Pencil Pouch With Plastic Bags
Plastic bags are an everyday item in homes and businesses. They are used to facilitate transportation, but there is great concern about their impact on environmental pollution, as many of them take many years to completely degrade. Although currently, great progress is being made in raising awareness of their use, it is not enough. Some countries have banned their use or issued measures such as not giving them away for free in supermarkets, but instead requiring consumers to purchase them. This encourages consumers to carry their own reusable bags and avoid the massive consumption of plastic bags. However, there are other types of plastics that do go straight to the trash, such as food packaging. This is an invitation to be more conscious of how we use our plastics. If only we would recycle them consciously, such as putting them in plastic bottles and filling them with all those small plastics or food packaging, making the famous love bottles or eco-bricks.
In this instructable, I want to invite you to discover another way to recycle or give these plastics another chance.
Thermofusion of plastic bags is a recycling technique that allows plastic bags to be transformed into a new material.
is a very economical and creative activity that can be done at home with these plastics, thus avoiding the misuse of plastics.
Supplies
- Plastic bags
- scissors
- iron
- needle
- thread
- Parchment paper or baking paper
This is a sustainable project that will give a second chance to all those plastic bags that end up in the trash and pollute our planet, reaching the seas and affecting marine ecosystems. Some animals mistake them for food, and they remain, blocking their digestive tracts and causing death.
This is an invitation to recycle plastics in all their forms.
So let's get started.
Image credits: Paulo Oliveira and resources found on the web.
1. Collect plastic bags you have at home, whether they're T-shirt-style bags provided at supermarkets or the plastic bags that package food comes in.
2. Organize them by color and size.
3. Wash and disinfect them.
4. Let them dry completely inside and out.
5. Select the bags you'll use for the base of the pencil case. I chose white bags.
5. Select the bags you'll use for the base of the pencil case. I chose white bags.
6. Cut them into rectangles approximately 9.5 x 7.1 inches.
7. Cut approximately 8 rectangles.
8. Arrange them one on top of the other.
9. Place parchment paper or baking paper on top of the previously cut plastic bags.
10. Then, using an iron, press over the paper to fuse the plastic bags. Do this for a few seconds. Depending on the thickness of the plastic, we'll fuse them with heat until we see that the plastics are compact. Do this little by little.
11. This way, you'll get a heat-fused plastic bag. Don't worry if the material is bulging or rough; this is normal. In this step, you'll see how durable it is.
12. Now it's time to start designing the pencil case.
13. Choose, if desired, plastics with textures or shapes. Here, I selected a sliced bread bag with orange circles. Cut two strips to place on each side of the pencil case.
14. Place the wax paper back on top of the pencil case to heat-fuse the strip of orange circles.
15. Select more plastic bags in different colors and cut the shapes you like best. You can make hearts, strips, or triangles. Feel free to design your pencil case.
16. Place the shapes however you like all over the pencil case, or place them on one side, or you can make a collage with all the shapes.
17. Replace the paper and press it for a few seconds, until they heat-fuse to the pencil case.
18. Cut off the excess with a pair of scissors or a scalpel, leaving a perfect rectangle.
19. Sew the zipper with a needle and white thread, as the base and zipper are white.
20. Make two cuts in the base of the pencil case, cutting two 3 cm x 2 cm rectangles in each corner.
21. Turn the pencil case inside out and sew the sides.
22. To finish, sew over the cut you made.
This way, you'll have a pencil case made from recycled plastics that were perhaps destined to go to the trash without a second chance. This is a nice way to give these materials a new use. It's really durable and easy to clean.