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GKT Blog

SPOONS!

11/26/2009 08:53
Recently, I became a member of Greene Keene Teens. My friend Lucy, the president and founder of the club, got me involved. After learning that there was a club meeting coming up, I decided to try and brainstorm about the club’s ongoing topic, disposable cutlery in schools. I consider myself to be somewhat of a visual and artistic person, so I thought about the issue that way. The best way to bring about change is to wake people up, I believe. The 31 billion plastic utensils disposed in the USA alone every year have to be heard. Their screams must be heard. The screams are loud. These screams must be expressed artistically, through an event of sorts. My idea is to try and collect as many plastic spoons from schools and businesses that would like to get involved. Thousands upon thousands of spoons would be a great way to represent the innumerable waste of cutlery plastics every year.

As a club, we could take each and every spoon, and draw frowning faces on them to depict how each and every spoon disposed is sad, because each and every one contributes to waste. With thousands of sad spoons, we could turn heads. Make an event out of it. We could set them up, in lines, in a field, to represent how truly countless the waste is in our environment. We could get sponsors to donate a small amount for every spoon set up. The event would be in the public eye, somewhere that everyone can witness. After the event, we could ask visitors to pick up a few spoons, to try and get them to visualize that the mess we are creating is not an easy thing to dispose of. By realizing the issue of plastic waste is hard to dispose of, hopefully people would cut down on disposal in the first place. The goal would be not only to change the ways of the people, but of schools across America who go through hundreds of plastic utensils every day.

Greenciles

08/15/2009 20:22
As a fundraiser and as a way to provide people with new ways o be environmentally friendly, the Green Keene Teens have been selling Greenciles. Greenciles are pencils made from recycled newspaper. Since the pencils are made of recycled newpaper the shavings can be put into the recycling bin to be recycled! Anyway, my dad works at Hamshaws, which is a local lumber store. I’m happy to announce that Hamshaws has recently become an outlet for the sale of the Greenciles. This is exciting because now more people can use Greenciles.

Towards the end of school last year, I started to ask if any of my teachers would want to buy Greenciles to use in the classroom. To my surprise, not many teachers wanted to. One day I asked my English teacher if he wanted to buy some Greenciles. He told me that it would be great to use the greenciles in school, but, unfortunately he declined to buy any himself. Instead of just turning me away he gave me advice. He thought it would be a good idea if I asked the school board if it was possible to put the Greenciles in the school budget. I talked with the administration, and after some consideration, they decided that Greenciles couldn’t be used, but a similar pencil by Papermate was put on the list.

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Pizza Box of the Future!

08/09/2009 19:50
I stumbled across this
video on a podcast called The Best of YouTube. Number 428 is the Green Box! There is a company called Eco Incorporated, and their first product is the Green Box. Not only is this pizza box made of 100% recycled and recyclable corrugated cardboard, it is also handy for more than holding a pizza. If you tear the top off along two perforations, you can create four serving plates, ideal for the family unit to carry around or bring anywhere. The bottom, with just a couple of tears along the sides, is transformed into a convenient storage container for leftovers. Check out Eco Inc.'s website here. It has a link on the website to the video.

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Magazine crafts!

07/26/2009 12:09

Just the amazing thing you can do with old magazines.

The girl that made this wrote that she found the idea in a book (Mark Montano's Big-Ass Book of Crafts) and tried it out, but I guess it took her hours to finish it.  All this project requires is a lot of patience, plenty of old magazines, glue,
and some varnish (or something else to finish and seal it).  I think I would love to make one of these, not only are they unique and artistic, they're made from recycled magazines!!!  Love this idea!
 
This was made completely out of old magazines!!!  This is quite a feat! 

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Poop!

07/26/2009 11:44
So since many people have dogs, I thought that this would be an appropriate topic. While you’re taking your adorable companion for a stroll in the park, he decides to make a pit stop to relieve itself. What do you do with his steaming pile? You should have answered, pick it up and put it in a plastic bag! But why use a regular plastic bag when you could get a biodegradable one instead! These great bags require no ‘pooper-scooper’ and they are also flushable! The price is not unbelievable either, only about $20 for over 100 bags, they don’t charge shipping fees either! Plus, their motto is “Save our plant one poop at a time”. Another reason to use them is that 10% of all sales are donated to help puppies in need. Check their site out, to get free samples. What a great way to help puppies and save our planet!

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Prep Day

07/13/2009 12:02
We recently had a prep day for the Harrisville Old Home Days event on July 9th. Lucy and I went to Price Chopper at around 9:30 to get granola bar ingredients, then we went to Walmart to get earring hooks and links. I couldn’t believe how cheap they were! Using the shrinky dink method of recycling certain types of plastics we could make adorable earrings (very chic and summer-ish) at a minimal cost. Then, if we were to sell them for at least $5, we would be making a huge profit! I love when we recycle and profit from it, it’s so exciting!

