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| Beautiful things can be created from recycling material! |
I always admire people with their creative abilities. Creative people
can use anything and turn them into something useful and beautiful.
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| A Towel Holder |
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| A Fence for a Backyard |
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In my travel aboard and mostly in North America, we have come across a
lot of beautiful useful items made from recycled or waste material.
Be creative and think outside of the box!
All the fence posts do not need to be cut at the same height.
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| A Fence Made of Branches |
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| Attractive door signs and decorations made from twigs |
This fence made from branches adds character to the rustic surrounding of this cottage place.
It's amazing to see what how many practical uses and purposes these branches can serve around our homes and garden!
Don't throw away the crooked or twigs with forks. They look perfect on these doors at a country retreat!
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| A bowl made from twigs |
After a storm, there are an abundance of twigs on the ground.
Use your creativity
and make something out of them such as this decorative bowl.
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| A twig basket made of twigs from my brother's backyard |
I made a basket out of tree branches gathered from my brother's backyard in Thunder Bay, Ontario.
This basket has been around for over fifteen years!
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| An interesting piece at Algonquin Park |
Surrounded by rocks, an old tree stump can be interesting by itself such as this one in Algonquin Park, Ontario
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| A modern centre piece made of twigs and small branches |
Small branches and twigs can be turned into gorgeous home decorations like this one displayed at a botanical garden.
Collect an assortment of small branches; cut them at various height, paint them white. Arrange in a way you like it. Nail the branches to a piece of wood.
You've got an elegant piece centre piece!
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| Wall Art Made from Branches, Niagara Falls, Canada |
Another beautiful and elegant piece made from branches was this wall decoration we saw in Niagara Falls
Very similar to the smaller piece, this one was also painted white and set against a navy colour wall.
Very eye catching indeed!
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| Wall decorations made with natural recycled material |
It you have to cover a large wall , another economical way to create a gorgeous wall decoration piece is:
a. Paint a piece of canvas or wood of desired size to fit the wall size
b. Place the branches down on the canvas. wood in a way that you like
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| This wall decoration cost very little to make |
c. Glue them down with a glue gun
d. Other elements such as small pebbles, leaves, feathers and dry plants can be used to add texture to the finished art piece
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| A bird house made of twigs and small branches |
Here is a rustic idea for twigs!
Cut the twigs and small branches at desired length and glue them together to make a bird house for the birdies!
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| Children's Museum, Rochester, USA |
Why spend money on expensive signs when you can create a beautiful unique sign like this one using twigs, small rocks and shells?
In Thornbury, Ontario, we saw these stools with legs out of small branches and twigs. I wish we kept some of the birch branches we bundled up for garbage pick up a few weeks ago. Very rustic stools for our backyard indeed!
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| White Birch branches used as hangers at a Christmas booth to display its craft items |
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| Long pieces of bark branches are used as hangers and for decorating purposes |
Branches are very versatile and people have found many creative uses for them.
At the Toronto Christmas Market, a couple of merchants used White Birches branches as hangers to display their craft, clothing and other seasonal items. Birch branches are often used to decorate inside the stores. They looked beautiful, rustic, and festive for the season!
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| A long bench made out of logs and a wooden plank |
At the Collingwood summer festival, we saw how logs of wood were used to make this nice outdoor bench.
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| Old cable wheel recycled into a coffee table |
If you come across some old big cable holder, don't throw them away.
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| The recycled cable wheel blends in nicely with some modern furniture |
They can be turned into pretty nice coffee table like the one we saw in an Ontario town.
I really enjoy looking at how pieces of logs, twing can be turned into pretty things to decorate our house. This basket to the right is rustic.
These small pieces of branches were ideal plant containers to bring in the nature in small living space.
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| Small hollowed out logs pieces make beautiful mini planters for small plants |
We saw these pretty mini planters in a mall in Guangzhou, China.
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| Leftover oyster shells decorate the entrance of the Oyster Bar in China |
On the same trip to China, walking by an oyster bar in Guangzhou, we came across some simple but pretty landscape scenery outside the restaurant. The beautiful white shinny rocks at the entrance to the restaurant caught my attention. They looked natural, beautiful, and were in unusual shapes.
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| Empty oyster shells |
On a closer look, I discovered that these beautiful objects were not ordinary rocks at all; they were empty oyster shells from the restaurant.
What a smart idea! Making use of the leftovers of the oyster dinners and recycling them to decorate the outside landscape of the place!
In the Toronto Island School where I visited not long ago, I came across a display on a school bulletin board with the creative uses of some very common objects.
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| painted bottle caps |
Students painted a large number of bottle caps in various colours to form both the leaves and the trunk of the tree for the display.
Very pretty, unusual and eye catching indeed!
I am interested in how twigs, branches, little rocks and pebbles any simple common everyday items could be turned into
lovely and useful things to decorate their homes or for everyday use.
Hope you'll enjoy them!
R.T.
Toronto
latest updated - Dec 24, 2015
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