More Kiva Loans!!

We just loaned a bunch more money to entrepreneurs in developing countries- who are in need, through Kiva.org.  This Summer the Teenage Eco Warriors earned $250 in honorariums by creating the Austin Responds wall AND by teaching a Plastic Bag Tu Tu workshop  both at Austin Museum of Art.

                                  Sydney, Alex, Roz and Circe  but wait where is Sadie?

                                          she was being camera shy but we found her !


BTW we highly recommend going to Austin Museum of Art to see some really great art!

What ever money we manage to make, we loan through Kiva. Almost everyone that we loaned to a couple of months ago has paid their loan back so we got to re-loan that money. The Teenage Eco Warriors really like it when we re-loan because we are recycling money!!

All together,with the money earned this summer and the money paid back we had a grand total of $450 to lend to people in need!!!!
This is a run down of who we made small loans to this time:

Maria Eugenia Méndez Buelvas  $25

Colombia

Retail

Narmandah Jamdaan    $25

Mongolia

Beauty Salon

Ruben Dario Martinez Lora     $50

Colombia

Crafts

Laïdou Group                $50
8 Entrepreneurs

Mali

Cereals

Therese Mukandanga  $50

Rwanda

Food Market

Victor Omondi Omolo   $50

Kenya

Fruits & Vegetables

Jean De Dieu Iyamuremye           $50

Rwanda

Food Market

Zoila Naranjo Gomez    $50

Costa Rica

Grocery Store

Pascasie Sekamondo     $50

Rwanda

Clothing Sales

Benkadi Ii Group          $50
10 Entrepreneurs

Mali

Farming

Teen Eco Warriors Gettin' Pretty!

This summer took the Teen Eco Warriors all across the globe. Just in time for school, they convened once again to strut on the cat walk for Keep Austin Beautiful's Recycled Fashion Show at the Austin Museum of Art. Circe Torosian designed four dresses for her collection of adorable, wearable plastic bag dresses and skirts. Allison, Sydney, Amber and Sadie modeled the dresses for the sold out show.

Here's an interview with Austin's the CW.

Check it out!

Here are a few photos of the individual dresses:

All of us!

Workshop at Austin Museum of Art!

Posted by: Circe!

If you didn't know, the Teenage Eco Warriors care deeply about the children.


That's why we recently participated in a Saturday children's workshop at Austin Museum of Art!


Among other things, we showed people how to make the plastic bag tutu, a signature work of the Teenage Eco Warriors

Here are a few examples!





and some tutus in progress...





and some people got super creative and invented their own fashions using the scraps too!

those are bag scraps on her shoes!

ankle decorations!


another variation on the shoe decoration

We were particularly impressed by the girl above because she is a plastic activist! Her name is Taylor, she is seven years old, and she made a video about the harm that plastic is doing to the Earth!

Here, check it out:

Good job, Taylor!




Well, we saw some pretty awesome things come out of that workshop, and successfully recycled hundreds of bags that would have otherwise been thrown away

Austin Responds!

Posted By: Circe!

SO recently, the Teenage Eco Warriors were invited to share their story and ask for the response of visitors on the Austin Responds wall at Austin Museum of Art. What's that, you say? Well, it's a wall at Austin Museum of Art that a group or individual selected by the museum puts prompts and questions on in any creative way they choose. Then, people who visit the museum can place their responses on a clothesline-like apparatus attached to the wall.

We chose to communicate our message with pictures, string, gems, and a few googly eyes and fake mustaches. We posed a few questions to the public, and mentioned a few light warnings about caring for our environment (If we don't take care of our oceans, the pirates will come back and attack the land people).

The wall was corresponding to the show going on at the museum dealing with themes of consumerism and how much humans consume (the title of the show is Chris Jordan: Running the Numbers).

