Finding Free Cardboard

Since we've been back in the U.S. on a summer holiday trip, I've had to start all over sourcing cardboard. In Tokyo I was hauling everything by bike and bike trailer and I had developed relationships with several places in my local community.

I was also able to scavenge from my neighbor's cardboard piles weekly on recycling day. It was pretty easy to get whatever kind of cardboard I wanted.

I haven't had time for a lot of cardboard projects while we've been in Michigan this summer. One thing I have been doing is scouting all kinds of exotic grades of cardboard.

There are some great materials out there... but before I tell you how you can get your hands on this stuff, let me first brief you on a few reasons why it's not as easy to get free cardboard as it used to be...

Exhibit A: Cheung Yan, (the woman on the left) CEO and power house of Nine Dragons Paper Industries. She just happens to be one of the richest self-made female billionaires in the world.

She is also partly responsible for the growing trade of U.S. waste paper and cardboard that is shipped to China to be made into cardboard boxes for export.  Yan's story is quite remarkable, and she's a big reason why even your local grocery store is baling their cardboard and selling it for a profit.

Exhibit B: Cardboard Compactor / Baler and Cardboard Bales. When I talked to the Produce Manager at my local mid-sized grocery store, he told me that cardboard bales sell for $75 a piece, and that their store produces about 2 bales on an average day. During peak holiday seasons they produce as many as 4 or 5 cardboard bales each day. That's over $300 dollars worth. Wow!

With that in mind, here are my top 3 sources for cardboard BEFORE it gets to the baler:

1. Befriend a manager or two in the produce department of your favorite grocery store.  They all use some kind of cardboard that they will probably be willing to set aside for you if you speak with them directly and explain what you're doing with the cardboard. This is my favorite place to score banana boxes, kiwi boxes, and the über fabulous watermelon boxes (I'll be posting about those next week.)

2. Wal-Mart, Kmart, Target, or your local "everything" store. Call ahead or stop at Customer Service first to find out when and how they break their cardboard down. The more specific you are about what kind of cardboard you're looking for the better. (Banana boxes, large boxes without holes, etc.)

I learned that Wal-Mart stocks at night and does all their re-shelving and cardboard processing then, so it's best to ask or call after 10pm at night and have them hold boxes for you until the next morning. They kindly held a shopping cart full of boxes for me in the area near their bathrooms at the back.

Target told me that the only time they had boxes available was Thursday mornings at 8am. Apparently this is when they restock and break all of their boxes down, and the only time to get any cardboard from their store.

If you get the cold shoulder, try talking to someone who stocks on the floor, they might be more willing to help you, particularly if you are looking for a small quantity of boxes. Persistence is key.

3. Any Local business that is small enough to pay for a cardboard recycling service is more likely to hand over their cardboard to you. It also helps if you are a regular patron of their business.

Deliveries are usually made according to a weekly schedule and cardboard has to be broken down right after delivery because of space issues. Call ahead to find out when is the best time to pick up the cardboard and if it works with your schedule.

ALWAYS Be ready explain what you are doing with the cardboard, how much you need and what size box you are looking for.

More Ideas:

* FYI Cardboard dumpster diving is illegal, mostly because waste management companies do not want to be held liable for any injuries that could take place during the "diving" part. Your best bet is to intercept the cardboard before (it's also cleaner that way) it gets to the dumpster, by talking to a business manager at the storefront responsible for the cardboard-only dumpster.

* Freecycle and Craigslist are other great options. Sign up and post a request for free cardboard. You can also peruse the "free" section or do a search looking for people giving away free cardboard boxes.

So that's my advice for cardboard collecting. I hope you get out there and start putting all this bounty to good use.

But first I need your help!

What's your secret for scoring recycled cardboard?

What kind of cardboard is available where you live?

I'm hoping to turn this post into a static resource page along with information on tools and materials, so I'd really love to hear from you in the comment section!

Update: March 2013

Some time tested ideas from Readers:

• Costco
• Sam's Club
• Independent Bicycle Retail Shops
• Independent Car Auto Body Shops

Cardboard + Your Car = Sun Dried Banana Chips

Materials used: cardboard, parchment paper, masking tape and an egg slicer is great for getting the bananas the right width for drying, but you can use a knife just as easily.

It's taken a while, but my whole family is starting to get excited about cardboard.

