Crafts Made with Plastic Bottles

Cutting Down a Plastic Bottle For Craft Use

Materials:

• bowl about the height you wish to cut
• pen or pencil
• cutting shears or very sharp scissors
• sandpaper
• round container like a plastic bottle

Directions:

1. Turn your bowl upside down. Place your container next to it and make sure this is the proper height you need your container. Take a pencil and roll the container around holding the pencil still in place while marking your area.



2. Poke through the plastic and cut as evenly as possible around the area using your lines as a guide.



3. Next take your container and swipe it several times in one direction across the sandpaper. This will make the top smooth and there will be no rough edges to cut yourself on.



4. Decorate the container however you wish and display your pens and pencils or any other item you might like in it.

By maphisx7 from Gordonsville, VA

Recycled Plastic Flowers

I came up with this idea for a school recycling project. It is made out of a any tall container and filled with flowers cut out of pop bottles.

Approximate Time: 2 days

Supplies:

• hot glue gun
• craft sticks for flowers
• scissors
• glue
• plastic pop bottles
• tissue paper
• newspaper
• buttons or gem stones

Instructions:

1. Get a container you want to use for the vase and cut a hole in the top of the container so you can place your flowers in it.
2. You will need to take the bottom of plastic bottles and cut the bottoms of them out making different flowers.
3. Then, paint the flowers any color you want them to be. Let them dry for about 1 hour.
4. Take craft sticks and make stems out of them, you can paint them green to look like stems.
5. You will want to hot glue the stems to the flowers. After hot gluing the stems, place a button or gem in the center of the flower.
6. Make an arrangement: stuff newspaper in the bottom of the container so it will make the flowers stay in place. After making the arrangement of flowers, you can decorate the container any way you want to. I decorated mine with tissue paper and broken glass.

Now your project is all completed. This is a wonderful recycled project made out of items you have at home!

By Kaitlyn from Toronto, OH

Craft: Water Bottle Holiday Gift Package

This is a great way to use some of those empty water bottles. Fill them with treats then decorate them up a bit, and you have a great package ready for gift giving.

Approximate Time: 30 minutes

Supplies:

• clean dry empty water bottle
• scissors
• Scotch or masking tape
• ribbon
• treats

Instructions:

You can use any size water bottle, I used the 8 oz. size.

1. Cut the bottle in half with a scissors, but not all the way through, leave about 1 inch still attached.
2. Fill with treats, something that can be stacked is best, I did cookies. You could do fudge, peanut brittle, etc. It should small enough to stack. I cut down my peppermint brownie cookies with a cookie cutter so they would fit.
3. Now fill up the bottle as high as possible. Close it up and put Scotch or masking tape over the seam. Make sure the cap is on the bottle. I used a wide wired ribbon tied around the seam and then added a few glitter ornaments. The treats should stay fresh.

By NoRulesArt from Sunny FL

Craft: Recycled Plastic Bottle Door Hanger

I saw this in my email this past week and I don't remember who it was from, but it is a perfect way to solve your pop bottle build-up that you were saving for "who-knows-what"

Create a quick pattern from an old business size envelope if you need one, level out the side. (I rounded my corners a little bit). Cut out the circle for the doorknob and you're done.

I applied a little peel-n-stick deco I cut out and also used foil flowers, decorate them however you want to. I want to use some of these in the garden and yard with small potted plants I can hang in trees or off a fence post.

I cut part of the bumps on the bottom off to use that way (about the size of the tip of my pinky finger for drainage).

Source: Craft related email - Forgot who it was from.

By Melody_yesterday from Otterville, MO

Crafts Using Melted Plastic Bottles And Lids

This is a way to use any type of plastic stuff: bottle lids, shampoo lids, prescription bottles, aerosol lids, any type of plastic. You take a cookie sheet and line it with foil. Turn your oven on to 450-500 dergees F. You line up the plastic you want to melt. Put some on their sides or stack a larger one on a smaller one. Put in the oven.

Keep a close eye on them. When they start to melt, they get in different shapes. Don't let them melt to just a flat blob. While the plastic is still hot and semi-molten, you can embed different things in the plastic (small toys, buttons, beads, odd metal pieces) or you can put pieces of crayon or glitter in them.

I keep a baby wipe box marked "Pirate Treasure" filled with these things. Kids love to look through them or hide and find them. Once my nephew was visiting and I had him melt an orange lid with a smaller one of blue kind off to the side. While it was hot, he stuck a plastic dinasaur in the orange. It made a small diaorama. He put metal loop off the side. This made a neat keyring. When it was cool, I added some glitter nail polish on the blue so it looked like waves. I wish I had a picture of it. It looked like the dinasaur was on a beach by the water.

Sometimes if the item won't stay in the melted plastic, you can use a spoon to bring the plastic up over the item to hold it in. Of course this is done with adult supervision. The hot things can be placed in water to cool faster. While I used a regular over, a toaster oven might work better.

By Nightsong from Hay Capitol of the World

Editor's Note: Be sure that you use proper ventilation when melting plastic as it may create harmful fumes.

Recycled Bottle Fluted Vase

I saw this done on the internet, a post on my Facebook of someone else who did it.

I decided to try it too. I have no epoxy glue so I can't glue them together yet, but I like the way it turned out. It would be a cute planter due to its little size and design, very lightweight. I plan to just lay it around. It is rather genius, don't you think?

By Robyn