Eco Friendly Home Projects

Dear readers, this blog will no longer be updated.  All contents will be moved to: upcycleliving.blogspot.com Please update your link, and we hope to see you again soon  😊 When I made the Mini Cardboard Tabletop Christmas Tree , I thought I was going to settle for just that. After all, we are packing up for the move; it's going to be a sad little Christmas. And as I was taking down all the 3M hooks here and there to leave the landlord a clean wall, these little 3M wonders gave me an idea. Well you see, I've bought stashed away quite a bit of the replacement 3M stickers for more than a year now; and they don't work well after hibernating in a shoebox, in a damp house in a humid country for that long. Now they will have the opportunity to shine (literally) before they announce retirement. So all together, 8 used and reused 3M wire hooks, 8 not-working-so-well 3M removable stickers, 1 good old reliable Christmas wired ribbon, angel lights from 2010 Christmas

Dear readers, this blog will no longer be updated.  All contents will be moved to: upcycleliving.blogspot.com Please update your link, and we hope to see you again soon  😊 This Christmas is going to be a quiet one for us as we are in the midst of moving, so a big(ish) tree like previous years is just impractical. But not having a tree at all would make it even sadder. And the solution is: a tiny, mini, tabletop cardboard Christmas tree!    The making is pretty simple: View larger image in new tab or window 1. Material: some patterned or printed cardboard (old Christmas cards, Christmas merchandise packaging, etc), I cut these from last year's Christmas crackers packaging box. 2. Cut them into equal sizes: 2 per tree. 3. Take 2 and stick them together, back to back using double sided tape. 4. Make sure they are adhered nicely together, trim away any jutting out edges. 5. Cut each piece into 2 equal pieces. 6&7. Using a pencil, trace the

Dear readers, this blog will no longer be updated.  All contents will be moved to: upcycleliving.blogspot.com Please update your link, and we hope to see you again soon  😊 A friend of mine is volunteering at The Heavenly Gift for Community at Heart , a non-profit organisation, to help raise funds for underprivileged children in Malaysia to grant their little Christmas wishes. The event is held at Tropicana City Mall which is in my area, so I went personally for a little donation and to see if there's anything I can help (keep them accompanied and look helpful as I'm really not a very good salesperson lol). They have a free gift wrapping service counter next to the donation table so I thought I could at least help doing some gift wrapping. Then we realised that people aren't really aware of the free service because there isn't any signage apart from one bunting standee. So I offered to make them some signboards. This one here is for the bo

Dear readers, this blog will no longer be updated.  All contents will be moved to: upcycleliving.blogspot.com Please update your link, and we hope to see you again soon  😊 Open in new tab or window to view larger image. Angel with smiley face drawn on cut out cardboard It is small - under 6', and made out of used egg crates held up by rustic wood! Hanging on the tree are little angels with wings made from fan-fold recycled paper (old magazine pages, used wrapping paper, etc) and halos made from twist tie wires (probably from bread packaging), and smiley faces drawn on cut out cardboard! It is not grand like most of the big shopping malls in Kuala Lumpur or Petaling Jaya, but it doesn't look pathetic like many either. And I think that the artists have put great effort in the thinking process and execution to keep consumption to the minimum and still came up with something this lovey. Whoever did this, well done!

Dear readers, this blog will no longer be updated.  All contents will be moved to: upcycleliving.blogspot.com Please update your link, and we hope to see you again soon  😊 Here's one of those tasks that I get given by my husband from time to time: fix it! He loves these trousers so much that he wears them again as soon as they get cleaned. And look what happened? The cloth at the waist band is all ripped. There is such a big hole that can't just be sewn back with threads. Also, the print is a very specific camouflage pattern which means that I can't just take any excess cloth and patch it on. But since the back pockets are mainly for decoration purposes, the rescue is here! I took the left back pocket out stitch by stitch very carefully so that I don't leave yet another hole behind. After a little ironing to get rid of the creases, I now have enough material to patch the waist band back. (It's like how they take a bit of the buttock ski

Dear readers, this blog will no longer be updated.  All contents will be moved to: upcycleliving.blogspot.com Please update your link, and we hope to see you again soon  😊 I don't wear T-shirts. Just don't like the look of them on me, full stop. They are often too big or loose, or just unflattering. Although I don't buy them myself, I can't stop anyone from giving them to me, especially when it is a Depeche Mode T-shirt. I was given this Depeche Mode T-shirt months ago, but can't bring myself to wearing it as it is still too big although it is an S. Wearing it to bed is completely out of the question because that would have been a blasphemy! I've been wanting to do some alteration so that I can enjoy wearing it and finally found the time to do so last week. And here's what I did: outline the shape of my desired outcome, cut away the unwanted part of the material then hem the sides up (all hand-stitched, no cheating). And this is what

Dear readers, this blog will no longer be updated.  All contents will be moved to: upcycleliving.blogspot.com Please update your link, and we hope to see you again soon  😊 I hate parting with old clothes, especially designs that don't come easy. This long dress has been with me since the late 90s, but lately the stretchiness of the material is gone and it is not tight-fitting any more. I can hear it calling out to me: "Please don't throw me away, please, no!" So here comes the scissors and the needle and threads. I cut the dress across the waist and sewed the hem and made it into a top. Then I dug out a pair of Chinese buttons I savaged from another old top which I had to bin (because the material was falling apart), and voila, I got myself a new Chinese Cheong-sum-like top! As for the bottom part of the dress? I've yet to decide what to do with it, but rest assured, it will be something useful :-)