On this day, Laura brought templates for making envelopes from magazines or any kind of paper. Although at first I thought it was a great creative idea, I had doubts on whether we could sell it or not. I had often used an envelope template myself to make original ones out of scrap booking paper, but I didn’t think they would be much of a hit… BUT IT WAS! I guess people liked the abstract idea and they just go for the creativeness of them. Another hit item created that day was the cards. We had previously made beautiful paper from sheets lying about the house, and with those we made cards. They could be greeting cards, birthday cards, get well cards, or anything else you can think of. They were waiting to be bought and written on. We made so many and only a handful were left over from Saturday, they are definitely worth making again. So, the moral of this blog is that when you can recycle (whether for a fundraiser or not) do it!

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Wasted School Supplies

07/07/2009 09:49
Finally school is out! Summer is here! Woot, woot!
Last week I had the urge to clean all of my binders and folders. I had saved all of my work throughout the year (just in case), and complied a huge pile of paper in the corner of my room. As I dumped the rest of my papers on the pile I realized I could make a blog out of how much paper we get and use in school.

The sad part of it is, about half of the paper I got I didn’t even look at after it got passed around the room in school because it didn’t really help me learn or study. But of course I recycled everything I could. The folders and the binders that are trashed of still sitting in my room, maybe I’ll try to doctor them up for more use…?

For next year I’m going to try to get school supplies that are recycled or will be able to be recycled after use (binders). Here is a site to check out some of the products out there, that was just the first site that came up when I googled.

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Corn Pens & Buying NOTHING

05/25/2009 08:48
So here's just something I thought was really cool. There is a completely biodegradable pen MADE OF CORN. How awesome is that? It's exactly like a regular pen with blue ink, and mine is actually green (color-wise)! And this pen will disintegrate in about 12 months after being discarded. What an awesome option for when you need a pen, because this isn't that much harder to get a hold of than a regular pen. I found this on a website that makes a lot of green products, some made of PLA, an alternative to plastic that is just as durable, but is biodegradable and MADE FROM CORN, which makes it extra awesome. You can use it for cups, cutlery, trash bags, combs, razors and more, and it only takes 30-45 days to compost. To find out more, check out this website: 2wplastic.com.



So I was listening to this Harry Potter podcast the other day (I know, I'm such a nerd!), and I heard this story about these two guys who are going to try to go two months (I think) without buying anything new. Obviously, there are a few exceptions, like they're allowed to buy food or other necessary/emergency items. But the basic idea is for them to go a little bit to an extreme in order for them to appreciate more what they do have. I thought this was a really cool way to learn to cut back on unnecessary items and be more eco-friendly, because we live in a consumer culture, and really, it isn't necessary for us to buy every new thing we see on t.v. This was a cool way to put things into perspective.

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Make a Rice Bag Heating Pad

03/28/2009 12:54
My friend had a rice bag heating pad at her house the other day when I went over, and since my hands were cold we stuck the bag in the microwave for about 2 minutes to warm it up and ta-dah! Instant moist heat radiating from a reusable heating pad! She bought hers somewhere, but I figured I could just make one out of old clothes I don‘t ever wear anymore. So I made 4 small bags to stick into your pockets and slippers, and 2 larger ones for warming up my feet when I go to sleep. (Which, by the way, is working wonderfully. Both my mom and I use them every night because it‘s quite relaxing and our beds are always cold when we first get in.) This is much more versatile than a disposable one-time heating pad sold at Walmart, it’s fun and easy to make, and definitely better than throwing your clothes away. Apparently, these make amazingly cute last minute gifts too.


Here’s how to make it:

Get an old T-shirt (any kind of clothing you don’t wear anymore, but preferably stretchy and soft, but NO METALLIC - remember it‘s going into the microwave!)

Cut out rectangles twice the size of however large you want the bag to be (for instance, if you want a medium sized bag, cut out a rectangle the size of a sheet of paper 8x11 inches)

Fold it in half and sew (either by hand or sewing machine) two short sides of the rectangle together with the inside of the shirt facing outwards

Now, the bag should look like an inside-out tube. It should be a rectangle (or square) half the size of what you started out with when it’s lying flat on the table

Sew the bottom of the bag together (still inside-out)

Turn the bag inside-out so that the outside of the shirt is facing out and the inside facing inwards

Fold about an inch of the top of the bag into itself so that the frayed edges are now inside the bag

Pin that part you just folded so it wont spring back out

Put some white long grain (NOT INSTANT) rice in the bag (I suggest that it’s full but not too full so the bag can conform to your feet or hand shape)

Sew up the top. You’re all done!

Here are some tips and info:

DO NOT WASH IT!!

Microwave it for only a minute the first time you use it so you don’t smell a burning scent then add a minute or two depending on how hot you want it (the length of time you microwave it for depends on the amount of rice you have in it, so until you know how hot you want it and how long it takes to make it that hot, do it in one minute intervals)

It stays warm for quite a while

Don’t over-do it or you will scald (maybe even burn) yourself

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