growable (we hope) home made paper (cardboard)

I often--ok, make that always-- have multiple things, projects, tasks, jobs, personalities (ha) going at once. A few weekends ago, my mom wanted to make paper. We have seen paper that is infused with seeds and we wanted to try it out. Mom found directions online, I got an old window screen from my sister in law, and into the kitchen we went.

Mom wanted to use only recycled paper. Since she works at a school, she started collecting reds, whites, greens, and a bit of yellows and blues so we could be 100% recycled. We were also super excited about the used screen that we could repurpose.

Nothing gets done in this house without some help...

...from everyone....

We started with ripping up the paper into pieced. I was tearing mine into smaller-than-dime sized pieces while Mom's were more like one dollar bills. We later realized that the dollar sized pieces were just fine since it was all going into an old blender anyway.

Then, we put handfuls into the blender and added water.

Then, we poured it onto the screen which was placed over the sink.

We spread it out and put waxed paper over each side. Then, we pressed it. This helped to remove some of the water and to even it out. We did this A LOT.

Then, we moved to the floor. We spread out beach towels and then pressed and pressed and pressed the paper some more. We changed the towels a few times to help it pull out more water.

Then, we oh-so-ungracefully removed the paper from the screens. It was very much trial and error and was pretty comical. After it was on a smooth, non terry cloth towel, we got out our seeds. Hindsight is 20/20.. marigold and zinnia seeds are just too big. We also used a packet of basil and forget me nots. Next time, we are using small wildflower seed mix. We kept each type separated on the paper.

When we were done pressing in the seeds, we took it out to our garage. We have a "wood room" with a wood stove that helps to heat the garage/house. Dustin had a fire going, so we just let it sit... for a few days... to dry.

The finished product? Well, it is at Mom's now and I have no photos, haha. But our paper, or a more appropriate term of cardboard, turned out well. Will it grow? We don't know.. I'll keep you post in the spring. The original plan was to use these as Christmas present tags. Somewhere along the lines, this ended up being the "practice batch". It really didn't take long at all. Other than the thickness (and the question about if the seeds will germinate or not), I call it a success!

This is definitely something we will try again. I'll post round 2's results when that time comes!

(Look what I learned yesterday!)

This post is linked in Funky Junk Interiors Saturday Nite Special  , at A Soft Place To Land's DIY Day
and at Today's Creative Blog's  Get Your Craft On.