Repurposed Cookie Sheets

by Julia Parker, from the March 2005 Newsletter

We have several well-used cookie sheets in our house. They are so well used that they’ve become nearly unusable. Now that they are too battered, rusted and sticky to really use for baking, I’ve determined a new use for them. We decorated a tray with a collage to cover the old grime and rust, and can use it for containing small toys, as a lap desk for writing and drawing, and as a board for magnetic letters and toys.

This project can be managed with young children (those who can cut with scissors) in several stages. We took a few evenings of cutting pictures for the collage. Two nights were needed to paste pictures on each side. Finally, I sealed the whole tray with polyurethane. One thing I really like about this project is that it re-uses not only the cookie sheet, but other materials that are in abundance in my house – old magazines, wrapping paper and my daughter’s artwork.

Materials Needed:

• Old magazines, newspapers, wrapping paper
• Tissue paper (used in gifts)
• An old cookie sheet
• Non-toxic glue
• Polyurethane (optional)

Directions:

• Cut enough pictures to cover your tray 1.5 times on both sides.
• Tear or cut strips of tissue paper 1 or 2 inches wide and at least 4 inches long.
• Paint or spread with your fingers a thin layer of glue around the edge of the cookie sheet.
• Glue the strips perpendicular to edge so each one covers the lip and extends beyond the edge a few inches (when you collage the other side, you’ll wrap them around and glue them). Overlap the pictures and paper so the metal doesn’t show.
• Spread glue on about 1/4 of the cookie sheet.
• Put pictures on the glue overlapping a bit so no metal shows.
• Repeat on other 3/4 of the cookie sheet.
• Glue down all the edges as you go. It’s fine to get glue on top of the pictures
• Allow to dry.
• Turn over.
• Spread glue along the bottom edge of the tray.
• Wrap the free edges of the tissue paper strips around the tray.
• Make a picture collage on the back as you did on the front.
• Seal the collage by painting another layer of glue on top or spraying or painting a layer of polyurethane on top. (Polyurethane makes it waterproof for cleaning.)

If your child is going to use the tray for writing or drawing, the pictures should all be from the same type of material (all magazines, all newspapers) to give a more even surface. If this tray will just be used to contain small toys (we use ours for beads), then you can use all kinds of paper for the collage. We used leftover valentines, favorite drawings on construction paper, newspaper, gift wrap and pictures from magazines. If you’re planning a long trip, consider buying a strip of stick-on magnets to put on the bottom of a few small toys, for example small cars or dinosaurs, so they will stay on the tray.

Julia Parker writes a monthly column on projects for kids and adults, and spends a lot of her time picking up beads.

Copyright: Copyright on articles and recipes are jointly held by the Moscow Food Co-op and the respective authors, except were otherwise noted.

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