The United States uses 129.6 Million plastic bottles per day which is 47.3 Billion plastic bottles per year. About 80% of those plastic bottles end up in a landfill!
I love this story that I spotted on themindunleashed.org. Here is an amazing way of using up the plastic bottles and creating homes!
By filling plastic bottles with sand, and molding them together with mud or cement, walls can be created, and a home can be built that is fire proof, and will maintain an comfortable indoor temperature of 64 degrees in the summer time.
To build a two bedroom, 1200 square foot home, it takes about 14,000 bottles.
We throw away enough plastic bottles to build 9257 2 bedroom houses per day! That’s just over 3.35 million homes, the same number of homeless people in America!
Please watch this inspiring video for an amazing solution to the millions of plastic bottles that fills landfills.
Creating the Vintage Look: 35 ways to upcycle for a stylish home, is a book by Ellie Laycock (Author and owner of Hunted and Stuffed, who I have blogged about before: HERE). This book is very well laid out with some creative tips, not only to use pieces that might otherwise have been thrown away, but also look stunning!
Discover how to upcycle to make unusual and unique homeware with Creating the Vintage Look. Upcycling is about taking something old, vintage, treasured or possibly even broken, and giving it a new lease of life by turning it into something new. It's a thrifty way of decorating and enhancing your home that avoids waste, but is also stylish. Here, Ellie Laycock shows you how you can make truly beautiful objects from things you might otherwise have thrown away. Be inspired by the ingenuity of her projects, including turning old tin trays into chic magnetic noticeboards, using teapots as quirky planters, transforming a vintage fruit crate into a rustic bedside table and converting metal cheese graters into tea light holders. All of the 35 projects have clear instructions and artworks to guide you on how to make them, and are grouped on a room-by-room basis, plus a helpful techniques section will teach you any skills you need to know.
The essential guide to outdoors fun for the whole family
by Charlie and Caroline Gladstone with Kate Burt available for £12.99 from Pedlars
If you are tired of having entertainment laid on for you at the flick of a button and fancy some real outdoor fun with your children this summer, then you will love this book and you will give your family a summer they will never forget.
This is the perfect time of year for this type of book because as the Summer holidays approach many parents are on the lookout for great things to do with their children. If you are on this Creatively Recycling blog, then chances are you will be on here as you are looking for something a little different. This book by Charlie and Caroline Gladstone is, what I would call a REAL activities book. What is lovely about this book is that it is all about activities you can do with children outdoors. As far as I am concerned, anything that takes children outside of their four classroom walls, or away from television and computers really has to be a great thing.
I think the real reason this book stands out from other holiday activity books is because it has been written by a couple who have six children and who quite clearly love spending time outdoors. Therefore, rather than someone being commissioned to write about a certain subject matter, this couple are simply sharing what they have learnt over twenty years of living the outdoor life with six children in the wilds of Scotland. It is a guide book, with tips, how to's and lists, but it also has pages in each chapter for you to write your own notes in.
I found the section on keeping hens very interesting and was surprised to also read that, as well as having six children, the couple also have six dogs, horses and a flock of ancient chickens. Their Best kit for the great outdoors I also found very useful as they explained their tried and tested tools and tell you where to get them from.
The instructions for things to build is beautifully clear. I would imagine many of these could be carried out by children and adults. To mention but a few: How to build a raft, How to build a dam and How to build a den - are all explained with illustrations to guide you through each step.
There is a Gladstone's guide to their Top five tents (the pros and cons for each design) and even a Campsite etiquette! The lay out of the book makes it easy to dip in and out of, so perfect for taking away with you. I found it a thoroughly enjoyable read and found my 13 year old dipping into it also.
There is a great cooking section that not only includes some inventive recipes, such as One pot dishes andWhole fish baked in newspaper, but also useful tips like, How to build a fire,Cooking equipment needed, and How to skin a rabbit.
As you will see from my bookmarks to date I have managed to find many things that attracted my attention in this book. Items I have marked as interest so far are Predicting the weather,Where to go cycling, How to tie different knots,Food Foraging,The best kit for outdoors and The best music for outdoors, then for those looking for a book to read, Ten must-reads about the great outdoors.
