Happy New Year!!!!!

We hope you had a wonderful Christmas, or another holiday you may have celebrated this season! We've had sicknesses, birthdays and lots of family time this week and still working hard to start the new year off right for Good Garbage. Good Garbage Gab will continue next week! 

Remember to continue saving things like bottle caps, corks, plastic containers, tp and paper towel rolls, and other items on our list found HERE. 

Wishing you a happy and safe New Year from our families to yours!

Like us? Well be sure to share our page with all your friends and family! We will have so much going on in 2013, everyone will want to continue watching us grow!! 

Holidays . . . A Time for Giving!

While you are trimming your tree, entertaining your guests, shopping for and wrapping all those wonderful gifts and before you throw things away, stop and take a look at what you are tossing and see if it could be re-purposed. Check out our list Good Garbage Accepted Materials and see if it is on here. You will also find the link on the right side of this page at all times. It is updated often and always current. At times you will even find a wish list attached to it.

Set aside a box and fill it with these items instead of throwing them away... Bottle caps, can tabs, corks, wine bottles, excess wrapping paper, toilet paper and paper towel rolls, decks of cards with missing cards, game pieces to old games and left over scrap from all your handmade gifts... there's a multitude of items we could use for art projects. 

If you own a business (and even if you don't) and you want to reduce your waste, take this list to work with you and see if there is anything you can donate. Maybe it isn't on this list but you think it could be re-purposed... Email us! We will be glad to talk to you about it. 

After the first of the year, we will have some days we will be setting appointments for drop offs! Thank you for your wonderful support!

Our First Showing of Support!

We have our first showing of support!  Along with two more commitments of $50 each! I will keep updating as we continue to grow!  No amount is too small! - Thank you! Thank you!

Securing Our Spot in the Louisville Sustainability Movement - We Need the Community's Help!

Imagine if you will... A retail shop whose shelves are filled with a colorful array of left over, unused and recycled crafting material donated by artists, crafters and corporations from over-runs and collection drives. Glass - tiles - marbles - fabric - paper - buttons. On the far wall sits a grandiose display of artwork made from materials you see on the shelves—created by everyone from preschool kids to adults—being showcased for everyone to see; some even for sale. Then,  tucked away in a corner you can hear children and adults laughing while learning how to re-purpose a plastic bottle into a spider for a Halloween decoration or learning how to take wire from an electrical cord and make a pair of earrings. THIS IS OUR PASSION... 

Our mission...To provide a sustainable means for collecting scrap material before it enters the waste stream and making it available to the community for creative reuse.

You've been watching us over the last couple months here as we work on building shelves, sharing ideas and talking to just about everyone we come within 20 feet of. The behind the scenes meetings, hashing out ideas, brainstorming, researching and making educated decisions have been continuing beyond what we have been posting here.

After researching many options and existing reuse centers across the country and meeting with various people around town—from the Center for Non-Profit Excellence to civic leaders, to artists, teachers and environmentalists—we have decided to pursue a fiscal sponsorship with SCRAP USA (SCRAPpdx) in Portland, Oregon. Our mission and vision are closely aligned, and they have a sound business model, proven track record, and many projects all over the country. They will give us ongoing administrative help, access to grants, and the ability to begin functioning as a 501(c)3, tax-exempt charity, as soon as they approve our application, which could be as early as January 1, 2013.

In addition to our application, SCRAP has asked us to show proof that our Creative Reuse Center will have community support. A key part of that is to raise $1,000 in start-up money. This does not go to the sponsor, but serves as seed money to help us take our message to the streets through classroom demonstrations and workshops, environmental and arts & craft events all over Louisville, and to help us open our Creative Reuse Retail Store. Any money we receive in this campaign is not tax-deductible, nor does it give any ownership or provide any return on investment. It is an investment in OUR community to serve under-funded groups and support another part of Louisville’s sustainability initiatives.

We have started an email campaign and are now asking you, as our followers and those who would support the store either by donations or as patrons, please consider supporting us in this initial $1,000 campaign. Our goal is to send our application for fiscal sponsorship to SCRAP by December 1, 2012, so any amount you contribute before that would be greatly appreciated. We would like nothing more than to meet with you personally, discuss our vision further and to pick up your contribution. No amount is too little.