I've got a few posts in the works inspired by mom, dad, and this post idea was sent by my sister who lives out in sunny Santa Fe, New Mexico USA. (see the little adobe house behind her truck?)

The bananas take about 4 hours to dry in her car in New Mexico. It could take a little longer in other places, but with the heat wave that's been sweeping the US,  maybe not?

Is this not perfection? The BEST summer snack!

My sister said that she's thinking about doing kiwi and apricot next, maybe even some  cantaloupe. But she said the best part is that it leaves a nice dried banana smell in your car.

Thanks Sis! This is fantastic!

Stackable Cardboard Puzzle Trays

Getting our toys organized to the point that they can easily be used and put away has been a huge focus in our home this past month.

Electra is a complete puzzle nut, so I thought getting our puzzles straightened up would be a good place to start.

These are just kiwi boxes, super sturdy ones, that I rescued from the grocery store. I cut out the front portion of the box with a utility knife.

The boxes have notches at the top that interlock with the box above. This feature makes the boxes great for stacking since they always stay in place.

In the first version I tried, I removed the entire front of the box, which I wouldn't advise. It's important to leave at least an inch or so on all three sides to maintain the rigidity of the cardboard.

We thought about decorating the boxes in some way, but I in the end I fell in love with the punchy red and yellow (and the little diagonal break.)  Bold, graphic colors are such a great contrast to all of the neutral shades we have in our apartment.

I'm a big proponent of Montessori philosophy. "Help me do it by myself," is a central Montessori theme, and this project is an example of one way that we integrate Montessori  philosophy into our day-to-day activities.

Electra always works on a mat to define the space, and chooses one puzzle at a time. When she's done she has to put one puzzle away before she gets  another one out.

Sometimes I pull all of the trays out for her to choose from and sometimes just a few, it kind of depends on the mood of the day and what she's currently interested in.

I have to say, with this system, she really does clean up after herself. There's something about that whole order begets order thing.

Now if I can just get it to spread to the rest of my house a little faster.

More on Montessori:

Basics of Montessori Philosophy

Montessori: The Science Behind the Genius, by Angelina S. Lillard, PhD (If you don't have time to read this excellent book, listen to the NPR podcast while you're folding laundry!)

Giant Cardboard Cubes and the Adjacent Possible

In the spirit of modeling creativity and inspiring play, I wanted to share with you a little bit about some of the "play" that I engage in here in my cardboard lab/home.

I made these giant cardboard cubes after spending an hour or so playing with a stack of cardboard banana boxes that I had collected.

Each cube is made from the tops and bottoms of two banana boxes and two cam straps.

Remember this stage in your kids? Everything down the rabbit hole...

We discovered that the cube has these pockets that are the perfect place for Isis to keep her favorite board books. (We have to keep our other books out of reach for now, otherwise we would spend all of our days re-shelving books instead of reading them.)

Last year I read the book, "Where Good Ideas Come From", by Steven Johnson and started thinking about how I could become more innovative in my day-to-day life.

In Where Good Ideas Come From, Johnson talks about an idea called "the adjacent possible." The concept goes something like this:  We seldom have fully formed ideas or creative solutions that come to us in a moment of brilliance. These ideas build up as slow hunches that we compile over time.

So in effect, it's all the little experiences that lead us to those  genius ideas.

I imagine these adjacent experiences as stepping-stones. You can't get to that big idea, without first leaping from little idea to little idea.

I'm trying to spend more time stepping away from the computer and actually playing and experimenting with cardboard as my way of building a path towards new ideas and designs in cardboard.

Future Parkour enthusiast?

I have to say, it's a lot of fun.

I get so much joy out of just playing with cardboard, with no obvious intent, just for the joy of it. Sometimes it comes of nothing, and sometimes you get giant cardboard cubes; a happy accident.

As Steven Johnson says, "Chance favors the connected mind."......

So now I invite you to comment!

What materials do you like to play and experiment with as an adult? Fabric, wood, flour, clay, fiber, dye, paper?

What machines do you work on and repair? bikes, sewing machine, cars, cameras, computers? (This year I replaced the hard drive on this very iMac that I write the blog on. Talk about empowering! You have to check out iFixit.com.)

Do you let yourself drift off into that elementary school aged daze, where nothing mattered beyond the sandbox or your paper and paste pot?

Cardboard Box with Wheels goes to the Airport!