I really did enjoy this book. In many ways it took me back to my childhood Summers when myself and my four siblings spent the entire day outdoors playing, inventing, building and eating outside until it was pitch black and we could see no more. This book by Charlie and Caroline Gladstone encourages children (and their parents) to think logically, to create, to build, to survive, but above all, to have fun.
They say that sometimes the best things in life are right under your nose. I felt this to be true when I discovered that Yeo Valley had recently launched some redesigned venue spaces for hire. The Yeo Valley HQ is based in the village of Blagdon, a 10 minute drive from my studio in Clifton, Bristol.
We all know the name Yeo Valley from the yoghurts we have eaten over the years, or perhaps more recently, from the Yeo Valley television advert. But it seems that Yeo Valley has more to offer than just organic yoghurt. Aside from its wonderful eco-friendly principles and organic range of 100% British products, Yeo Valley offers venue spaces to hire in the company HQ. The HQ itself is in an outstanding setting, nestled in the valley of Blagdon, Somerset. The rural views from the rooms are breathtaking and yet it is so close to Bristol. Yeo Valley's six 'Amazing Spaces' (as they call them), are really worth seeing. Each space has its own unique character and all are designed and styled by Sarah Mead, wife of Tim Mead, Managing Director of the family business. What I love is that Sarah has styled each room using second-hand items that she collected off Ebay. The result is stunningly unique. I couldn't think of a more inspiring place to hold a meeting, conference or workshop than here.
Yeo Valley has six rooms to hire which are: The Beatles Room, The Old Trout Room, The Lecture Room, Fisherman's Friends, The Cow Rooms 1 and 2 (which also convert into a single large Cow Room). Once hired, Yeo Valley can serve breakfast on arrival (with lots of their delicious yoghurt of course!). You can also snack on homemade biscuits in the morning and cakes in the afternoon. Lunch is prepared by their talented chefs using locally sourced ingredients and served in their fully licensed restaurant. They also offer free wifi, state of the art audiovisual equipment, and parking is free and ample!
There are so many lovely things to see when you enter Yeo Valley HQ that I am going to struggle to fit them all into this post (and sadly will have leave quite a few out). The styling throughout has been put together using items found from here, there and everywhere. Yet Sarah manages to make it all work so elegantly and beautifully.
'AMAZING SPACES'
THE BEATLES ROOMS
Inspired by the iconic and famous fab four, the Beatles Room is ideal for smaller groups.
A polished dining table, ceiling rose, and intriguing, illuminating centrepiece all add to the salubrious feeling in this traditionally decorated room.
Yeo Valley's biggest room with state of the art multimedia equipment. The Lecture Theatre is perfect for presentations, with its 12 ft screen and capacity for up to 120 guests.
I must say though, that the Amazing Spaces are just a very small part of Yeo Valley Company. Apart from the family run dairy that we know, which the Meads have run for the past 50 years, the other spaces equally deserve their own blog post as they are just as impressive:
Yeo Valley Organic Garden Tea Roomwhich is open to the public to enjoy. The Tea Room is a lovely, light open space, with a wonderful view up the valley over the organic garden.
Yeo Valley Wills Barn: Set apart from our other Amazing Spaces, with fabulous views over Blagdon Lake, this makes a truly inspiring venue for gatherings of all kinds. Whether meeting or meditating, bonding or brainstorming, privacy and seclusion are always guaranteed. Wills Barn is also fully carbon-neutral, powered by solar panels and heated by a biomass boiler. It’s an 18th-century “bank barn”, but fully refurbished to ensure it provides a warm welcome at any time of year.
Having spent the morning at Yeo Valley I can not recommend it enough as a venue hire. I have only captured a small part of what I saw as I walked around. It represents everything that is Bristish, recycled and organic and yet at the same time manages to this with the upmost style.
For the Yeo Valley Spaces website, please click HERE.
For the Yeo Valley Family Farm website, please click HERE.
You can also write to, Yeo Valley HQ, Rhodyate, Blagdon BS40 7YE
I am going to leave you with one of the Yeo Valley television adverts. I think this is very clever marketing. It is informative, giving you the information you need to know about their product. It is also cool, therefore targeting a wider age range, but at the same time, it is different. This advert stands out and you remember it. That is what being in a creative space will do.
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