zero waste recycled Mother’s Day cards

Filed in Blog, Guest Posts by on March 17, 2011 10 Comments
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Some of Sian's recycled mother's day cards

Some of Sian's recycled mother's day cards

As you know, when it comes to arts and crafts I was at the end of the queue for the gene. However, our guest poster today was definitely at the front! I’ve had the pleasure of meeting Sian and her family and when I met her Sian’s table was strewn with all sorts of wonderful creative projects from Morsbags to knitted socks. Today she is sharing an inspiring post about some  recycled mother’s Day cards she has just made.

Sian is a freelance craft writer and mum to four boys ranging from 12 to 2 1/2.  She has been crafting since the age of 6 and at the last count she could do over 60 different crafts.  She Loves to re-use things to stop them ending up in the recycling box.  You can follow her crafty activities on Psychodelic elephants.

Mothering Sunday Traditions

Mothering Sunday as it started out in this country was the one day that serving girls got to go home to see there mothers.  Being serving girls they didn’t have access to much and certainly didn’t have much money to buy anything with for their mothers when they went back home to visit.  They normally either made a Simnel cake and or pick wild flowers on the way home.  Since then of course the commercial world as picked up on the idea of Mothering Sunday or Mothers day as it is called in the US and a large amount of merchandise can be bought to gift to our mothers ranging from cute cuddly teddies to large cards with “I Love you MUM” on them.

A recycled Mother’s Day

I was thinking about this and had an idea. how about taking this tradition back to its roots and producing a present or a card out of “rubbish”.    So with this in mind I sent out creating a card for my mum with things out of the recycling box.

I started ferreting about in the recycling box and I came up with several things.

From ‘rubbish’ to recycled art

Newspaper, The Times were doing a freebie promotion the other day and I ended up with one!

Shiny paper from chocolate wrappers

Child’s painting, whilst I love the paintings my littlest does at nursery there are only so many I can keep otherwise the house would be drowning in them

Manila envelope

Scrap paper

White card backing from a shirt bought for my husband!

I lay all these things out on the kitchen table to start to play and noticed that there was a lovely contrast between the shiny paper of the chocolate wrappers and the newsprint.  So I started cutting out hearts of both the newsprint and the shiny paper!

cards-from-reused-materials

Recycled card and paper

Having cut the white card to a large rectangle 32cm x 16cm I then folded the card in half to make the right shape to start sticking the hearts on to the card.  I stuck the shiny hearts on top of the newsprint ones and then stuck them on to the card opposite each other.

recycled-card

Recycled textiles and clothes

I suddenly thought that the card needed something else just to finish it off and whilst I was thinking about it I remembered I had a pair of trousers that were beyond mending ready to go out in the bag to go to the clothes recycling so I set about with a pair of scissors and cut the buttons of them. Then I glued it with very sticky glue the button in the middle of the hearts to make it look like a flower.

recycled-card-from-reused-materials

Recycled Mothering Sunday cards

I don’t  like my hand writing so I chose not to put a sentiment on the outside of the card but if you want to put one on you could either use a rubber stamp or print some words out on the computer.

Once I started I couldn’t stop and I ending up making another two – the one below and the one at the top of the article!

recycled-mothering-sunday-card

About the Author ()

I am a long time supporter of the Green and Sustainable lifestyle. After being caught in the Boscastle floods in 2004, our family begun a journey to respect and promote the importance of Earth's fragile ecosystem, that focussed on reducing waste. Inspired by the beauty and resourcefulness of this wonderful planet, I have published numerous magazine articles on green issues and the author of four books.

Comments (10)

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  1. Sandie says:

    These cards are quite beautiful! I’m inspired to make some for mine and Simon’s Mum. Thanks for sharing.

  2. Julie Day says:

    What a good idea. Maybe I could do one instead of buying one to save money. We shall see.

  3. Teresa says:

    You don’t have to imaginative to do things like this, just practical and have manual dexterity because you can take ideas from other people and put a twist on them. Easy, really.

  4. Alyson says:

    Whilst the idea is lovely and wish I was that imaginitive, I don’t do mother’s day and I’m the mother! I’d much rather get something like that at any time of the year , spontaneously. When your child gives you a hug, for no reason, that makes a mother’s day, well it makes my day and thats enough for me.

  5. Susi says:

    What a great idea! This is something I can, and likely will, use with my Guides!! Thanks!

  6. CarSue says:

    This is a lovely idea, and one I’ve been doing for such a long time! I like to use old photos of family members that otherwise might not be enjoyed. Last year for Mother’s Day, I made my mom a card from an old greeting card I had received, and glued a photo to the front of her holding me when I was a baby. On the inside, I used scraps of lace from an old shirt to frame my message, written on the back of a pretty scrap paper.

    Reuse projects like this can turn out quite lovely! I love the shiny hearts and newspaper hearts on the first card here! Lovely!

  7. Jo says:

    These are really attractive; so glad to get new ideas because while I can copy them, I can’t think them up 🙂

  8. Sian says:

    Thank you everyone for all your nice comments about the cards I had a really great time making them and digging through the recycling box to see what I could use. Keep an eye on my blog as I in the process of making a rather yummy Easter Egg craft out of a duck egg!

  9. saandyy :)) says:

    Muyy Intereszanthee La Verdad!! Qe Con Nada Se Hagaa Algoo :))

  10. Thank you for this timely suggestion. It will be a fun craft project to do with the grandkids for their mamas. Think we’ll do it again for their papas too.

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