Shrink Plastic Project With Kids

In my post Recycled Bags Need Recycled Tags I shared with you how to use #6 plastic containers to make shrunken plastic tags.  At the time I thought this might be a fun craft project to do with kids.  Well I had my chance to try this project out recently with my 6 year old friend, Aubrei.

Hamming it up & ready for recycle fun!

Aubrei came to hang out with me one day while her daddy was at work.  Normally we like to go to the beach, playground  or just play outside in the yard when she visits. This time it was raining so that put a damper on our usual activities.  Time to get creative!

I took a look around the house for something fun we could do together and I found a clam shell container with the #6 in the triangle.  What luck!  I know just what to do with that.  We'll make some recycled shrunken plastic beads.

We had a lot of fun doing this project together.  Here's how you can too.

Supplies:

• #6 plastic for recycling
• scissors
• permanent markers 
• hole punch
• scratch paper
• cookie sheet
• oven
• string
• beads
• adult supervision

To start out, line a work area for the child with some heavy scratch paper.  I recycled a brown bag for this project.  Kids don't get to use permanent markers very often, so be sure to explain what permanent means or you may wind up with a "tattooed" little tyke or a redecorated work table!

Recycle artist in training!

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees and line your cookie sheet with additional scratch paper.

Cut out different shapes from your plastic and punch a hole in each one.  These will be about 1/3 the original size after shrinking, so make them large enough for the child to draw on, but small enough to use for beading. 

While you are busy cutting out the plastic for the beads, have your child color a picture on the scratch paper.

All ready for the oven

Once the child has finished coloring interesting designs & pictures on the plastic, add them to the cookie sheet. Leave about 1/4" between each plastic shape.

When all your plastic shapes are decorated or you've  filled the cookie sheet, it's time to put them in the oven.  Be sure you run your range fan to ventilate any fumes.

Remove from the oven after 2-3 minutes and allow to cool out of reach of little fingers.  They will have shrunken down to about 1/3 of the original size and will have thickened up substantially.

Recycled beads make unique keepsakes

While your recycle beads are cooling, gather up your other beads and some string. 

For young children use large beads with large holes that are easy for small hands to work with.  Stringing beads is a good activity for developing  hand eye coordination.  

I like to tie 1 large bead to the end of the string as a stopper so they don't pull the string all the way through the bead.  Now just let them choose and add their own beads being as creative as they like.

Your homemade recycle beads will have holes too small for young children to string, so add a jump ring or string loop for them.

A special gift for Aubrei's special friend

You can make bracelets, necklaces and even sun catchers.

Aubrei decided to make a necklace for Bunny!

This project was a lot of fun!  We got to spend time creating together and we talked about recycling too.  Aubrei said her favorite part was using permanent markers! She was so proud of her finished necklace for her stuffed bunny too!

I hope you'll try this one with your children.  It's such a great way to encourage creativity and recycling. 

10 Tips For Hummingbird Photos

Whether you have a point and shoot camera or a more professional set up, photographing hummingbirds can be a challenge. 

I shared some of my bird photography on my post Hummingbird Happenings.  Since then I've received a lot of questions about what type of equipment I was using to get such fantastic pictures.   Surprisingly it's not all about the price of your camera. 

Here's my 10 tips to take striking hummingbirds photos:

12 mega pixel affordability

1. Equipment:  Camera's range in price from around $50 to thousands of dollars.  Having an expensive camera is nice if your a hobbyist or professional photographer, but for the rest of us it's not always practical or affordable.

I have a great little point and shoot camera.  It's an Olympus FE-46 12 mega pixel with a 5x optical zoom.  This little camera is a power house.  I use it for everything! My camera cost only $50 at Christmas time, so when I tell you that it's not all about the price of the camera you use I'm saying so from experience!  I'm proof that you can get priceless shots even with an inexpensive camera.

I've found the key for taking these great photos is knowing my camera and the best settings for the particular photo.  So experiment with your camera.  Try taking the same shot using several different settings.  Can you see the difference?  Choose the setting that looks best to you.

