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I.D.E.A.s!
Newsletter of The I.D.E.A. Store, May 3 - 16, 2012
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Join our email list for updates of inventory and ideas!
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SHARE this newsletter to help us get the word out about what a great place this is for our community! Check out our website for our shopping hours, directions to the store and our wish-list of items for donations and more!
www.the-IDEA-store.org
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Be bejeweled!
Another Jewelry Blowout Saturday, May 5
Hope you're reading this newsletter the minute it lands in your e-mail inbox because you don't want to miss the next Jewelry Blowout Sale happening Saturday, May 5, from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. in The I.D.E.A. Store's classroom area.
The quality of recent jewelry acquisitions has been superb, and has included many vintage items. Naturally, we'll be sharing the love with you on May 5. In addition to necklaces, bracelets, earrings and other ready-to-wear jewelry, you can select from all sorts of beads, charms and findings as well as jewelry-making books and magazines.
Whether buying for yourself or others (don't forget: Mother's Day is coming right up!), you'll find an incredible selection of gently used jewelry at sparkling good prices.
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Moms hunt & gather while kids craft
Pre-Mother's Day 'Drop & Shop' May 12
Attention all you moms out there! Our first-ever pre-Mother's Day "Drop & Shop" event
will take place from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. on Saturday, May 12. Here's how it works: You drop off your children (age 6 or older) in our classroom area and Education Coordinator
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Customized picture frames and decorative pins are among the projects on tap for the pre-Mother's Day Drop & Shop event.
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Shauna Carey will direct them in a craft-making exercise that will result in a special, Mother's Day take-away gift. Kids can choose from three
craft-making projects: customized picture frames, decorative pins or
a surprise activity/gift. Meanwhile, you'll have the luxury of shopping in the store kid-free, at a leisurely pace.
The cost per child is just $5. Pre-registration is NOT required; just show up at 11 a.m. on May 12!
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Meet metals maven and . . .
Volunteer Extraordinaire:
Amelia Neptune
The I.D.E.A. Store volunteer Amelia Neptune comes to us by way of a whole other galaxy: Albuquerque, New Mexico!
Before landing in the Midwest, where her husband is a law student at the University of Illinois, Amelia focused on environmental studies and sociology as an undergraduate in Southern California and later earned a master's degree in environmental sciences and policy from Johns Hopkins University. While in Washington, D.C., she also worked at the Nature Conservancy.
After moving to Illinois, Amelia quickly found a part-time job as a sustainability specialist in Facilities & Services at the UI, a position funded by the university's Office of Sustainability.
"I work on a lot of projects designed to make the campus greener," she said. Those projects include the recent "Bike to Work Day" and a possible bike-sharing program.
Given her background and interest in environmental issues, it didn't take Amelia long to learn about out about and make her way to The I.D.E.A. Store. And soon after she began volunteering, Amelia found her niche as metals master.
"The first or second time I came here to volunteer, the metals bin was overflowing," she said. After asking The I.D.E.A. Store Manager Gail Rost if she could assist in taming it, Amelia got the thumbs up and was led to the back storage area.
"There was a mess of unsorted metals," just begging to be organized, she said. "It has been inspiring to me to see other better organized areas and look to them as an example of what I wanted to do with the metals."
The metals master said her approach to organizing what she described as a collection of often "strange, mysterious, oddly shaped things" is to "go through everything first to see what's there before organizing anything."
In addition to her environmental interests, Amelia also enjoys making mixed-media art from found objects - including odds and ends and scraps she picks up off the street or finds in her home junk drawer. So, for her, The I.D.E.A. Store, with its abundance of source material, feels like "a dream come true."
"I've always loved making things out of other things," she said. "And caring about the environment and wanting to find new uses for what otherwise would be trash is something I feel passionate about and inspired by. Those two things are what brings me back all the time.
"Volunteering here also is a very Zen experience for me," she added. "There's something very meditative about sorting through nuts and bolts!"
