Eco-Christmas Blog Hop 2012

Welcome to the Eco-Christmas Blog Hop! Today is all about celebrating the holidays with a bit of eco-conscious cheer.

I'm starting off the hop with a lunch sack from Subway and an empty coffee bag.

Let's see what I did...

I took two lunch sacks + one coffee bag and upcycled them into two decorated holiday gift bags. How did I do this?

First, I painted the lunch sacks with black acrylic paint.

After they dried, I stamped them with foam star stamps and white acrylic paint. (Disclosure: My stamping abilities are still below average and I used a white paint pen to touch up the stars.)

I added white rick rack to one of the lunch sacks using Mini Glue Dots and then I moved onto making bows out of a coffee bag (Organic Seattle's Best #4 - my favorite!).

Tutorial: How to Make a Bow From a Coffee Bag

Supplies for coffee bag bows:

empty coffee bag

paper shredder or fringing scissors

scissors

stapler

craft knife

wire

1. Remove the closing tab from the coffee bag and cut the bag in half. Fringe the top half with a paper shredder or fringing scissors (I had to go back and cut through the plastic coating with scissors), cut in half, then use scissors to curl the ends. Cut a small hole in the middle of the unfringed bottom half of the coffee bag and set aside.

2. Roll up each fringed half. Set one bow aside.

3. Insert the rolled up fringe into the bottom half of the coffee bag and secure in place with a staple. Cut off the excess below the staple.

4. Use a craft knife to cut a small slit near the staple and insert wire.

5. The coffee bag bow is ready to be added to the gift bag.

Use the closing tab to secure the second bow to an additional gift bag. Here are close-ups of the two coffee bag bows:

The final step was to cut up old greeting cards to create gift tags. I tied them to the gift bags with Sew Easy floss. Done! Hope you liked my Eco-Christmas holiday gift bags! It's now time to hop on over to the next blog. ~Danielle

Participating blogs:

You are here--> Danielle: EcoScrapbook
Next stop--> Jules: Inspired Jules
Dani: Scrapper on the Street
Renee: Charms Buttons & Bows
Lisa: The Cherry On Top
Alex: meli-melo studio
Erin: Deeply Rooted Life
Leslie: Momma Harvey

Happy Holidays!