2. Camo:  Camouflage is not required, but it definitely helps to get great wildlife photos.  With hummingbirds being so tiny, it's important to be able to get fairly close to them and camouflage can help with that.

I took my first set of pictures in my regular clothes and I was able to get a few nice ones. For my next session I donned my camo cap and sweatshirt and right away I noticed the difference.  Those little hummingbirds had been keeping a bit of a distance from me in my street clothes.  Decked out in my camo gear they began flying within a few inches of me.  In fact they got so close I could feel the vibration of their wings!

Good lighting for great pictures

3. Lighting:  Finding the right light balance is key with capturing the detail and beautiful iridescent coloring on the hummers.  

The best natural lighting is on a cloudy day when the sunlight is diffused by those clouds.  If you're shooting on a sunny day, find a shady spot and try to take your photos in the morning or evening.  Mid-day on a sunny day the light will be too harsh and tend to wash out your color and details.   

Also, play with the white balance adjustment on your camera to find the best setting.  When shooting under the cover of my porch the light beyond the porch in my photo background was much brighter than the foreground.  To compensate for this I used a +0.7 - +1.0 white balance. 

4. Motion:  Hummingbirds are fast little fliers.  Since digital cameras don't always have an option to set up a fast shutter speed, it can be hard to catch these images.  

Check your camera for a sports or action setting.  This will have a faster shutter than your normal settings.  Even still it will probably be slower than these birds. 

Move your hummingbird feeder to a stable location where it is not swinging.  I set mine on our porch rail.  If you have a tripod, use that to stabilize your camera.  If you don't have a tripod, try resting your camera on a stable surface.  I don't have a tripod, so I set mine on a towel on the same porch rail.

Be sure to stay still yourself so you don't frighten the hummingbirds away.  

Avoid this by focusing on feeder

5. Focus:  Getting the focus on such a small and fast moving target can be difficult.

Set your camera on macro or close up.  This will help to capture the small details.  Set your display to show a target on your focus area.  

Because of their sporadic and quick movements, it's difficult to focus on the hummingbird itself.  Instead  zoom in to a spot on the feeder and set the  focus there.  Now when a little hummingbird lands on that spot the camera will be focused on it as part of the foreground.  This will give you a much higher success rate for good pictures and it's a whole lot easier trying to keep  the focus trained on the moving birds especially when using the zoom.

With the macro setting on most cameras, your picture will be clear at the focus area and blur out the rest of the picture.  You can see in the shots above how the focus went to the background and blurred the foreground image.  That is because I was trying to focus on the bird.  When the bird moved, the camera readjusted resulting in a bad shot.

Cluttered backgrounds distract from birds

6. Background:  When setting your feeders for photographing, be aware of the background that will be behind your shot. 

There's nothing more frustrating than snapping a perfect picture of a hummingbird in full glory only to discover that there are distracting elements in the background. I shot many of these! 

Try changing the placement of the feeder or you may be able to simply change the angle at which you are shooting to achieve a better background image and a better background makes for a better photograph. 

7.  Patience:  Be patient with the process and give yourself plenty of undisturbed time to sit and take photos.  

There's no way to rush this.  You'll be at the mercy of the birds landing at the feeder so just relax and enjoy some time with them.  It's fun to observe their behavior with each other and it's always nice to have a reason to be outdoors.

Use flash for birds in flight

8. Flash:  Use the flash on your camera sparingly.  Flash photos can wash out the color and detail of the birds with harsh light. 

There's one exception to this rule.  I discovered this little trick by accident, but what a great one.  

If you are trying to capture the motion of your hummingbirds in flight, set your flash for  "fill in" or whatever the setting is on your camera that makes a series of 2-3 quick flashes.  This causes a strobe effect that allows you to get a stop motion type picture without a fancy camera.  Cool!

9. Quantity:  To get quality hummingbird shots it's all about quantity.  Take lots of photos because not everyone will be a keeper.  

