Years ago I was invited to teach a workshop to recreational leaders on ideas for a kid craft activity. I chose to share how they could use items around the house to create low-cost kid arts and crafts. Recognizing how many budgets are limited, Treasures from Trash was created.

Enlist the children in saving items to contribute to your fun arts and crafts projects. This is a great opportunity to incorporate the importance of recycling and saving our landfills. Listed are some ideas of recyclable items to save, but look around and see if there are other items that can be used to create your own Treasures from Trash. Use your imagination and think "outside the box"!

These recyclable items make great arts and crafts projects. Make sure to check the items so that they are clean and safe for the children to use.

• Egg cartons
• Paper rolls
• Berry baskets
• Baby food jars
• Plastic soda bottles
• Tuna cans (no sharp edges)
• Greeting cards and old calendars
• Six-pack plastic rings
• Paper grocery bags
• Magazines (child appropriate)
• Coffee and drink cans
• Oatmeal containers
• Newspaper
• Assorted sized cardboard boxes
• Clean socks (The ones not lost in the dryer!)

Some kid craft activity ideas include puppets, box sculptures, science projects, collages and homemade gifts. Puppets can be made from all sizes of bags, socks and boxes. Create a marionette with a shoebox and imagination! Many science projects such as making a tornado, rain or terrarium call for a plastic soda bottle. Use berry baskets to decorate for Mother's Day, Grandparents Day or Easter gifts.

Making a collage is an inexpensive art project when using a lot of the items listed above. Put out old greeting cards, calendars, magazines, postcards, and paper scraps for the kids to create a unique collage. Save leftover craft supplies such as buttons, ribbon, lace, fabric scraps, and beads to be used on the collage.

I hope this is a beginning of you creating your own Treasures from Trash projects. If you run out of ideas, just put the recycled items out and let the children create! They can be very resourceful and imaginative.