It seems that Nike has found a way to turn bottles into soccer kits! By kits we mean the whole soccer uniform that teams wear during practice and on the field.

This is just one way to keep all those plastic bottles out of the landfills and we here at Ecomaker HQ are glad Nike has decided to do something like this. We hope other companies get the hint and do something like this as well. If you could try to create an everyday item out of other materials, what would you make?

If you would like more information on these soccer kits, you can head on over to Nike Better World for more information!

Photo Credit: The Busy Brain

Maybe you know someone who collects things at the beaches or maybe you collect things yourself. Either way here are a few ideas that will get you crafting and remembering all the places you got each piece in the process. Plus you’ll be doing great things while keeping items out of the landfills in the process right? Right!

Thinking about framing a family photo and giving it as a gift? Why not decorate that wonderful framed photo of the family at the beach with the beach finds from the trip. It gives the photo life as well as creating conversations about the memories you made in the process.

Working on remodeling a bathroom? You can make your own Homemade soap dispenser and decorate the dispenser with your beach finds as well. This idea can also work by decorating your bath and shower tile with beach glass or shells too.

Our favorite idea and one that inspired this post originally was using pieces of driftwood and decorating the garden with them. These are all great ideas and we hope that you can think of even more. Do you have any ideas for reusing your beach finds? We’d love to hear them!

If you liked this article and would like to read the original article that inspired us, head on over to Apartment Therapy for more information!

Photo Credit: Balanced Crafts

When we heard about this creative, imaginative 9 year old the other day, we just had to tell you about it. By using used cardboard boxes Caine’s love for arcade games came alive when he spent all summer building his own arcade so much so that his friend’s didn’t believe him when returning to school the following Fall. This video speaks for itself.

Mostly, we love that Caine could build his arcade out of the used boxes and keep them out of the landfills and have fun doing it, of course. If you had boxes like this at your disposal what would you make with them if you were given the chance to create anything? An elaborate cat tower for your favorite feline pets perhaps? That’s just one idea, of course. We hope this video and story was as inspiring to you and it was for us here at the Ecomaker HQ.

If you liked this article and would like more information, check out the original at Boing Boing.

Photo Credit: net_efekt

Here’s a quick kitchen tip that is not only clever but will have you thinking of clever ways of presentation next time you have house guests!

Have you ever wanted to make those perfect eggs to place in a breakfast sandwich whether in be for an English Muffin or Bagel sandwich but you couldn’t figure out how to make those round perfect eggs? No, you don’t need to buy that plastic looking kitchen tool that will do it for you, we wanted to show you this idea when we first saw it and you won’t have to buy a single thing. In fact, you might already have a few of these around for use in recipe for this week right in your fridge!

By using an onion cut to about an onion ring thickness or even a bell pepper cut in to rings you can make your own egg rings, while having a fancy way to show off those morning eggs in the process! You could even take this a step further by dicing some ham, onion, bell pepper topped with a little cheese to make your own Denver omelet in an onion or bell pepper ring.

If you liked this article and would like to read the original to find out more, head on over to Lifehacker for more information.

Photo Credit: gozalewis

Announcements! Announcements!

We’d like to take this opportunity to make some announcements that would clear up and explain why there’s been a little hiatus here as of late. We’ve been working on several things behind the scenes here to expand what we’re already doing here.

First up! We’re been working hard to provide you with a cool place to buy Ecomaker products to wear around or even have your morning cup of tea or coffee with! You can find that store over at Printfection!

Second of all, we’ve been participating in a year long project called the 365 project where you post a photo of your day for 365 days. We though this would be a great way to show you what’s going on Behind the Green every day here at the HQ, you can check that site out at The Ecomaker 365.

Last but certainly not least, our founder here at The Ecomaker HQ has always wanted to find a way to branch out and offer all of you other services as well. This day has finally come. You can check out this project at Splice Merge Media.

Papalote Salsa Trading Company originates from the famous Papalote Mexican Grill in San Francisco, CA. They were even lucky enough to win a Throwdown against Bobby Flay. Papalote is proud to announce that you can finally Order Salsa online and ship it to your friends and family anywhere in the US.

It was a great honor for The Ecomaker team to meet one half of the Papalote team tonight while we were out at the local market. We happy purchased our jar of the Habanero variety and had it with our burritos tonight. This salsa makes a wonderful addition to almost any meal. Try it on anything that you think it would taste good on!