I can't tell you how many photos I deleted that just showed my hummingbird feeder! I would aim and shoot, but the bird would fly off. 

I took hundreds of shots and came away with about 80 that I really liked and another 50 or so that were fine.  That's the great thing about digital photography you can take tons of photos and just keep the good ones.

Crop for great photos

10. Editing:  Use a good photo editor to crop and adjust your pictures. I use Picasa from Google.  

By cropping your pictures you can eliminate excess background and bring the focus in to a particularly nice part of your photograph.  

Sometimes what looks like a poor photo from a full picture view can become exceptional by simply cropping it down. 

The photo on the left is a good example of cropping to turn an ordinary picture into something special. I was bummed that I didn't get the full face of the male hummer in his full color, but after taking a second look I realized that with a simple crop I still had a stunning picture of 3 females perched together on the right side of the feeder. 

I hope these tips help you to get some wonderful pictures of the hummingbirds that visit your yard.  So get outside and get shooting!

Recycling DIY: How to make a May Day basket

May 1st, aka May Day is a fine way to celebrate springtime, friendship and neighborly love.

Ever since I was a young girl, I've looked forward to the arrival of May Day and the chance to bring a little surprise and sunshine to an unsuspecting recipient.

Now as an adult I've moved on from the construction paper creations of my youth, but I still like to be creative with my May baskets.

Today I'm going to teach you how you too can turn an old can, some sticks, wire,  a bit of ribbon from your stash and some pretty spring flowers into a little basket of joy to leave on a lucky neighbors door.

For this project you will need the following:

• a hammer and nail
• needlenose pliers
• a thick piece of elastic (or several rubber bands)
• about 3 feet of medium gauge wire
• a can from your recycle bin
• pruners
• some sticks
• about 2 feet of ribbon, string or leather strip
• some pretty flowers and foliage
• and about 1 1/2 hours of free time

 Step 1:  Using the nail and hammer punch 2 holes in the side of the can near the upper rim.  Try to space them evenly apart

 Step 2:  Cut a piece of your wire about 18" long.  This will form your handle and needs to be long enough to hang over a doorknob.  Run wire through the holes you made in Step 1.  Allow the wire end to poke through about 3".  Using the needle nose pliers, wind the wire around itself tightly.  Cut off any wire ends.

Step 3:  Remove the paper label from your can and place it in the recycle bin.  If you dont remove this, some of the label will show through the gaps in your stick basket.  

Step 4:  Using the pruners, cut your sticks to varying heights at least as tall as your can.  Use sticks from different types of trees for a variegated effect which adds visual interest, or use all the same type for a cohesive more refined look.  It's up to you. 

Step 5:  With your thick elastic or several rubber bands on your can, add the sticks until the entire can is covered.  Vary the height of the sticks for interest.  I like the way this is starting to look.

Step 6:  Leave the elastic in place and run some wire around the can over the sticks.  Use your needle nose pliers and twist until this is tight and secure.  Now remove the elastic.  Check around the can for any loose spots and add twigs to fill those. If you like, add some vine around your handle to camouflage the wire handle.

Step 7:  To cover the wire from view, use your piece of ribbon and wrap around the can several times.  I used a bit of leftover leather strapping on mine for a natural effect.  You may want to use bright ribbon, raffia or even yarn cover your wire.

Step 8:  Fill  your May Day basket with beautiful blooms! Don't forget to add some texture with different types of foliage too. Or for a garden buddy you may want to fill with starts from your garden.  

Step 9:  Hang your basket on a neighbors doorknob.  You could add a little card if you like, but my idea of May Day is to try to be anonymous.  I'm a little to slow now days for the "ring and run" of my child hood.  Instead I just wait for an opportunity and hang these up while my friends or neighbors are out.

Bring Some Spring Green Indoors

Bring some spring cheer indoors

Green is my favorite color! Green for the Earth, Green for growth and especially Green for spring! I love to watch the new foliage come out in shades of chartreuse and then harden out to emerald, evergreen and blue green.