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Test your own mettle with metals projects
Would you like to get heavy into metal? The I.D.E.A. Store has tons of metal items great and small, ranging from those easily identified to "mystery metals" - more than you can shake a metal cheese grater at. And speaking of cheese graters, the next time you see Amelia Neptune, ask her how she once used one to make a funky kitchen lamp!
Meanwhile, here are some inspirational links to sites of mixed-media artists who work with found metals. Peruse them to ignite your imagination and fuel your own creative endeavors:
* Metal Schmidt Studio and Foundry
* Jim Shores Art
* Video on metal assemblage sculpture by Tricia Courtney
Also, here are some links to ideas, tips and tools for working with metals:
* Ideas for creating with scrap metals.
* Tips for using tin snips.
* Methods for removing rust and paint from metal objects.
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The Village Green: Composting 101
Create 'black gold' in your own backyard
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By Carol Jo Morgan, MSW, MS
Environmental Outreach Coordinator
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One of The I.D.E.A. Store's environmental goals is to divert useable materials away from the landfill. You can do the same with something the store doesn't carry: kitchen and yard "greens" and "browns."
At our home, it's a rite of spring to remove the black winter covering from our compost pile, harvest last year's ready-to-use "black gold," and mix it into our garden beds in anticipation of planting crops. Our compost pile is an open system, contained by recycled-content plastic fencing, which each year holds materials from two households, generating about four 5-gallon bucketfuls of rich, dark, earthy scented natural fertilizer. Why buy it when you (and nature) can make your own? By composting, you'll not only reduce the amount of recyclables sent to the landfill, but also return valuable natural resources to the environment, enrich your soil and help it retain water in the summer months.
What method of composting could work for your circumstances? You can choose to do open or closed composting, depending on several important considerations. An ideal open compost pile site is a flat patch of permeable ground away from large trees
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"Greens" and "Browns" - even Zuzu's petals - commingle and begin to "cook" in this example of an open compost pile.
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and wooden structures, with convenient access from your kitchen, good drainage, access to a watering hose, and located in a spot that gets equal doses of sun and shade through the day. An open system size of
3 feet in diameter by 3 feet in height will generate enough heat to hasten decomposition. For a larger volume, invite your neighbors to contribute from their
yards and households, then share the
finished compost with them.
If you have few kitchen or yard scraps, don't want to attract neighborhood wildlife, think your dog might chow down in an open pile or know your neighbors might not understand the benefits, a closed composting system would work. Several styles of open and closed systems are commercially available, or you can make your own. The Illini FS Farmtown Store on University Avenue in Urbana offers three styles for different conditions. Prairie Gardens in Champaign has two closed styles available this year. You can make your own versions with guidance from websites such as this one.
Regardless of the method you choose, composting is a fascinating family and classroom learning project. A wide range of decomposers including microbes, worms and insects will actively break down the pile's fresh contents. They are fascinating to watch! You can learn to maintain your compost set-up for maximum return by using informative resources about composting, including the Anita Purves Nature Center's "Squirmy Science" loan box, my personal-favorite booklet called "Home Composting Made Easy," which you can purchase at Urbana's Common Ground Food Co-op for $3.95, and by checking your local library.
Coming soon to the store's display case: more education ideas about composting!
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So, What's This All About?
The Champaign Urbana Schools Foundation saw a need in the community to accomplish several things: 1. Support the arts and arts education, 2. Support environmental education in our communities, 3. Impact the environment by reducing the rate of waste disposal, 4. create a place for everyone to have access to quality materials and 5. Support itself in light of the difficult economic times. So donate your discards and shop re-use. Its about making a difference!
www.cuSchoolsFoundation.org
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INVEST. DEVELOP. ELEVATE. ACHIEVE.
The I.D.E.A. Store is an earned-income social enterprise
of the Champaign Urbana Schools Foundation,
a full 501c3 non-profit organization supporting K -12 education in
Illinois Community School Districts Unit 4 and Unit 116
Phone: 217-352-7878 Store hours: Tuesday - Friday, 2 pm - 7 pm and Saturday, 10 am - 3 pm
28 E. Springfield, Champaign, IL 61820
2nd Floor - handicapped access and loading dock available on north side of building
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