R is for Recycled Lobster Rope Mats | No better way to say “welcome to my home”.

A recycled lobster rope doormat has been on my wish list for years. I love the ingenuity of their evolution. When federal regulations banned the use of float rope by Maine lobstermen, due to issues with whale entanglement, they had to switch over to sink rope and retire the float rope. While the rope could have ended up in a landfill, instead it became the manufacturing material for a new line of products.

While it’s still possible to find recycled versions of the float rope doormat, there are also other companies that now manufacture them using new rope opening up more tailored designs and colors. They are wonderful, but I prefer the environmentally friendly nature of recycling the used float rope.

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Recycled Magazine Circles Decorative Bowl

The first year with my One Little Word® project, I selected embrace as my word, and one of my goals for the year was to embrace more creativity in my life. I had been fascinated with recycled magazine crafts for a while and decided to give it a try.

It’s a super easy project, although it is time-consuming to make a lot of circles, and you will need quite a few to make something larger like a bowl. It makes for a fun, creative activity while watching TV. There are many great sites out there on the internet that give various instructions and show all the amazing things you can make with recycled magazine circles. The cool thing about this craft is that it’s not exact, and there are many variations on the path to a successful project.

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