I love to bring a little of that spring green indoors too! Today I'm gathering foliage with different shades of  green throughout the yard to make a nice little arrangement. I know most bouquets are full of brightly colored flowers with very little foliage, but it doesn't have to be flowers to be beautiful!  I don't have much in bloom right now, but I do have a lot of green going on in the garden.

To create a spring green bouquet, look for interesting textures, different glosses and shades of green.  Include some branches in bud and others with fully opened leaves and choose leaves of varying sizes and even some twiggy dead wood.

Grab a vase, jar or other interesting vessel and starting with the largest leaved branches begin filling.  These larger leaves will help form a sort of foundation from which to build. Then begin layer in your branches working from the largest leaves to the smallest.

A rule of thumb for floral arrangement is to work in odd numbers to create an appealing arrangement. However, this is a creative endeavor, so do what looks good to your own eye. You may want to clump 1 type of foliage together and use another type to spread throughout the arrangement. Also, think about creating different heights within the arrangement and step back from time to time to view it from a different perspective. 

I used Salaal as my base in this arrangement. The larger thick leaves of this native plant form a network of support to place my other leaves. Next I added the dead wood and then began layering in the other leaves from there to create a full lush arrangement.

The plants I used were Salaal, Oregon Grape, Sea Breeze branches,
Thimble Berry, Huckleberry, Butterfly Bush and Maple.
You can use whatever foliage catches your eye.

I did another arrangement using my houseplant cuttings.  It came out really beautiful and is a nice addition to the living room for color while these cuttings get new roots. 

A spring chore of taking new cuttings from my
houseplants became this pretty arrangement.

When the roots are developed, I will break this down and use these propagated starts to make new houseplants for myself, others for gifts and still others to maybe sell at the local farmers market this summer.

So as you can see, you don't have to have the bright colored flowers of summer to create beautiful bouquets. Use whatever is on hand and in season. The only limit is your own imagination.

How to recycle 6pack rings into snowflake

I got the original how to information from Craftbits who had a quick tutorial on how to make these, but then I was asked by a couple of followers if I could make a more comprehensive step by step for this project.  Here it is:

Here's what you will need to make 1 large snowflake ornament:

   

    *20 six-pack beverage holder rings

    *1 foot of fishing line

    *Stapler

    *Staples

    *Scissors

 

Take 2 of your 6 pack rings and lay them back to back on top of eachother.  You'll notice that they curve in one direction.  Stack them so they curve away from eachother like the next photo

 

Staple them together here and here

Now you'll fold them to match the Staple marks

 Repeat on the back side

It will look like this when both sides are done

Get 2 more 6pack rings and repeat, then you will connect them together:

Staple at the arrows, flip over and staple in the same place on the other side

Now continue until you've connected 10 of these together like the next photo

Now you'll run your fishing line through 1 side

Now pull the fishing line taut to form a ring.  Knot the fishing line. Now staple to connect the 2 ends. Flip and staple connecting 2 ends on other side

 

Cut off excess fishing line and use to make a ring to hang your snowflake:

Here's what your finished snowflake will look like.  So pretty!

Have fun and enjoy this great recycled Christmas project!

Don't waste your waste! Become a Worm Wrangler.

Ok gardeners and other green people are you still throwing your food waste in the garbage?  Stop that!  Don't waste your waste!  Become a Worm Wrangler.

Do you know that the average American household produces about 5lbs of garbage everyday?  I wonder how much we could reduce that by simply composting our food waste.  It might even lower your garbage bill!

I started coralling crawlies last fall when I set up my wonderful Worm Factory Worm Bin.  I love this company for making their worm bins from  post consumer recycled materials and they're here in my local area. Also the lifespan of these bins is supposed to be about 70 years and it comes with a 5 year warranty!

Worm Factory Worm bins rock!!!

