As a college student studying engineering, I burn through a lot of paper. A whole ream of the stuff would be used up entirely on a fairly regular basis because of the nature of my homework, and the amount of diagrams they involve. To cut back on the amount of paper I use, I began to use scrap paper from the miss-prints. The problem was, though, that papers from different subjects would get loose and mix with one another, usually resulting in an important section of notes going missing for quite some time. I needed a way to bind my scratch paper into a notebook, and I wanted to do it in a fairly green way.
Here's my solution. This notebook is made from and bound with recycled materials. The cardboard covers and scratch paper are being given a new life, and staying out of the trash while I am using less paper.
Making one of these notebooks takes about 45 minutes. I usually make one while on the phone each night, as you can still concentrate on other things while making one. The composition books that this will be replacing cost only a dollar or two, so this is more about recycling rather than saving vast amounts of money. As an added plus, you can get some pretty cool designs of your covers, depending on the boxes you use, or you can have the plain side out and decorate it yourself.
Here's my solution. This notebook is made from and bound with recycled materials. The cardboard covers and scratch paper are being given a new life, and staying out of the trash while I am using less paper.
Making one of these notebooks takes about 45 minutes. I usually make one while on the phone each night, as you can still concentrate on other things while making one. The composition books that this will be replacing cost only a dollar or two, so this is more about recycling rather than saving vast amounts of money. As an added plus, you can get some pretty cool designs of your covers, depending on the boxes you use, or you can have the plain side out and decorate it yourself.
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Materials you will need are
-used paper. My school has a lot of computer and graphics labs, and each of them has a recycling bin for miss prints. This gives me a pretty ample amount of the stuff.
-a cardboard box. I prefer to use the flat kind, rather than the corrugated kind. Cereal boxes, the boxes for 24 packs of soda, most microwavable dinners, etc. will do. My room mates eat a lot of that kind of stuff, so I have a good supply in our personal recycling bins.
-thread. I use carpet thread because it is pretty robust stuff. You can use regular thread, but I would double it up to be safe.
-a ruler. We will be measuring the places for our holes to be punched.
-a thumb tack. This will be used as a punch to make our treading holes.
-an x-acto knife. This will trim down to size our box.
-a writing tool. You will need to mark a few things.
-a board to bear down on. We don't want to mess up any tables punching hols or cutting, do we?
-duct tape. Just for good measure.
-a bulldog clip to hold our paper down.
-used paper. My school has a lot of computer and graphics labs, and each of them has a recycling bin for miss prints. This gives me a pretty ample amount of the stuff.
-a cardboard box. I prefer to use the flat kind, rather than the corrugated kind. Cereal boxes, the boxes for 24 packs of soda, most microwavable dinners, etc. will do. My room mates eat a lot of that kind of stuff, so I have a good supply in our personal recycling bins.
-thread. I use carpet thread because it is pretty robust stuff. You can use regular thread, but I would double it up to be safe.
-a ruler. We will be measuring the places for our holes to be punched.
-a thumb tack. This will be used as a punch to make our treading holes.
-an x-acto knife. This will trim down to size our box.
-a writing tool. You will need to mark a few things.
-a board to bear down on. We don't want to mess up any tables punching hols or cutting, do we?
-duct tape. Just for good measure.
-a bulldog clip to hold our paper down.
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And like to make shiny things from recyclables. How very cool.