Woven Magazine Page Baskets

When my son was five years old, deep in his dinosaur phase, we visited the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History. As we rounded a corner, a very large dinosaur skeleton suddenly loomed over us. My son froze, threw his arms out and toppled over flat on his face, overwhelmed by joy. Apparently, that kind of ecstasy saves supple young bodies from bloody noses and broken bones.

I tell this story because I nearly reached that level of ecstasy the first time I walked into a Storables store. Yes, I know, it's hardly the same thing as the wonder and awe of a wide-open and joyous young mind. Whatever.

I have a thing for storing my small mountains of office and craft supplies. But, I also have a thing for saving money. Recently I realized I needed more pen holders and little containers for storing all the miscellaneous little things I seem to collect faster than cats collect internet hits. I eyed a stack of old magazines in a corner, did a little Googling, and got busy.

There are tons of tutorials and videos on how to make magazine baskets. I looked at them all and mostly used this one from LoveToKnow Green Living:

How to Make a Basket Out of Recycled Magazines

I also checkout out How About Orange because I love her stuff.

Some tips not covered in most tutorials:

When you have your base done and are ready to fold up the strips to make the sides, use a ruler or something with a straight edge to fold the paper against to make a nice, straight line.

I just used invisible tape to secure strips. It has the same texture as the magazine pages and these are just for me so I wasn't going for perfection.

This isn't quite as simple as it looks and the tutorials make it seem. The paper is slippery and just looking for an opportunity to cut you. Tape is your friend.

Next time, I'm going to finish the tops of the baskets with colored duct tape.

In fact, my next paper weaving project is going to be these Recycled Woven Placemats and I'm going to use duct tape around the edges.

And maybe these Recycled Magazine Coasters.

The Dull Knife way: Buy as little as possible, re-use everything you can, recycle as much as you can, make things yourself as often as possible.