Upcycling Crafts for Kids: St. Patrick’s Day

Mar 12

We’ve partnered with Tracy Williams from the Howard County Recycling District, on a series of fun crafts that encourage upcycling items that may be recycled or mistakenly thrown away at your house. Here you’ll find photos and step-by-step instructions for a simple craft you can create together with your family. This craft was inspired by an article by Stefanie Girard from CraftGossip.

Supplies You’ll Need:

Plastic Water Bottle (we used Ice Mountain)
Green Craft Paint and Brushes
Glitter
Sharpie Marker or Writing Utensil
Construction Paper
Adhesive (we used sticky dots)
Box cutter or Scissors with Adult Supervision

Cut the Bottle

I cut around the last line of the water bottle to preserve the shape of the bottom of the bottle. Bottles may vary in the shape or design of the bottom, be sure to check you have the bottle you want. An Ice Mountain bottle has 5 heart shapes on the bottom with a small point in the center. We chose this bottle in order to make the luckiest four-leaf clover for our cards. We then cut one portion of the bottom into the shape of a stem.

Paint your Shamrock or Clover

You can use any shade of green you like, but we picked something from the craft box called “Spring Green.” You’ll want to be sure you’re painting on a surface that wont be ruined by a little paint splatter or spill. We painted two coats on our clovers to make the color very bright and opaque (you could not see through the paint). After painting, allow your clovers some time to dry and clean your brushes.

Fold and Write Decorate Your Card

We can’t wait to give these cards to our friends! You can fold your card however you’d like, but we decided to fold ours in half horizontally. You can share a kind message or a simple “Happy St. Patrick’s Day” to the recipient of your gift. Having everyone in your group write their own cards is a great way to practice fine motor skills and writing or spelling. Don’t forget to write who its from with your name or signature.

Add the Final Touches

Once your shamrock or clover is mostly dry you can trim the plastic and adhere it to your card. We added a little bit of glitter to ours to make it extra fancy. Sharing something like this craft with a friend or family member is a great way to upcycle a single-use plastic item like a water bottle and create a low-cost handmade item with love.

Remember to recycle the remaining pieces of your water bottle and opt to use a refillable water bottle as often as you can.

Photo Provided | Howard County Recycling District

Tracy Williams, Education Coordinator of the Howard County Recycling District shared why we should try to use less single use plastics, like plastic water bottles:

“Single use plastic is cheap to produce and cheap to use, but can be very costly in the long run! 9.1 BILLION tons of plastic has been produced in the US alone since plastic was introduced in the 1950s, and 79% of it still sits in landfills or the natural environment. Let that sink in! Plastics continuously break down into smaller and smaller pieces in the environment becoming microplastics that have been found in just about everything on the planet, including the human body! If we can reduce the amount of plastic that enters the environment, we can reduce microplastics and the health problems that are associated with them.”

Alli Lee