"DIY Balloon Centerpiece"

 

Frugality is a must for a financially-challenged organization such as ours. At work, people got used to seeing my upcycled decorations like this DIY centerpiece. I came up with the idea when I thought the venue we’ve chosen to celebrate a corporate dinner party at is nice enough but not that interesting. It looked like a canned venue to me. So apart from the red & green balloon pillars I made like the one in this photo minus the curly balloons (balloon pillar photo credits: world wide web), this DIY centerpiece adorned each of our table.

Materials used:

Empty Red Horse bottle (big) – used as vase

BBQ Stick – as stems

5” red & white round balloons

Silver crepe paper – as ribbon

Green crepe paper – for stem wrapping

Gold Japanese paper – vase cover

Scotch tape

I ordered my balloons online Balloon Supplier while the rest of the materials at National Bookstore near you

"Recycled Art"

Re-use. Reduce. Recycle.

This is what we usually see in most commodities we purchase nowadays. This campaign is unquestionably ubiquitous and without a doubt, has been spreading extensively, reaching almost every age group. Oh, I do hope it does.

Well, I myself am, or should I say WAS guilty of not doing my part of saving mother earth. Like any working individual like you, I am at all times occupied with my “to do” things. Having my regular day job in the office on weekdays and my secondary profession – a visual artist on weekends and every time in between, it’s almost impossible to consider environmental awareness program such as waste segregation. A lot of people have more time to do that.

Until one of my mentors, Ms. Teena Gaw of Avilon Zoo inspired me to lay my fine art skill onto recyclable items like soda cans, cereal boxes, etc., which we can later on teach to kids through a SUMMER ART WORKSHOP! This can make every kids’ (and moms’) time worthwhile especially on school vacation while making them believe that they too can have superpowers, be the earth’s superheroes and save the whole world through recycling, in imaginative ways possible! All that is needed to do, is teach them how.

 Being an artist herself, Ms. Teena’s creative juices are overflowing which she passes on to everyone, including myself – which I sometimes just tweak a bit. It became our habitual “artsy brainstorming”.

Coupled with my very willing contributors of “raw materials” a.k.a. “waste products”, who happens to be my supportive officemates, friends and family, this project is almost impossible to set aside.

The attached images are a few samples of what I came up with, using junk items I have collected. The big Q now, is how to stop? Everything I see is a blank canvass waiting to be painted. Canisters, stones, medicine bottles, even CDs! My tiny room is now morphing into a big pit of junk. All that is needed is that ever elusive Time to convert these “nothings” into “some things”!

So, do you want us to get your kids do these? We’d love to! Pls. be advised of the schedule and the rest of the details to be posted SOON!

See my creativity using coffee

"Stone Painting for a Cause"

Dogs and Cats are usually the top-of-mind domestic pets we consider to live with us. Basically because they "reciprocate" the attention we trustily needed especially in times of stress. But ironically, because of their kind’s inevitable reproduction, dogs and cats have the most headcount in animal shelters, waiting to be re-homed. 

  The increase of stray dogs and cats’ population became a cumbersome to the society hence, the birth of drastic riddance plans such as the “Tambucho-Gassing”. Thanks to animal rights supporters’ untiring advocacy, the bill has been pulled-out. 

The people behind the animal shelters can only do so much and are badly looking for all the help they can get in order to support the homeless animals under their auspices. And this is one way of response that we thought of… STONE PAINTING FOR A CAUSE…

See my creativity using coffee

"Coffee Painting"

It was early evening of 2010, I was seated on the sofa inside our humble abode. Ina Garten was prepping her scrumptious-looking home-made meal for her husband Jeff on Food Network channel as I was having my usual mug of coffee, just the way I wanted it, steaming hot, dark with cream, and an ample amount of sugar.

The barefoot Contessa’s cookery was inviting & visually stimulating, indeed. My mouth was starting to water when the whiff of my coffee aromatically stole my concentration away from the monitor. It guided me to timeless possibilities of what coffee could offer. Using it as a potential medium for painting popped into mind, and what happens next is a history…

Ella Hipolito
See my creativity using coffee