If you liked this article and would like to find out more about Papalote you can follow them on Twitter and ‘like’ them on Facebook.

This is a great bread that you can start just before you go to sleep in the evenings or to work in the morning if you plan ahead a little. We hare at the HQ used our stand mixer but all you have is a mixing bowl and a spatula, that works too. We’d put this recipe right up with the Baguette Recipe we featured a while back.


What You Need:

1 – 1 1/2 cups of lukewarm water (About shower temp, no hotter or you will kill the yeast)
1 teaspoon of yeast
1 teaspoon of salt
3 cups of AP Flour (All-purpose) or 2 cups AP and one cup of Whole wheat if you prefer).

Let the yeast bloom in the warm water for about 5 minutes and bubble up. If you’ve never worked with yeast before, if it looks like you shook up some soda or a nice head of beer, you’re doing just fine.

Combine the other ingredients into the mixing bowl and slowly add you yeast and water mixture while combining. When everything is nicely combined, let your dough rise 8-12 hours. If the dough is a little sticky, add a little flour until it’s just barely sticky. A good trick is spraying a mixing bowl with non stick spray, or a little softened butter and toss the dough ball a bit so that it doesn’t stick to the bowl as much before you let it rest the 8-12 hours.

When you’re home from work or wake up in the morning. Spray a baking vessel of your choosing, like a cast iron pan, loaf pan or even something like a cookie sheet if you have to. The trick here is it has to preheat with the oven. Put the vessel out just as the oven comes to temperature and place your dough on it as is and bake it just like that, don’t worry if it lands a little funny, it will bake evenly.

Let this bake at 450 for about 30 min. Let cool for about 30 minutes before consuming. Enjoy!

If you liked this article and would like to view the original. Check out, Cold Antler Farm.

Here are a few ideas to turn these ordinary pallets into something useful and keep them out of the landfills! Have you ever wanted more space in your garden and just feel like you don’t have enough room for everything? Grow upwards! By using a pallet on it’s side you’ll have plenty of compartments to fill with herbs, leaf lettuces and anything else you can think of.

Want to make your studio apartment or garage less cluttered? Use some pallets to make some sturdy book shelving for the latest novels or all the mechanic and woodworking books in the garage.

One more idea for you to mull over. How about a space saving way to put up those bikes in a small spot by making a bike rack out of the pallets? These are just some of the great ideas to repurpose those wooden pallets. Can you think of more?

If you liked this article and would like more information, head on over to Apartment Therapy and Treehugger!

Photo Credit: daryl_mitchell

Here’s a great idea from one of our friends. Bev, runs a wonderful blog called Bev Cooks. We at the Ecomaker HQ are so happy to bring you this recipe so that you can enjoy it just as much as we do.

Did we forget to mention that you can also make this as a slow cooker recipe. What a great thing to come home to as wonderful start to a new week. If you have the time to make this on the stove, it would probably work as well.

The wonderful thing about cooking is that you can add or omit what ever you feel like, depending on what you have on hand or if some one doesn’t like one ingredient or other.

The Ecomaker team added Sriracha instead of the Jalapenos and had to leave out the sprouts, bell peppers,lime and rice noodles but, let’s just say the HQ Kitchen still smells amazing without these things the recipe called for.

If you don’t have noodles this will serve well with rice instead. Use what you have, right? Right! We hope that you have a chance to make and enjoy this soup as much as we did.

Did you like this article? Want the original recipe? If you would like more information on Bev Cooks, be sure to check them on out Facebook and Twitter.

When thinking of curry in America you may be more familiar with Indian curries rather than this Japanese version. This Japanese version differs because it is thicker than an Indian curry due to it being made from a roux of butter and flour first before any other ingredients are added in. Japanese curries are also sweeter than Indian curries as well. Japanese curries contain a fruit element like apples to make it this way. As a variation the HQ thought we’d mention the use of pears instead of apples, just as a thought as well.

When preparing the curry it is also very important to cut all the vegetables needed first before cutting up any meats or poultry. If you would like a little heat to your curry you could add a squirt of sriracha to the pot too.

One last thing we’d like to mention is, use any potato you have on hand or like as well. Traditionally here at the HQ we grew up just using russets as they were the most commonly available. Tonight version had Japanese (White) Sweet potatoes in it because they needed to be used up and it came out just as wonderful as ever.

If you liked this article and would like more information on this and other Japanese dishes, you can head on over to No Recipes for more information.