We are also always on the lookout for a building where we will be able to set up a retail shop, workrooms, etc. Have or know someone who has space that could be donated to us for a year? Or dirt (and I mean DIRT) cheap? Let us know.

Thanks for your time and thanks for your continued support by following us on here and on Facebook! Please be sure to share us with all your friends!

Anne Walker & Lynn Burgan

Anne.GoodGarbage@gmail.com

Lynn.GoodGarbage@gmail.com

We accept checks or you can contribute using PayPal (anne.goodgarbage@gmail.com).

We can begin by doing small things at the local level, like planting community gardens or looking out for our neighbors. That is how change takes place in living systems, not from above but from within, from many local actions occurring simultaneously. 

Grace Lee Boggs

Good Garbage Gab, October 19, 2012

Welcome to the first edition of Good Garbage Gab, where we offer useful tips and crafts for re-purposing items that you may normally just throw away (or hopefully recycle), or save not knowing what you can do with them. We may  also showcase local reuse artists and give you links to articles we think you might find interesting. We are doing this to get your motor running and thinking about the various ways you can reuse everyday items to keep them out of our waste streams.

     In order to keep from scaring off those new to repurposing, I thought it would be nice to start slow and easy. So I'm offering up a simple tip and a simple craft.

 2-Liter Bottle Canisters

You can use these for tons of items: Coffee, tea bags, sugar, crayons, markers, cotton balls, q-tips, change, and a host of other things. I like them because you can see what is in them so easily and when something is on the top shelf, with me being so short, that comes in quite handy. No guessing...

    What you need: Two 2-liter Bottles, washed, dried and any labels removed, Sharp knife such as an X-acto knife and a sharp pair of scissors.  

    Using the knife, cut the two bottles to look like the pictures here. Using the scissors, trim the bottles neatly.

Place the shorter one on top of the taller one and there you have it... a lidded, clear canister.

Another option is to paint them like these and use them as piggy banks, or whatever you can dream up! Both designs were painted with Rust-Oleum 2X satin spray paint and then details added with acrylic craft paint. 

Be sure to recycle the left over plastic!

And if you thought that was easy... Here's something even easier. No craft skills involved.......Button Earring Holder

You know all those extra buttons you get on a new shirt? Or the ones you take off a shirt before you reuse it as a rag or for other re-purposed items? Use them to keep your matched earrings together in your jewelry box or when taking  a trip in your jewelry bag. 

Did you go DUH?!?! Why didn't I think of that? Yeah, me too. 

Hope you enjoyed this new feature of our blog and can put to use the ideas we share. If you have something you've done and would like to share, please let us know by emailing or commenting here. Share our blog and Facebook page with all your friends and let's all work towards a better Community! 

Yarn, Yarn, Yarn...and Ideas

Yarn, Yarn and more Yarn!!! Oh my goodness the yarn! Received two, well stuffed black garbage bags full of all types of....yep, you guessed it YARN! We are quickly filling the shelves we built last week. We have to build more ASAP!!!! We are in need of scrap plywood, 2x4's and anything else that can be used as shelving, or stackable bins, plastic shelves, bookcases, etc.

Besides collecting stuff, we have been busy working on our plan and talking with everyone we possibly can about the creative reuse center. Passing out cards to anyone who will give us a minute. We have received a very warm response to our idea and hope we are building a great team of future volunteers as well!

We are starting a new feature this week simply called Good Garbage Gab. At least once a week (possibly more) we will be featuring ideas on repurposing items in your house, showcasing reuse artists and sharing thought provoking articles and such. We hope this inspires you to find ways to repurpose other things you might throw away and to keep as much out of the waste streams as possible.  Please feel free to post or email us with your own ideas. You are welcome to send us pictures of your finish products too. If you know a reuse artist, we'd also love to hear all about them. Be on the look out for the first post coming soon!

Thank you for following along, supporting and sharing our adventure in building Louisville's Creative Reuse Center. Keep watch for some exciting news over the next few weeks!

-Lynn & Anne

We have a home...

... at least for storage. This past Sunday we made it feel like home. Sort of anyway. We worked our butts clearing and cleaning up (as best you can a dusty, old buildings basement) our storage area.