Yes, it's true. We ditched our stroller for a cardboard box with castor wheels, and it was awesome!

Where to start?

A few weeks before our flight, I was puzzling through the logistics of moving a toddler and a three-year old through the airport with all of our accompanying accoutrements. Both at Tokyo Narita and Detroit Metro, I knew we had some distances to cover between gates, check-in, immigration and the rest. I hate strollers and started thinking of ways I could avoid taking ours through the airport.

That's when I started playing the what if game with myself.

What if we pulled the girls through the airport in the box with castor wheels? Or they pulled each other? Wait, I think our carry-ons would both fit in the box if we wanted to carry the girls or let them walk instead... yes, they do....Oh and wait a minute.. the box fits the dimensions for a carry on.. perfectly.... And hey, I think this could be genius!

I tucked a shear-ling sheepskin into the box for the girls to sit on in the airplane. It made a very soft and comfortable lining for them when they were sitting in the box at the airport.

Taking the Box with Wheels through the airport was even better than I imagined. When we initially walked into the airport towing the box with the girls behind it everyone around us actually just stopped and stared.

They had huge smiles on their faces and there was a lot of pointing and giggling (in a good way). A few people came up and asked us if they could take pictures, and we laughed and willfully obliged.

It felt a lot like we were pulling our own mini Fourth of July parade float through the terminal.

Still going strong even with all the bags AND kids in tow.

Surprised to find out they're trying to curb hamster trafficking at Tokyo Narita Airport?

Isis befriended EVERYONE at the airport. No luck getting a business class upgrade though.

Where should we take our box next?

Cardboard Travel Swing (A Father's Day Tribute)

Made from about five layers of glued corrugated cardboard and 4 cam straps, we created a  swing, with well, more swing. This is a great kid's swing to keep in your car or bike bag, particularly if you find that sweet spot near a body of warm water this summer.

If you use cardboard that comes from a box that has a waxy finish, your swing would be water-resistant, and should hold up in the event of an occasional splash.

The design of this swing is a common one, but the inspiration runs deeper.

The whole idea of bringing a swing to the people is one that stems from my father; rope swing builder extraordinaire.

My father actually made a practice of seeking out "rope swing type" people, and convincing them to let him build a rope swing (or zip line) for them in their back yard. He was a kind of "missionary of extreme backyard play" seeking the easy converts of the neighborhood.

I remember my father, one evening, relishing in the fact that he had scored a large pile of tow rope from a local ski hill that had recently gone out of business. He thought it would be enough to make a swing for every family in the neighborhood.

He had extension ladders, tree climbing harnesses, and I seem to remember a pair of spiky shoes for scaling tree trunks.

He was always planning ahead by stockpiling materials. Once he and my mom even moved a massive old hospital fire-escape into our backyard which he reconfigured into an incredible twisting tube slide that launched from our back deck.

I cannot remember a time in my life when we didn't have some kind of risky swing to swing on or I couldn't hear my father's occasional Wheeee! punctuate the silence of a beautiful summer day as he pushed one of us on a swing.

I know it would put a warm feeling in my Dad's heart to know that we are sharing his enthusiasm for big swings with a few kids in Tokyo.

Thanks for all the fun Dad.

Happy Father's Day.

Flower Pounding on Paper Egg Cartons

We've done another project for TinkerLab's Flower Challenge this week. You have to try flower pounding! It's really simple and we got great results! Electra also loved getting the chance to use a REAL hammer.

A few of the different projects that I read about on the web used watercolor paper (check out this one at Sweet Leaf Notebook). We used Egg carton lids that we had on hand. The cartons worked really well, I think because they are so thick and the texture helps absorb some of the moisture in the flower.

The biggest tip I have for you is that it's important to spread the flower's petals out, and use flowers with simple shapes and bold colors. Yellow Nasturtiums worked the best for us, but this works great with leaves too.

Ikebana-Inspired Teacup Arrangements

I snapped this photo of Electra playing with some leftover flowers from my Ikebana class  earlier this week and started thinking about how I could downsize this "Big Box" arrangement into something that would be more easily displayed.

Enter the teacup.

I always love arranging in open-mouthed containers and teacups are just the right size to display at dinnertime without overwhelming the food and conversation.

