Making your own paper

Here are some interesting facts about paper consumption in the US.

• Each of us uses approximately one 100-foot-tall Douglas fir tree in paper and wood products per year. (American Forest and Paper Association, 1996.)
• More than a quarter (28%) of the stationary and other fine paper recovered in America is recycled into tissue. (American Forest and Paper Association, 1996.)
• The average American recycled 329 pounds of paper in 1996 (America Recycles Day).

(information from Oregon Department of Environmental Quality)

For every six Americans who recycle their paper, that ton of paper has effectively:

• Saved 17 trees from being cut down
• Preserved 380 gallons of oil
• Conserved 4000kw of power
• Reduced 3 cubic yards of landfill space

(information from ("How It Works")

One way you can help to increase your recycling numbers and reduce your resource consumption is to make your own paper—besides, with the summer upon us, we’ve got to find something to do to entertain our kids.  Why not have a crafts day where you create your own paper?

Aside from a place that you don’t mind getting wet, there isn’t much in the way of materials that you’ll need.

• Blender
• Water
• Wood to make two frames or two wooden frames
• Screen mesh
• Tub or other high-walled container
• Stapler
• Hammer and nails
• Sponge
• Cotton / cloth towels (2 or 3)
• (Optional) food coloring
• (Optional) pressed flowers, string, ribbon, crushed seeds, etc.
• (Optional) two teaspoons of liquid starch or Elmer’s glue.

Some of the websites suggest using white glue or liquid starch in your pulp, but most have no such requirement.  Apparently the starch will help prevent ink from soaking into the fibers—avoiding blotches if you intend to use your paper as stationary.  If you plan on it being mobile, you’ve come to the wrong place.

The first thing you want to do is to create the frame that will hold the screen mesh.  Select a size of paper that you would like to make (For that matter, you can also select a shape of the paper.  There’s no need to make a rectangle if you’d prefer a triangle or duo-decahedron).   If you aren’t the type of person who enjoys woodworking, the easiest thing to make would be a square or a rectangle.  You actually want to create two identically shaped/sized frames.  The inside dimensions of the frame should be equal to the size of the paper you want to make.  If you were going for 8-1/2” x 11” paper, the inner measurement of the frame should be 8-1/2” x 11”.  I didn't mention it, but this is the step that requires the use of the hammer and nails.  Of course if you are really good with woodworking, you can use a spline jig, table saw and some glue and make a mold and dackle that will last for many years to come.

Once you’ve constructed the frames, take one of them and lay the mesh over it.  Pulling it tight, fold the mesh over the side of the frame and secure it using some staples on the bottom side.  Essentially you are constructing it to resemble a drum head.  The mesh should be tight across the inside of the frame for this is where the pulp will gather when you are ready to make your paper (this is called the mold).  If you have chosen a frame that has a relative high wall, more than an inch, you can get away with just constructing one frame.  The frame without the screen is called the dackle.

You can put them aside for the time being when you are finished.  One other point—if you don’t know a hawk from a handsaw, you can get away with using two picture frames of the same size rather than trying to construct something.

Select an area to work that can get a little wet.  If you are planning on doing this with kids, I would suggest using the neighbor’s house.  Fill your tub or bin with a couple of inches of water.  You need to be able to completely submerge your frame in the water, so the tub needs to be deeper, wider and longer than the frame you have constructed.

The next step requires the blender.  Take the paper you are going to be recycling and shred it or tear it into very small pieces.  If you’ve got a shredder, it will make your life a lot easier to use the material in the bin rather than trying to shred paper by hand.  Fill your blender half way with the paper and then fill it to the top fill-line with water.  You may have to experiment a little with how much water to add.  Ultimately, you want to blend the concoction until the concoction is the consistency of pea soup (if you of a Dickensian bent, than the consistency of gruel will do).   If you plan on making more than one sheet of paper, you might want to have a small bucket where you can keep the pulp you are making and go ahead and blend all the paper you’ve got.

Don’t forget to add the starch or glue before you begin the straining with your frame.  While I cannot speak to the accuracy of the statement, one poster on the web suggested that she uses glue rather than starch because “cockroaches love starch.”  I suppose for those of you living in the Palmetto state who have the joy of the presence of our state animal, you might want to go with the glue rather than the starch.

Pour some of your pulp concoction into the tub/bin and then take your mold and dackle and place one on top of the other.  The dackle should be on top (i.e., facing you).  Dipping the assembly into the water/pulp, begin to gently rock it back and forth, coating the screen uniformly in the pulp mixture.  When you’ve got it as thick as you’d like and covered completely, slowly take the assembly out of the water.  Make certain that you keep the mold/dackle level.   You want to allow the water to drain as much as possible from the mold.

Remove the dackle from the mold and place it to the side.  Depending on how good you get at this next step, you want to flip the mold quickly onto a waiting, flat towel.  If you can’t flip a flapjack without breaking it, you might want to take a towel and place it gently on the mold, and flip the whole thing together.  The pulp paper should now be underneath the mold and resting on the towel.  Put the towel, pulp and mold onto a flat surface.

Your next step involves taking a sponge and gently soaking up as much of the water as you can from the pulp. Once you’ve got as much as you can get, and the more the better, you can attempt to remove the mold from the pulp.  Once you’ve done that, you can repeat those steps until you’ve run out of pulp in your bin, patience or a place to dry the paper.

If any of your sheets tear or have holes, all you need to do is scrape them up and throw them back into your bin.

Happy recycling! (and writing).

Here are some websites that offer instructions on making your own paper.  One of them suggests using wire-hangars and panty-hose in lieu of a wooden frame and a screen.  Of course if you watched the movie ­Mommie Dearest, you know you aren’t allowed wire-hangars!

http://www.pioneerthinking.com/makingpaper.html

http://dnr.wi.gov/org/caer/ce/eek/cool/paper.htm

http://www.make-stuff.com/recycling/paper.html

http://www.wikihow.com/Make-Paper

http://www.funsci.com/fun3_en/paper/paper.htm

es.com/id/How-to-Make-and-Recycle-Paper/">http://www.instructables.com/id/How-to-Make-and-Recycle-Paper/

http://65.109.144.97/curriculum/PreK-8_Guide/Activity_51.pdf