Thank You for Individual Donations!

I would like to thank all of the wonderful people who have donated to the Recycle Your Pants project.  Previous blogs have mentioned thanks to the organizations and thrift stores that have helped me.  Now here is a shout out to the individuals:

Nina Buesing Corvallo:  www.ninacorvallo.blogspot.com

                                    - fine art:  www.ninabuesing.net

Rolande Duprey:  www.purplerock.org

Amy Ferrell, Artist - Printmaking/Mixed Media

Barrie, owner of Happy Rainbows located in Sherman, CT

Also, thanks to all of my customers at Elephant's Trunk today!  Please let me know if you have any special requests, comments, or would like to donate to the project.  We will add you to the list.  Contact: Adelka's email:  info@RecycleYourPants.com

Buy for Sustainability

I am pleased to announce that for those of you who are not interested in making your own beautiful recycled bags, you can now buy them online.  My online shop is www.EarthBlues.etsy.com.  I will continue to post new items on the site, so you can have a look at all of the different designs, especially as I create new ones.  While not every bag for sale is made from recycled materials, I have a commitment to using the resources that I have available to me and making high quality items that cannot be found in a factory.

Etsy.com is a wonderful site that allows small businesses to be created by artists and craftsters. Everything on the site is homemade or vintage.  Check it out.

Click on the title above to get redirected to the shop!  Enjoy.

 

Ecological Logic

Now here is a performer who is making sense of all of our environmental nonsense.  Rolande Duprey, a supporter of the RYP-project, has created a new show called "Ecological Logic."  The creation of this show, which premiered on 4/24/09, is what inspired the Plastic Soup entry.  The nonverbal show, using 3 puppeteers & 1 live musician, features a tremendous plastic sea through a nightmare sequence.  I hope that more schools and public libraries add this to their list of events, because it deals with crucial issues we currently face in a high-spirited and whimsical way.

Thank you, Rolande, for creating with love and concern for our world.  You Rock, Purple Rock!

Fish Soup for the Plastic Soul

Well here we have it.  We have one more reason to use reusables.

I cannot believe that I am only hearing about this Plastic Soup now, more than a decade after it was first discovered by a man on his yacht.  In 1997 a man sailing 500 nautical miles off the coast of California discovered this giant mass of plastics floating just under the surface of the Pacific Ocean.  This mass is so gigantic that it actually spans close to Japan, putting Hawaii just South of the middle of this mass of floating garbage.  People have called it "Plastic Soup."  Items are beginning to break apart and degrade in this landfill of the sea, but plastics actually take years to completely degrade.  We have a mass of garbage caught in ocean currents swirling around in the Pacific.  Congratulations, Plastic Junkies.  (The article reporting on this from 2008 is enclosed in the title to this Blog.)

While no evidence has been found about the long-term effects this could have on the ocean, there are ongoing reports of whales, fish, and birds dying due to plastics caught in their systems.  The fish and birds mistake the plastics for fish, so they gobble up our less than precious disposables.  Just imagine us accidentally eating our plastic fork that came with our lunch.  I am pretty sure our systems wouldn't be able to handle it well either.  Maybe we need to educate the big and little sea creatures.  Rather than teaching them to do tricks, let's teach them the difference between a fish and a plastic bag.  Anyone for a deep sea seminar?  OK, so which is simpler educating the fish or educating the humans?    

Spreading the Message towards Peace

The Recycle Your Pants project has been supported by multiple peace organizations that we would like to recognize for their efforts in nonviolent social action.

The first time the public was able to view some of our bags while discussing our mission was at the World Peace Sanctuary located in Amenia, NY.  A Call to Peace Festival was on Saturday, August 9, 2008.  It was a beautiful event, and I would like to thank each and every person who took part in that event.  Please support them and find out more at www.worldpeace.org or just click on the title of this blog entry.

More recently we also presented the project at the Hope Out Loud annual event in Bushnell Park in Hartford, CT on Sept. 14, 2008.  Many peace activists, social organizations, individual activists and musicians made this event possible.  The group was formed in reaction to the events occurring on 9/11.  www.hopeoutloud.org

Let us all work to empower and strengthen our communities.  Take part in the world.  "May Peace Prevail."

Local Initiative for Recycling

In order to reduce our carbon footprint with RYP (RecycleYourPants.com) we are asking communities to begin working with local thrift stores or community centers who would accept the ripped and unwearable jeans needed for this project.  If you can sew, ask your local thrift store if they would be willing to set up flyers reminding people to not throw away jeans that they think are unwearable & make sure they save them for you.  If you can't sew, then find someone willing to make them that does.  RYP is in the process of beginning this on a local level and eventually we hope to help others begin similar programs in communities across the globe.  We are looking into attaining non-profit status at the start of 2009, so that this can become a social-networking site and a community empowerment program.  The site will list both the thrift stores supporting this recycling effort and have a list of places that offer sewing class, so everyone can dust off those old sewing machines.  The more we can produce for ourselves using the materials existing close at hand, the stronger we become collectively.  We certainly have a long way to go, because we have seen many things change in this world recently.  Now we are examining how we got here.  Now we just have to envision where we want to go and demand it.  

Please support the organizations who donate to this project and thank them for being involved in such a needed movement.  Here are some of the groups who have contributed:

Our biggest donation has come from the New Fairfield Thrift Shop!  Thank You.

Contact/Location:  POB 8871 / 77 Route 39 No. / New Fairfield, CT 06812  

Hours: Wed-Fri 10-4pm, Sat. 11-3pm 

www.nfcts.com (203) 746-9247

We received an interesting donation of a bag full of pockets from 

The Thrift Mart of New Milford, Inc.  

146 Danbury Road

New Milford, CT  06776

(860) 350-2153

Energy used in production of Plastic/Paper Bags

Here is a excellent link that offers information about the energy waste caused by producing so many plastic bags.  Check out the sections under Other Facts **Why paper is no better than plastic, **Impact on Oceans, **Environmental Impact.

They mention paper bags use 4 times as much energy to produce than plastic.  Also, only 1-3% of all plastic bags actually get recycled, which also consumes energy to do.  The impact they have on the ocean must be the worst part.