Fortunate to get a jump start, we also couldn't do as much as we hoped because the old tenant hasn't moved out of it completely yet. Though we were very lucky to get a great start on collecting "junk" left behind by old tenants in the Hope Worsted Mills building. Lots of wood for shelves, the old plexiglass from the original windows that are being replaced, various types of paper, old computer keyboards, windows and lots of other stuff. With it being such an old building, we also felt very lucky we didn't run into any other furry 'tenants.' We left dirty but truly energized.

Today and over the next couple weeks we will build shelves, and continue looking for bins, storage containers, tables, and of course donated items we will be able to sell in the reuse center. The behind the scenes work for the center is keeping us extremely busy as well. We hope in the next few weeks to be sharing some very exciting news. Be sure to keep checking back on our progress...

The Frantic, Idea Flying, Farcical, First Few Weeks...

Wow! What a wild and crazy first few weeks for Good Garbage!

Since we met, we have been haphazardly exchanging ideas and thoughts about what we want to do, our vision, mission, setting goals, and taking deep looks into ourselves to assure this is what we want, and how we want to go about it.

There is so much excitement as we begin this journey, but there is still a lot of work ahead of us. Though in the end, to be able to teach about reuse, make items available to artists, crafters and teachers and keep the "junk" out of the waste stream will be the most fulfilling experience we have ever had. We hope you too will begin to think about what you are throwing away and see there could be a new use for it instead. If not, ask us...we may have an idea or you can donate to us to help further our cause! 

We have talked with many movers and shakers around Louisville and Kentucky getting some great advice and gaining supporters for the Good Garbage concept.

We are slowly getting a little more organized and making sense of the thoughts and ideas we've had. We are becoming a little more concrete in our efforts as well, we signed a six month lease starting October 1 in the Hope Worsted Mill's building basement for storage. This will allow us to start gathering things we will need such as bins, shelving, and racks as well as actual products you will be able to buy once the store opens. We have looked at possible store sites and as soon as we find one that is just perfect, we will be sure to share.

While we begin the brick and mortar part of the reuse center, we are busy also with all the behind the scenes things. Deciding if we will go this alone or find a fiscal sponsor, getting all the legal paperwork filed, and creating an advisory committee to help us along. We will be looking for a few volunteers soon as well to help with gathering and sorting in our storage space.

What IS Creative ReUse?

Have you ever thought about the many things that can be done with that jar you are throwing away? That chipped tea cup? Plexiglass from an old building's windows? 

Anne and I seem to think about that with everything. The jar? It becomes a vacation time capsule, holding small memories of places visited. The chipped tea cup becomes a faux fireplace mosaic, complete with a mantle. And the plexiglass becomes a cute magnetic dry erase board or a cloth & ribbon memo board.

We get excited about stylish, functional, and innovative creative reuse ideas. From a grocery bag made from an old stained, ripped t-shirt to a gallery installation, from home-made costume to classroom educational materials, creative reuse includes all projects that incorporate materials that would otherwise be thrown away. Teachers, artists, crafters, and designers who transform what could have been thrown in the landfill into something with new value will find materials at Good Garbage.

As much arts-related as it is environmental, creative reuse demonstrates that artistic creativity and learning can take place anywhere and everywhere - and with all manner of materials - and that "junk" has value for those who can see meaning beyond the discarding of things.

Two Women... One Vision... Chance Meeting... Dreams Coming True

Welcome to our Good Garbage journey... The vision of two women, meeting by chance, turning their dreams to reality!

What is Good Garbage you ask? Though we are still in the beginning stages, our mission is to divert usable materials from landfills to underfunded teachers and artists while promoting creative reuse through educational programs and workshops for children and adults in order to continue to protect the environment within our community.

Our vision is to have a brick and mortar creative reuse retail store, workshop space and eventually a gallery full of artwork created by the many talented artists in the Louisville area.

The purpose of this blog so early on in our journey has multiple purposes, but mainly is to familiarization the Louisville community with the concept of creative reuse and the Good Garbage name, introduce the gals who are spearheading this vision, Anne & Lynn, and to share our successes and failures and hold us accountable, as we pour our blood, sweat and tears into making our dreams come true.

So you are welcome and encouraged to sit down, enjoy your favorite beverage, and join us in our humorous, sweaty, frustrating journey of two women... one vision... a chance meeting... determined to make our dreams a reality!