So, here's my post about cardboard, teacups, and toddler flower arranging for the fabulous TinkerLab's flower challenge that starts today. If you haven't seen Rachelle's site, I highly encourage you to head on over there and check it out. She's got amazing activities and lots of ideas for turning your home into a creativity and innovation haven for your whole family.

You might be familiar with some of these traditional kinds of Japanese kenzan or "frogs" as my mom calls them. There are also glass and iron versions in beautiful shapes, and some are highly collectible.

The only problem with these types of kenzan is that they don't sit well in the bottom of a teacup. The tapered shape of the cup makes them wobbly and difficult to work with. For that reason, I came up with two different kinds of cardboard fixtures that could be used to stabilize the flowers, and were easy for little hands to use as well.

The first fixture is made out of a rubber band and cut up cardboard tubes. This style worked well for our white teacup that was relatively small in diameter. It's hard to construct this style if the diameter of the container is too big without ending up with a bunch of rubber bands and cardboard pieces shooting all over your kitchen. You also need to be careful not to let the cardboard tubes touch the water. They will melt.

The second fixture is made by tracing the mouth of the teacup onto waxy fruit box cardboard, and then cutting it down until it fits securely inside the cup. I poked holes in the cardboard with an awl but you can easily use a Phillips head screw driver or a nail. You want to make holes big enough for flower and foliage stems to easily fit through.

Negative Space

Don't fill the entire fixture with holes. You want to leave some negative space that you can later cover up with moss or some other kind of low-lying ground plant. If you use the cardboard tube style kenza, just leave about half of the space empty. This can really open up the arrangement and make it more pleasing to the eye.

We had a great time going out to collect plant materials together. Electra is learning to use scissors, so this was a great way for her to put her new skills to use. I have a pair of clippers that are spring-loaded, so they were very easy for her to use and I just carefully supervised her, helping point out stems that were a little easier to cut through.

We chose a large variety of foliage and flowers searching for as many different shapes and textures as we could find. We had so many great conversations when we were out flower picking in the little neglected spaces around our neighborhood. Electra cried, "Momma, you have to smell this one!" and "Feel how fuzzy this leaf is!"

When we got home we laid down newspaper and trimmed some of the stems, removing any leaves that would come close to the water. It was wonderful to finally just sit back and let Electra create her own arrangement.

After Electra finished arranging the flowers we covered the remaining part of the fixture with some luscious green moss. She was so proud of her arrangement!

I know she'll be eager to try again next week, perhaps with some clippings from our balcony garden? Nasturtium, fennel, mint and lavender sound like a delicious combination for celebrating summer vacation at this time next week!

Be sure to check out other blogger's submission at TinkerLab's Flower Challenge Blog Hop / Linky Party.

Meeting a few of My Eco Heroes

Last weekend I had the honor of attending the International Symposium on Marine Plastic Pollution: Toxic Chemicals and Biological Effects hosted by Dr. Hideshige Takada and the International Pellet Watch here in Tokyo. (Wow, I know) I found out about Dr. Takada's work while researching citizen science projects last year to participate in with Electra and Isis. My husband was also interested, so this spring we contacted Dr. Takada to participate in his IPW project. Dr. Takada kindly invited us to attend his symposium on Sunday and it was a really fantastic experience.

For the last three years I have been reading and watching documentaries about plastics in our environment (Plastic: a Toxic Love Affair, Moby Duck, Bag it, Cheap, The Story of Bottled Water, My Plastic Free Life), and now I'm reading my newly signed copy of Plastic Ocean, by Captain Charles Moore.

Meeting and hearing from this round-up of plastic pollution All-Stars was a kind of  dream come true for me. One of the whole reasons I started The Cardboard Collective is that I wanted to provide families with alternatives to all of the plastic furniture, toys, and products that have become so ubiquitous in our day-to-day lives.

I cannot cover all of the things that I think you need to know about plastic here in the post so if you're interested and want to learn more, go ahead and click on some of the links I've attached above.

I'm so grateful to the dedicated group of scientists, researchers and activists that I heard from at the symposium for providing the data and passion behind a movement that I hope will someday change our planet and our health for the better and three cheers from all of us here at The Cardboard Collective.

Urban Gardening with Cardboard Planters

I made the cardboard planters by cutting a pineapple box to the desired size through both layers and then inverting the inner box. I also used a few strips of washi tape to brighten things up a bit and make the planter more secure.

