The 3 R’s (and new upcycle) are ways for us to help cut down on our waste. They conserve natural resources, landfill space, and energy.

Reduce, Reuse, Recycle, and Upcycle

Reduce- This means reducing your consumption or buying less. Ex: Buying items that take less packaging. Buying durable products (Quality over quantity).

Reuse- Rather than throwing out items like clothing or food jars, consumers can find new uses for them -- and thereby reduce their consumption of new resources. Ex: Taking an old pot and storing pencils inside. Taking an old carton of milk to make a watering pail.

Recycle- Recycling is a series of steps that takes a used material and processes, re-manufactures, and sells it as a new product. Ex: Buying recycled materials and taking the time to pick out recyclable items to be given to a collection center.

Upcycle- This is the process of converting waste materials or useless products into new materials or products of better quality or for better environmental value. This is different from recycling because items came from objects that would have been trash but are put together to create a better product than before. Ex: Taking old scraps to form something useful, a coffee table from broken pieces of glass and a wheel.

Step 1: Basic Setup

Story Division

Remove the white strip of cardboard off the box of Johnson’s baby head-to-toe wash (value pack).
Poke a hole in both sides of the strip of cardboard
Take some string (this was from Charter’s Club: intimate pajamas’ packaging, but any durable string works) and tie a knot in one of the holes.
Then take the string and place it through the box with one of the side openings and bring the string to the other side. Put the string through the other hole and tie it to the other side of the strip of cardboard.
This will be the division between the first and second stories.

Room Division

Take the side of a shoe box (Cupcake Couture was used here but any works) and cut off the whole short side of the box
Cut a door through the newly cut cardboard, and that will act as a door between the rooms
Tape down the division thoroughly

Step 2: Lights

First Floor

For the lights on the first floor, take 2 Easter eggs and break the top half from the bottom half.
There should be two distinctive sizes of eggs but that's okay.
Take a pipe cleaner and from the outside go through one of the two holes.
Now, weave your way out the other way.
Continue this until all the half eggs are strung along the pipe cleaner
Tape the ends of the pipe cleaner to the ends of the ceiling

Second Floor

The lights in the bathroom and bedroom are made the exact same way the first floor lights except only one full egg is used per room instead of 2 and instead of a full pipe cleaner, use half.

Step 3: Bathroom

Bathtub

Cut a corner of the the candy cane box (any box works) and make sure the piece you cut is roughly ½ inch thick and about 2 inches long.
Take the part that is “whole” and cut an oval in it.
Tape down in the corner of room

Curtains

Take a some thick string (this was from Charter’s Club: intimate pajamas’ packaging, but any durable string works) and cut 4 pieces, each about 3-4 inches long
Take some tape and place it on one tip of each strip.
Put the pipe cleaning in between the tape and string and fold down so that the tape only touches the string but wraps up the pipe cleaner. This is so the “curtains” will be movable along the pipe cleaner
Repeat this step for the other strips of string

Toilet

Take half of an Easter egg and cut out a half an oval from the candy cane box
Tape together the half egg and piece cardboard so that the the egg is opening from the top. Make sure the oval part of the cardboard is upwards
Tape it together and tape it in the bathroom Kitchen and Dining Room

Step 4: Kitchen and Dining Room

Table

Cut out a square piece of cardboard from any box and cut a hole near each corner.
Take a pipe cleaner and go through one hole and then the second one, but making sure to leave a lot of room so the pipe cleaner would act as the legs
From the second to third corner, make sure there is no space between them Between the third corner and fourth corner hole, make sure to leave space in between to act as the legs.
Flip the table upside down so the pipe cleaner going through the holes isn't visible and fold down the legs

Chairs

Take a strip of cardboard and fold it into 5 equal parts with the folds going inward, outward, outward outward outward Fold in the outward, outward, outward portion to make an incomplete square
Take the incomplete square and put it in the hole of the legs of the table Repeat these steps to make the a second chair on the opposite side to the first

Oven

Take a strip of cardboard about 2 inches thick and 6 inches long and fold it in half.
Then tape it to a corner on the first floor about an inch off the floor
Take the candy cane box and cut out a corner section to fit inside the corner where the strip of cardboard is. Make sure the oven is not too tall or wide
Take a “whole” side of the corner that will be facing outward and cut 3 sides of a square leaving out the bottom one

Fridge

Take a 7 inch strip of cardboard and fold it into four equal parts
Arrange the box so that it is in the shape of a box
Tape the loose sides together and tape the whole thing next to the oven in the corner

Step 5: Bedroom

Bed

Cut out a top hat like shape from one of the boxes.
Then from the burger king meal cut out one of the long sides of the box
Fold it so that it looks similar to the fridge except two sides are going to be a lot longer than the two other sides
Tape up the new box and wrap it in an old dryer’s sheet, leaving the ends of it tucked into the inside of the bed
Now, tape the new bed to the bed frame

Small Table