Japanese Flower Kusudama Ball

So today, we will be making a Japanese Flower Kusudama Ball. It's not actually that fitting for our 1-2-3 Thursdays since it takes a lot of time to make these, but then, we can squeeze it in from time to time.

The good (and bad) thing about maintaining servers is that I've got lots of free time when nothing is happening, so I decided to kill time by making these awesome flowers and made them into a ball! It's also a good way to curb hunger, sugar crash and sleepiness during work hours. ;)


These balls have so much potential! I even think they'll look great in weddings, a bouquet that my bridesmaids will carry, perhaps?

Materials for Japanese Flower Kusudama Ball

• 
• 

Tools for making Japanese Flower Kusudama Ball

• 

How to make Japanese Flower Kusudama Ball

A huge factor in the outcome of this the color of paper you will use. I made my flowers from the pages of my Garfield Calendar which I received last Christmas. All I did was to cut them into squares to make the traditional square Origami paper. Since the paper is thin glossy paper, it's really easy to fold.

Ideally, you would want to use a larger paper so that the flowers look prettier. I suggest using magazines or old note and sticky note papers to make these.

I'm working on making a flower out of my used note papers here in the office, It will probably take a long time to complete, but at least I was able to upcycle my paper.

Over all, it took me about 5 hours to do this, of course that's with work going on in between making these. It also depends on how fast you fold and how quick your glue dries.

Check out these easy to follow tutorials on how to make the flowers and the Kusudama

Balls From Folding Trees (Photo Instructions):
1. Part 1: Making the Flowers
2. Part 2: Making the Kusudama Ball

From S Forrest in YouTube (Video tutorial:)
1. Part 1: Making the Flowers
2. Part 2: Making the Kusudama Ball

Tweet

Baguio Country Club Christmas Village - Eco Friendly Christmas Decorations

Last weekend was a long one, with Bonifacio Day falling on a Friday, my family and I decided to go up to Baguio and have a vacation.

On of our itineraries was to visit the Baguio Country Club where we can buy the famous raisin bread that people keep raving about. We can buy this inside the Christmas Village that the Baguio Country Club created.

I was surprised with what I saw, a real delight! Most of their decorations were recycled! AWESOME! They were also very pretty! Something that you wouldn't mind displaying in your home, and you can proudly say it was recycled!

Most of the materials used were from plastic bottles and aluminum cans. It's either the top half, the bottom half of the can, the bottle caps, the bottoms of the bottle.

The way the decorations were used were really lovely. I heard my mom exclaim that she'll start collecting bottles so that we could have cheap decorations for Christmas!

 Lovely bells made from half bottle tops with caps on, painted white and gold, with a sprinkle of silver and golf glitters to make them sparkle

 A huge tree made from plastic bottles with red caps that have dyed (green) water inside. Leaves and flowers were made from huge, painted plastic bottles (1.5L-2L)

 A wonderful string of flowers made from plastic bottle (300mL-500mL) bottoms, painted and glittered. Angels were made from small lotion/soap squeeze bottles. Heads are made from bottle caps and the halo from the bottle cap rings. Painted white and glittered

 I'm not really sure what kind of decoration this is, but they sure are lovely. They are made from aluminum soda cans, i think you can make a top and a bottom from one can!

 Golf ball tree is made from halved golf balls which were bedazzled with glitters. Poinsettias made from plastic bottle tops and bottoms with plastic bottle caps. The glass bottle tree was made from glass (wine) bottles painted and bedazzled with glitters

 A very pretty star that is made from 2 large plastic bottle bottoms (1.5L-2L)

Another neat idea for stars. 5-6 500mL Gatorade bottles, painted and bedazzled with glitters

Tweet

Dining in or Getting it "To Go", Where-ever it is, Refuse the STRAW

There are days when you just want to eat out. It's either you want to celebrate something, or you're just too lazy too cook your own meal. Whatever the reason is, eating out is no reason to forget to save the earth.

Usually, when we order food, we order a drink to go with it, and more often than not, a drinking straw is given with our drink. We have to learn and remember to refuse the straw. It's not helping the environment at all.