I used the same concept to make the cardboard steps. I had to cut a second box to fit inside the top step for more support, but it does the job for Electra's small time guerrilla gardening project in our stair well.

I've learned after a few years of living in Japan that you can get away with anything that is super cute / Kawaii (rhymes with Hawaii).

......Like a little girl growing a morning-glory in cardboard pot.

Flip it over and it's a custom sized box or planter...

The planter on the right is what sparked the idea for making cardboard planters in the first place. They're called Wonderpots, and they're made from 100% recycled material. I've used them for the last 4 years and they work great. They last about two years before decomposing to the point that they need replacing.

My recent discovery of the waxy cardboard fruit boxes has got me thinking in a million directions. And the cardboard planter experiment will be the ultimate test of their strength.

I didn't even glue or tape this planter together. I just set it in the planter holder. The only thing I did was poke a few holes in the bottom of the planter to provide drainage.

So far we've got a young crop of edamame and edible-pod peas going strong. We'll see how our cardboard planter experiment holds up after a summer of growth and watering.

What about you, have you ever tried planting your annuals in cardboard?

Cardboard Bookshelf Organizers

As Electra dives deeper into the world of (pre) reading and books, we're trying to get a handle on our bookshelf.  I made this Maisy cardboard bookshelf divider for Electra as an experiment to see if it would help her understand that we can group books, and also guide her in putting her books away more easily. So far the divider has helped on both accounts, and I'm hoping to make some more dividers that correspond with our seasonal books, like a Christmas tree for Christmas, a heart for Valentine's Day, and a jack-o-lantern for Halloween.

I traced the Maisy character onto computer paper, colored it, cut it out and glued it to the heavy duty wax treated cardboard I talked about in the Wheels on the Box post. I learned the hard way after hacking through a normal piece of corrugated cardboard that you really need the strength and rigidity of the waxy fruit box cardboard for this divider to hold up. (You can see my first and second tries below.)

I had to use quite a variety of tools to recreate Maisy's chiseled features, including scissors, craft knife and mini cardboard saw, so I'll have to get back to you on the quick and dirty way of getting through this tough cardboard. (If you have any suggestions I'd love to hear your ideas in the comment box.)

Maisy is a character from a series of books written and illustrated by Lucy Cousins. We especially love Maisy because we can get a bilingual version in English and Japanese that we check out from our local library. We have learned colors, shapes, textures and so much vocabulary from reading these books together. Maisy or Lucy, if you're reading this, thank you for all the adventures!

Newspaper and Washi Tape Softballs

A quick post - a non cardboard one even. These newspaper and washi tape balls are great; A Nerf ball stand in for toddlers. They take minutes to put together, recyclable, your child's first soft ball.... Hmm, paired with a cardboard tube bat? ...and an indoor batting cage?

The Wheels on the Box

Just add Wheels... During our last trip to 0123 Harappa the girls really enjoyed the cardboard box sleds that they had. I kept thinking about how we could make an adaptation using castor wheels and some hardware from the local DIY home store. The real discovery however proved to be the strength and durability of a certain breed of fruit and vegetable boxes.

Dad's old necktie makes a great and easy pull strap. Just thread it through the holes and tie a square knot.

By the way, we've been putting castor wheels on everything in our house.

Utilizing our cardboard hitch, Electra starts up her own tricycle transport for babies business. (Kitchen to tatami room connections offered daily.)

Besides the scary warning akin to those found underneath your mattress, I found out that this box is built to hold up to 55 kilos!! It also has a water-resistant and wipe-able waxy finish (mothers rejoice!) which I believe must help combat mold and mildew during transport of fruits and veggies.

Scour your local grocery store for one of these sturdy boxes. I'm sure your friends in the produce department would be happy to help you out!

I found the castor wheels for about $ 0.99 a piece and then looked for nuts and bolts to fit the castor wheels. The bolts are about 2 cm in length. Just enough to accommodate the castor wheels and the single walled box.

Using a leather punch, (but you could also use a small Phillips head screwdriver) I punched holes in the bottom of the box that corresponded with the holes on the bottom of the castor wheels.

I found out after a few days of play and finding lost nuts all over the place, that you should orient the bolts so that the nuts are attached on the inside of the box. (OK stop giggling!)

I cut an extra piece of cardboard to act as a liner and provide a little more strength and rigidity to the bottom of the box. It also provides some protection from the bolts sticking up when the girls are riding inside.

