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Jun 13, 2012

Waste Not Want Not Lesson


Trash Snack Recipe
12 oz. semi-sweet chocolate chips
1 cup peanut butter
1 stick butter
12 oz. box Crispix cereal
1 lb. powdered sugar
1 white kitchen trash bag

In a saucepan, melt chocolate chips, butter and peanut butter. Put the Crispix into a large bowl. Slowly pour the chocolate/peanut butter mixture over the Crispix.  Lightly stir until all Crispix are coated.

Take a medium white kitchen trash bag and put half of a one pound bag of powdered sugar into the bottom. Pour the bowl of chocolate covered cereal on top of the sugar. Cover with the rest of the sugar. Tie the top of bag and carefully shake the bag. Store in ziplock bags.

 
Water Bottle Flower Craft
Water bottle
Scissors
Colorful Fingernail polish
Glitter glue
Optional pin or barrette base
I saw something similar on one of my favorite crafts sites and had to put my own spin on it.  Recycling crafts are a fantastic way to make use of things that would otherwise be thrown away and damage the Earth that God made.
Cut the bottom off of an empty water bottle.  That is the part you will use for your flower.  Trim the circle to make four or five petals depending on how the bottle is made. 
Now, this is the neat part. Preheat your oven to 225 degrees F.  Place the plastic flowers in an aluminum pie pan and set in the oven for about 10 seconds.  Watch it carefully.  It will start to shrink and curl.  Take it out as soon as it is the desired size and shape.  Let it cool.
Paint the petals with the fingernail polish.  This gives it an enameled look.  Put a drop of glitter glue in the center of the flower.  Use it to decorate a package or box. 
Optional:  Hot glue the flower to a pin or barrette base.
Other ideas: Use the sides of the bottle to cut into shapes for necklaces and key ring tabs.  Cut circles from the sides of the bottle and decorate to make bangle bracelets. Cut shapes from craft foam and glue to the lid to make your own stamps.  See how much of the bottle you can use.

 
Waste Not, Want Not Lesson
Ezekiel 16:49-50 (KJV)  Behold, this was the iniquity of thy sister Sodom, pride, fullness of bread, and abundance of idleness was in her and in her daughters, neither did she strengthen the hand of the poor and needy.   And they were haughty, and committed abomination before me: therefore I took them away as I saw good.
When God gives us plenty of anything, He means it to be a blessing to us and a way for us to bless others.  If we misuse that blessing by eating too much, being selfish and making a lot waste it becomes sinful.  When we take more than we need of something, we are taking from others.  There are many people in the world who do not have all they need.  Taking more than we need is greediness.  That is wrong because it hurts others.  Living a careless throw away life style hurts the environment that God told us to protect.  It is a way of being prideful and putting our desires before God’s.
People used to often say, ‘waste not, want not.’  That was a way of telling us to make the most use of everything we have so there will be enough to go around for everyone.  A modern way of saying the same thing is, ‘reduce, reuse, and recycle.’ Reduce means using less of something.  We often use more than we really need of things.  Reuse means to use something again instead of getting a new one.  We do that when we give our outgrown clothes and toys to someone else who needs them. Recycle means taking the material from something and making it into something different.  Try to make a habit of doing at least one of these every week.   
Consider having the children in your group collect soda cans for a month.  Take them in to the recycling center and plan together how to use the money to help someone.
Deuteronomy 8:17 And thou say in thine heart, My power and the might of mine hand hath gotten me this wealth. 18 But thou shalt remember the LORD thy God: for it is he that giveth thee power to get wealth, that he may establish his covenant which he sware unto thy fathers, as it is this day.