Why we shouldn't use straw

Straw is made from plastic, which we all know, doesn't decompose. What's more, straw is just a one-time-use kind of plastic. You don't reuse straw. It's downright unhygienic. Poses a lot of health issues. So what happens after you use it? Yep! it's for the dump fellas!

Straw is more trouble than it's worth

Straws in the dump is the least of all evils though. We're lucky if the straw ends up in the dump. Most of the straws end up in water ways clogging it up, or worse - gasp!, at the open sea or flowing rivers, where the poor sea creatures think it's food and swallow it! Imagine eating fish who ate plastic! wow!

But wait, straws protect me from bad stuff

Okay, hold on, protect you from what exactly? The germs and bacteria in the rim of your glass? What makes you think that it's only on the rim? Whatever's on the rim is also inside the glass, it was "washed" on the same tub of foamy hot water.
There's no point in denying that straws protect the enamel of our teeth. Yes it really does a good job at that. It's okay to use the straw for that reason, as long as your teeth is more important than saving the world :)

Recyle it

There will be times that we will forget to refuse the straw, or we cant drink our drinks without it (like shakes and frappes). What do we do now? Well we can keep the straws and reserve it for craft making like these:

• 
• 
• 
• 

With that said, let's all learn how to refuse the straw.

Tweet

Waste Plants and Green Coal

Zehira USA, through its local subsidiary, Integrated Green Technology Visayas Inc. will start building a state-of-the-art garbage disposal system in Mactan, Cebu. This garbage disposal system will break-down garbage and convert these to green coal, which can be used by coal-fired plants. Similar systems are also being considered to be built in the municipalities of Molave in Zamboanga del Sur, Midsayap in North Cotabato, and Galan in Sarangani, and Panabo City in Davao del Norte

Stabilat Technology, which is the technology that will be used for the garbage disposal system is from a German company called Herhof GmbH which specializes in the design, construction and operation of Stabilat plants.

For more information on this project: http://newsinfo.inquirer.net/242311/mactan-waste-plant-to-produce-green-coal

Tweet

Plastic Bottle Boat

Here's a pretty good use for plastic bottles:

Very useful in floods, especially the one now ravaging the Philippines.

Tweet

Biggest Earth Hour Yet. Philippines, A Hero Country

It's been a few days since we celebrated Earth Hour. The tallies are in, and an estimated 1671 RP Cities, Towns, Provinces and Municipalities of the Philippines joined Earth Hour, making the Philippines the country with the most number of cities (et.al) who joined. RECORD BREAKING! We've been awared "Hero Country" as we have been number 1 for  four consecutive years; since we joined in Earth Hour. IMBA talaga ang Pinoy. (Filipinos are really good/one-of-a-kind)

Learn More Here: http://www.wwf.org.ph/earthhour/

Tweet

What did you do during the Earth Hour?

So, what did you do? Some people (like me for instance), don't go out to earth-hour celebrations. I just stay at home and try to do something productive under the moon- and candle-lit night.

This Earth Hour, I decided that I wanted to have a candle-lit dinner date. Haven't experienced it at all, and I thought it would be fun. So, as soon as SDEHBF (super duper extra hot bf) arrived at my place (around 1830), I asked him to help me out with preparing our date food. We didn't want to go for rice since we were trying to trim down our waistlines. Turned out, rice might have been a more low-calorie choice! Haha!

Our menu last night:
Deviled Eggs
Herbed Tomato Gratin
Garlic Bread
Banana-Mango Dessert-y (No idea what to call it)
Grape-Lemonade + Soda + Gin Punch

• 

We had so much fun making the food before earth hour. It was all spur of the moment, and what was tough was we didn't have the same taste in food (well, the ones we were preparing anyway). I wanted the deviled eggs spicy and tangy. He didn't want it to be spicy. I want the tomatoes to be infused with a strong herb flavor. He didn't want a strong herb flavor. Everything turned out great afterwards anyway. Yummy! We made too much food it was good for 4, but we ate most of it! So much for our waistlines!

Deviled Eggs:

• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 

Herbed Tomato Gratin:

• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
  

Garlic Bread

• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 

Banana-Mango Dessert-y (No idea what to call it)

• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 

Grape-Lemonade + Soda + Gin Punch

• 
• 

So this was how I spent my Earth Hour. How did you?

Tweet