Here are some pictures of the wall:

This was our main question

And this is someone's awesome response to that question
(Click here for the link)

The whole wall (well, most of it), Circe in her
plastic bag dress, and a responder

Our message to the children

Roz by her dinosaur, and well dressed in her bag tutu

check out our flickr album to see more photos

Coming up next: Children's workshop with plastic bag tutus!

Update!

Posted by: Circe

Heyyyyyyy friends! The Teenage Eco Warriors have good news!

Our loans on Kiva.org have been completely repaid, so we re-loaned our $250!

we loaned $25-50 to seven people all over the world:
-a mother in Tajikistan who raises cattle,
-a mother of three in Peru who is in clothing sales,
-a cafe owner in Kenya,
-a mother of three in Senegal who is in retail,
-a livestock raiser in Kenya,
-a woman who sells her crafts in Kenya (yay for crafts!)
-and a man in Lebenon who needed more tools for his work

There's more good news!

We're beginning to plan a fundraiser so we can put more money in our kiva account, and donate to other charities!

The fundraiser will include live music from local teen bands who want to help out and a silent auction with crafts we've made

It should be super hip-happenin'!!!

Our Crafty Readers Share Their Cool Ideas

One of our crafty readers, Emily- of Santa barbara California, was inspired by those plastic bag skirts that we like to make. She made an incredible dress from a vintage plastic table cloth and some black electrician's tape. She also made a beautiful necklace from buttons and thread. Below are some pictures and instructions for you on how she did it.

here are Emily's instructions: Thanks Emily!

Dress materials:
vintage dress pattern
vintage plastic lace tablecloth
black vinyl electricians tape
hooks and eyes

place pattern on lace in the usual way that one would lay out a pattern. cut out pieces. I cut off the seam allowances around the neck and armholes and only left them on the sides and back. Stitch the dress together on a sewing machine using a long stitch. Where the lace is lacey you may have to insert tissue paper between the seams in order to not have to deal with the holes in the lace. When dress is stitched together turn right side out. I topstitched the bust and back darts with doubled black thread by hand. The armholes, neck and back were done by placing one half the width of the tape on the right side of dress and fold over to back, matching edges of tape on right and back sides. I then top stitched the tape by hand using a doubled black thread. It's too hard to use the machine because the tape is sticky and causes the needle to gum up and the thread to break. I made the flower out of a strip of lace about 18 inches long. I did a long
running stitch by hand and then pulled it to shape the bloom. Then I stitched the running stitched edge together in places to reinforce the bloom shape. I then stitched the bloom onto the dress using doubled black thread and a large plastic button (on the inside of the dress I added a small circle of the plastic so that when I sewed into the plastic it would be stronger.. The bloom is edged in a running stitch using a doubled black thread. I called the dress "Notta Balenciaga".

NECKPIECE INSTRUCTIONS
materials: plastic buttons
linen thread - 6 strand
wash away interfacing

cut piece of interfacing the size and shape of finished neckpiece adding two inches extra all around for ease of handling.

useing plain thread stitch the buttons onto the interfacting in the desired pattern.

With linen thread, on each button, go up through underside of button to front and down in it's next hole to back. leave a tail of three inches or so on each side of the holes. after each six or buttons, tie the linen thread to adjacent buttons on as many sides as possible. This makes a linen web like structure on the back side. Proceed until all buttons have been linked together in this way.

rinse out disolvable interfacing in mildly warm water. allow neckpiece to dry thoroughly. when dry, separate linen thread into individual strands and fan out around buttons to your taste.

wear and enjoy!
About me: self taught, crafty from birth, age 62, woman, mother and grandmother of 3.
Emily

KATIE IN JAPAN !!!

It's summer in Austin!  Angsty Teenage Eco Warriors are all quite busy. Especially Katie.

Katie has been studying Japanese since middle school. She worked diligently all year on the exchange student application process.  She was accepted AND given a full scholarship! Yay Katie!

You can see what Katie is up to in Japan -here is her blog  http://nihonkatie.blogspot.com/