Here's some fun facts about worms:

• Wrangling Red Wiggler Worms is called Vermiculture
• Worms eat up to 1/2 of their body weight eachday, so if you've got a pound of worms they'll eat a 1/2 pound of your food waste everyday!
• Worms in bins should receive a mix of 1/2 food waste and 1/2 fiber, so worms can eat your junk mail and shredded documents!
• Worms process your compost much faster in a worm bin than in a regular compost bin and takes a lot less work than turning a compost pile.
• Garden plants grow faster and fuller when fertilized with worm tea!
• You can use worm bins indoors or out! So even apartment dwellers can raise red wigglers.
• Mixing finished worm compost into your potting soil makes houseplants healthy and happy
• Worms will reproduce in your worm bin but they'll regulate themselves based on the environment and amount of available food and space!  Watch this short film from Isabella Rosellini to learn more about worm reproduction

Here's a peek at my healthy happy worms.

I love my worm bin so much I even made my own video about it this summer.

Here's Fat Red Worms

There are a few things that worms won't eat and should not be placed in your worm bin.  They're not too picky, but worms will not eat onions, citrus rinds, and jalepenos or other hot peppers.

African violets - propigation and care

I'm crazy for propigating plants.  When the works done in my outdoor garden, I turn to my indoor plants to get me through the gloomy days of winter.  Today I'm going to show you how I turned a handful of african violets into a growing collection!  This is a very easy way to increase your houseplants with little effort or cost.

For this project you will need:
     * a few fully mature african violet plants
     * 3-6 weeks time in sunny window
     * short jars or glasses
     * some small pots with saucers
     * good quality organic potting soil
     * pencil

This organic mix with worm casting and bat guano costs a little extra

but it's worth it when you see the blooms on these violets in winter

Remove a few of the healthy outer leaves from your mature plant.  You'll want to break them off cleanly and close to the main stem.  This is also a  good time to remove and compost any of the old faded flowers or leaves.

Here's one of my mature plants.  I'll remove the bottom leaves at the stem

Place the healthy leaves in a short jar or glass and add water to cover the bottom 1/3 or less of the stems.

A recycled artichoke jar is just the right size for this project!

Place your jar of leaves in a sunny window sill for 3 to 6 weeks.  Keep a close eye on the jar for newly forming roots.  Be sure to add water as needed, but don't overfill or you risk rotting your stems.  When adding water be careful not to get water on the furry leaves.  Remove and compost any of your leaves that begin to turn mushy at the stem.

When you begin to see small leaves or plantlets growing out of the base of your stems, it's time to pot up your new starts!

Fill your small pots with potting mix and pack down gently. Using a pencil, create a depression in the soil. Carefully seperate the leaves with attached roots and place your leaf in the depression.  Gently pack soil around the stem of the leaf. Be very careful that you don't break off the new plantlet from the leaf.

Here I've places several new starts in a single pot.  Once the new

growth reaches at least 1" I will seperate these into their own pots

Water your new start and place in a sunny window.  When the plantlet has grown to about 8 leaves of at least 1 inch high, you may cut back the original starter leaf.

This is a start I planted about 1 month ago. 

General care for your african violets:  

African violets require a medium to full light of a south facing window to bloom well.  They like to be kept humid, but not wet.  To keep up the humidity you can place a few saucers of water amongst your plants.

I can hardly wait for all these little beauties to bloom!

The biggest mistake when growing these plants is over watering.  It's best to water them from the bottom and allow the plant to draw up the moisture from the roots.

Another common mistake is water on the folliage, this will cause rot or brown spots on your plants.  You may however, spray a fine mist on them a few times per week. 

To get big beautiful blooms, you'll want to fertilize these plants about 1 x per month in the winter and 2 x per month in the summer. I was using worm tea from my worm bins, but found it's too smelly to use indoors.  You can purchase a specialized fertilizer for african violets at the nursery.

Mine usually bloom starting around Thanksgiving and continue all the way through early summer, then they rest and begin again in late fall. 

These delicate blooms last for several weeks

The best part about propigating your own houseplants is sharing!  I love to give gifts that are handmade or in this case homegrown.  These make really great hostess gifts and violets are especially appreciated when they are in the full glory of bloom!