Of course don't forget to decorate the box to look like your favorite fire truck, school bus or train car. (We haven't gotten that far yet.)

A cardboard box with wheels is a wagon, a trailer, a wheelbarrow, a hangout spot, and all around super fun toddler toy.

Yay cardboard!

Getting Sorted with Cardboard Magnets...

This latest project began when I started shamelessly digging through someone's recycling bin on the way to the train. It turned out that a neighbor was parting with a stainless steel file sorter with trays, as well as an over-sized rectangular tin. Hmm I thought, I know these are just what I need...

So after a wash, I realized that the tin was perfect for storing all of our cardboard letters and tinker toys. And since it's a tin... it was perfect for magnetizing (/monetizing? I wish) our letters.

I also made a little lime green cardboard frame which has magnets on the back for doing letter and number sorts. I tell Electra, "Put all the numbers you can find in the square." or "Which of these are from the Japanese hiragana alphabet?"

Spelling out "to-ma-to" in Japanese hiragana...

(Finding 5's... (You can see the fan card for "Ran" from Electra's first pony ride. ))

My luck continued when that night I received an early Mother's Day gift, from MY mother! It was packaged in the perfect cardboard box. After applying some washi tape stripes to the side, reinforcing the inside and pasting a pretty picture on the top we were all set. A perfect fit, and a divider in the middle for our bilingual magnets.

Cardboard Playdate

(Cardboard Pull Toy at 0123 Harappa)

After a week of sewing my heart out for the Elsie Marley blog KCWC (Kids Clothing Week Challenge) I'm ready for a break and the opportunity to get back to my cardboard projects.  I had a great time sewing and even had a blouse that I made for Electra featured on Elsie Marley's Blog. It was a great opportunity to engage in a Sew Along, and I'm hoping we can do something similar  here on The Cardboard Collective someday (of course with cardboard).

Today I took the girls to a favorite public indoor play place in Tokyo called 0123 Harappa. Harappa is a place for kids aged 0-3 and their parents to play with developmentally appropriate toys, socialize with other children and parents, and basically have fun.

Harappa has lots of activities for kids including a library area, an art area with clay, paper, crayons and glue, an are just for small babies who are not crawling yet, a house and dress up area, an open area for ride on toys, blocks, slides, small climbing gyms and so much more.

I wanted you to see some of the great ways that the staff at Harappa uses cardboard. They have made some incredible creations, and they're always changing! Here are a few of the things that they've made that I hope will inspire those with young children.

I've got to find out how they are cutting Japanese cardboard letters with such precision!

Peek-a-boo Wall murals. Hand painted cardboard.

Animal ball toss. They've put a rounded piece of cardboard inside so the ball rolls back to you quickly and easily.

My favorite. An amazing "Where Do These Animals Live?" wall puzzle (The pieces are magnetized and everything is hand painted.)

Cardboard Cylinder Walls for hiding small objects in. I didn't see too many kids playing with this, but I know if we had one of these in our home the girls would absolutely love it.

Even this adorable cardboard lion memo pad and pencil holder!

You can see why we love this place.

Cardboard Sakura Pavement Stencils

Cherry blossom petals are on the streets everywhere! Tokyo looks like it's been covered in fairy dust.

I was inspired by this post at Oh Happy Day about creating lawn "heart" stencils with flour.

We tried cherry blossom petals, cardboard and flower shapes, experimenting with both the stencil and the negative of the stencil. It was a beautiful day and Electra and Isis both absolutely loved collecting up the petals and scattering them onto the stencils. The best part was seeing the smiles on the obachans (grandmothers), who were out for a walk.

A great way to enjoy sakura, sunshine, and giggling little girls.

A Spring Swing

We've been away to all sorts of places during Grandma's 3 week visit to Japan, and to be honest we haven't had a spare minute to catch our breath and let you know what we've been up to. No cardboard projects until today, but lots of time to dream after being reacquainted with all the beauty and ingenuity of Japan's temples, gardens, and urban streets.

And did I mention that spring is in the air? Literally. Our cherry blossoms are at their peak beauty and their petals are just beginning to fall... my VERY favorite time of the year.

I made this swing to take to our favorite playground that has only a climbing structure and no swings.

