Create a silver ring from a silver quarter – costs just 25 cents and a few hours of your time!

This suggestion is inspired by a friend of Lora’s who visited Ohio recently.  He wants to be a mushroom farmer!  If you like mushrooms, you can grow your own “Gourmet mushrooms in an old coffee cup.”  Yum!

And finally, some DIY wall art.  Very retro.  I already know where I’m going to put this masterpiece when I get around to making it…

If you ever bike at night, it’s so important to be reflective and visible!  I hate it when I almost hit cyclists and pedestrians because they blend in with the road – I really don’t like accidently killing people!  Make yourself or your friend an awesome hi-vis badge for your bag or jacket so that I can see you when I’m driving.  Thanks.

It’s summer. It’s time for taking naps in the warm sunshine, just like your cat likes to do. What better place to take a nap than in a homemade hammock – even cats like hammocks.  The author of this instructable says it takes $10 and an hour of time to create your own hammock.  I’m planning to make mine on my next weekly craft night!  Be sure to videotape yourself getting in for the first time and then send us the hilarious results.

Love,

Elyse

Take action here and learn more at Raise Hope for Congo’s website.

Greetings! I hope you all have been enjoying this week as it is, of course, a very important week for us environmental enthusiasts. Lorax has been very busy this week because, on the 19th, we kicked off our “cellphone wars” to encourage students to donate their old and unused cellphones to be recycled. The top contributors will receive a gift card to Chipotle and Gamestop. Also, this week we unveiled this years T-shirts, which are purple! On top of all this, we have also undertaken a campaign this year to educate our school and community about the environment. A big step we have taken in achieving this goal, was that we sent informative newsletters about the environment to all of the elementary students in Solon, describing to the students the potential affects that we, as people, have on the environment and what we can do to help. We are very proud of the progress we have made this year, and we hope that we can continue it!

-Nikhil

Some awesome Instructables have turned up in my email lately – check ‘em out!

Who loves garage sales, thrift stores, and water fountains?  I do!  Combine your favorite things into one with the “How to make a Three Tiered Garden Fountain” Instructable.  It’s definitely got class – just add a solar-powered fountain pump to make it even more sustainable.

Who has ever cooked in a solar over?  I have and it was easy-peasy!  Consider this idea: instead of microwaving your lunch at work, just set your lunch in your solar oven an hour before lunchtime and you’ll have a hot, healthy meal to eat in no time!  I’ve heard some questionable things about the safety of microwaves anyway.  Go build a solar oven today!

And finally, I couldn’t pass this instructable up – these pretzels just look so tasty!  You don’t have to pay to go to a professional sporting event just to get pretzels ever again.  Just make them at home and don’t forget to share.

If you are a supporter of greenlightzine.org and you’ve ever created an Instructable – let us know!  We’d love to include it in our blog.

Thanks to Tricia for the suggestion!

Also check out this book: Design Revolution by Emily Pilloton. In January of 2008, with a thousand dollars, a laptop and an outsized conviction that design can change the world, rising San Francisco-based product designer and activist Emily Pilloton launched Project H Design, a radical non-profit that supports, inspires and delivers life-improving humanitarian product design. “We need to go beyond ‘going green’ and to enlist a new generation of design activists,” she wrote in an influential manifesto. “We need big hearts, bigger business sense and the bravery to take action now.”