it after you've taken something out, that way it won't overtake your whole closet. And someday make something with all that stuff! Let us know if you have.

Getting Crafty with toilet paper tubes

Hi Beth A here, I thought I'd do a How-to posting for my latest favorite item to keep, toilet paper tubes! I've been keeping these things for months now, knowing I wanted to make something out of them. The first thing I made was some cute necklaces for kids to make-n-take at a "green" fair back in the spring, but I'd always thought I could make some type of window screen with cut pieces. So when I was catching up on my reading of the Craft blog I saw this post about paper tube wall art, I'll admit that I didn't actually read the instructions, but I knew that I could modify the project to become my window screen. So here is how I did it:

Mine uses only 5 toilet paper tubes.


Then I picked out a paper to cover the inside and outside of the tube (white and red), cut the paper into quarters (4.25 x 5.5 inches).
I then put the cut paper into a box to spray mount them, that way the spray doesn't get on the floor. I used 3M Super 77, but a regular spray mount or even rubber cement would probably work fine.
Then roll the paper over the tube on the outside and roll it and tuck into the inside. After they are all covered with paper, cut them with regular crafts scissors into about 1/4" slices (you should get between 9-10 slices per tube) You can cut them thinner or thicker as you like. When you cut the strips they'll get a little bent, into a leaf shape.
I then arranged them in the design pattern that I liked, it took some fussing, but I wanted something asymmetrical while still somewhat rectangular to fit into my window.
I then glued each petal together with regular school glue, I tried a glue stick first but it didn't work. I did not clothes-pin them, but you may want to depending on the intricacy of your design. I glued them one at a time keeping the design intact while lifting one slice up and gluing it.

Wah-LA! You've got to attach some string to the top, and hang it wherever needs a little inspiration.