The swing is made of three very sturdy cardboard tubes that I measured to the desired length and then cut with a Japanese hand saw (nokogiri).  I used paper twine to weave around the tubes, which took about 10-15 minutes, and then threaded rope through the outer two tubes. My trusty bike straps make the swing adjustable and easy to put up and take down.

A fun swing that I can also easily carry with me to the park to hang on a low tree branch. All parts recyclable or reusable. I haven't tested to see how much the swing can hold, and Electra is not a candidate for doing so due to her featherweight status, but I'm quite sure it could hold most toddler's quite easily. Give it a try and let me know how strong yours is!

Cardboard Tinkering Toys and Mobiles

Intergalactic Cardboard Space Station? Cubist Crossroads? Alice in Cardboard Wonderland? Just a few possibilities for Cardboard Tinkering Toys.

After experimenting with some tightly rolled up magazine pages, our universe kept expanding. The fun part of tinkering with the cardboard and magazine pieces is that you keep adding pieces to your building set as you go. As you fiddle, you get new ideas for ways that you can connect the magazine paper rods to one another. Add to your building set every time you play. We were able to recycle some of our old cardboard beads and cardboard alphabeads, and I've been saving words and images cut from cardboard boxes as well.

I also loved the possibility for mobiles.......

Here's a closer peak at some of our components. To be able to attach cardboard rods in two different directions, I glued two cardboard circles together with the channels running perpendicular to one another. If you glue four circles together and poke a whole through the center of each one, you can get your magazine rods to attach in four different directions plus you can thread the component piece on another magazine page rod. Other great possibilities include splicing two pieces together to get x-shaped pieces that act as stands and stabilizers.

I love the "found" poetry aspect of using cardboard words in conjunction with the bold cardboard geometric shapes.... Now go play!

Daruma-san

Daruma dolls are a tradition in Japan having to do with casting a wish, setting a goal, or pursuing a dream. It's been about 6 months since I started The Cardboard Collective and it's taken me that long to straighten out a few ideas in my head about where I want to go with my cardboard passions. With that in mind, I purchased a Daruma doll at Jindiaji's festival this year, filled in the pupil of his right eye, inscribed my goal on the bottom of the doll, and put him on the bookshelf in our living room (as did Electra). (When I hopefully achieve my goal, it is tradition to return the Daruma to the temple where it was purchased for ceremonial burning.)

After spending a few days sitting around the living room I realized that having a  Daruma doll in your house is a bit like planting your Kabuki-makeup-wearing kick-boxing coach in the corner with an eternal (one-eyed) look that says "Get out there Tiger." You can almost hear the throaty Clint Eastwood like growl seeping out. "Wow," is all I can say. It's really kept me on top of my game!

One last note about Darumas; (you can learn more about their history and how they are made here) guess what they're made out of? ... Recycled Cardboard.

Cardboard Message Stamps II

This is a variation of Cardboard Message Stamps using paper twine instead of cardboard. The paper twine affords more bend-ability for working with cursive  or handwritten style fonts and yields a print that's a little more whimsical. I will warn you that this project is a little fiddly and takes patience to curve the twine, hold it in place until it dries and get all the short pieces of twine to meet up. At the time I was doing it, I thought, hmmm this is tough, but now that it's finished and the stamp came out so well, I would venture to say that I would try this project again.

I can't read the package to be 100% sure, but I believe that this paper twine is made from the paper milk cartons that we recycle here in Japan. It reminds me a lot of the paper handles on those safety suckers that they handed out at the local credit union (bank) to pacify us when we were kids. And you know what? It worked! If only safety suckers were an option for nearly 1 year olds.

The first stamping always comes out a little patchy. The second run, pictured at the top of the post, stamped easily.

So I know this project begs the question, why make a message stamp, when you can just buy one?

1. Personalization. Write a name, or message that you would not otherwise be able to find on a store bought rubber stamp.

2. Make it Big. Perhaps you want to say something in a Big way over and over again. Then it would be handy to have a cardboard stamp.

3. Limited Life Span. Perhaps someone in your family is turning 40 and you don't foresee using a "big 4-0" stamp all that often or holding onto it for eternity. You also don't see the point of buying a stamp at the store and then Goodwill-ing it, or throwing it away. That's when a 4-0 stamp would be brilliant if made out of cardboard. You can recycle the whole thing. I think that really is something to celebrate. And by the way I think it also makes you very cool and very smart.