One Man's Trash is Another Girl's Hobby

The morning glow that shines through my window. The sound that echoes in the room. The alarm that wakes me. Since it doesn't have a shape of its own, one can't just say where inspiration is. I push open the curtains. The color of Mexican plum blossoms engulfs the light from the window, cutting patterns on the room's interior. From my dresser, I grab the same ordinary clothes, and head to the usual place. The kitchen table is filled with evidence of a well-lived home. Half-burned candles and half-finished plates of food sit on a cluttered table. Lunch bags open and close in rapid succession as a day's lunch is chosen and repeatedly reconsidered. Freshly pressed work uniforms are laid on the back of worn wooden chairs. Then, as abruptly as it started, everything is quiet. Mom waves goodbye for work, and siblings depart in a flurry of jammed toast and hastily finished homework. I take a sip of lukewarm coffee and unfurl a crinkled sheet of notebook paper. On it lies a rough sketch of a girl and a list of random objects. I look up at the Roman clock that hangs above the "EAT" sign on the kitchen wall. Exactly 8:02 am, it's time to make a doll.

"You can't use up creativity. The more you use, the more you have." -- Maya Angelou

From the moment I first understood the need to recycle, scavenging for supplies has been the defining feature of my craft. "Earth Dolls," as they were coined by my mom, are made almost entirely from recycled material. Each doll begins with a roundish bit or bob as a core for the head. Then, strips of magazines, the occasional subpar test, and other flat plant-based rubbish are wound around each other. Each layer is separated by a thin coating of delicious glue. Slowly, a sphere is formed. Tissue paper is then soaked in water to form a slurry that is plastered on the rough sphere and left to dry overnight. Next, strips of paper rubbish are rolled together and cut. Finally, I glue the roll to the sphere and coat everything in a thick layer of mod podge followed by a thin layer of white paint; the head is complete.

"More than 40 percent of plastic is used just once, then tossed"

When I was younger, I would walk around my neighborhood collecting empty bottles to make my dolls. Now, I imagine myself partnering directly with retailers to source their waste as raw material. Like all retail establishments, craft stores and fashion houses have a tendency to discard items with only minor imperfections. Meanwhile, more than 5 trillion pieces of plastic are already floating in our oceans, and three out of five fast fashion items end up in a landfill.

"I dwell in possibility." --Emily Dickinson

Using my notebook, I match the head to the sketch I think fits best. From there, I make the doll's torso out of random junk glued together. My favorite picks are old clothes, cardboard boxes, dried-out sticks, and bubble wrap. Theoretically, I could make it out of anything, and no one would ever know. But we'll keep that a trade secret. Breasts are always made from paper mâché covered with a thin layer of packing foam. The base is always a bottle filled with odds and ends to weigh it down.

"The average American throws away around 81 pounds of clothing yearly."

Aside from selling the finished products themselves, I've long wondered how I could sell the idea of a "trash doll." While the completed version is appealing to the eye, the process isn't. Monotonous hours of cutting, shredding, seam ripping, and disinfecting before a person could even begin the process of constructing a doll. Sadly, this makes the experience inaccessible for a person short on time. And while I sternly believe the average person is interested in recycling, the longer something takes to do, the less likely people are to do it. Then I happened upon a thought. "What if I did the prep for them?" Whether or not the person cuts the paper themselves the end result is still the same. They have the material to make a doll, and landfill-bound trash gets recycled instead. After dozens of redos, I settle on five tiers for my doll kits.

The DIY doll starter kit would include:

• A prefilled strip container of paint including dark brown, Light brown, tan, white, black, red, yellow, blue, gold, and silver

• A 2oz bottle mod podge
• Pre-shredded paper strips
• A small bobbin of white thread
• 1 needle
• Fabric scraps
• 4-ounce bottle tissue paper slurry
• 4 glue sticks
• 1 roundish head "core"
• 3 paintbrushes
• 1 hot glue gun
• 8 x 2 inch length of bubble wrap
• 2 sticks
• 3 small skeins of yarn in black, brown, and blonde.

Other necessities such as an empty bottle and the trash to fill it with would be up to the crafter to obtain.

Alongside the starter kit would also be the "I know what I'm doing!" kit, which is the same as the starter kit but removes:

• Paint
• Paintbrushes
• gluesticks
• glue gun
• needle
• thread

The "Round 2" kit would also be the same as the starter but instead removes:

• glue gun
• paintbrushes
• needle

The "Adventure in action" kit would be completely different and include:

• multi-colored yarns
• ten different paint colors
• glitter mod podge
• more fabric scraps
• random rhinestone/charms

Lastly, the "Creativity connoisseur" kit containing:

• twenty different paint colors
• glitter, satin, and matte mod podge
• glow in the dark finisher
• highly pattered fabric scraps
• multi-colored and multi-textured yarns
• 4 ounces of random rhinestones/charms
• 4 paintbrushes
• synthetic eyelashes
• misc. small items

"Creativity doesn't wait for that perfect moment. It fashions its own perfect moments out of ordinary ones." -- Bruce Garrabrandt

After the torso is constructed, the real work begins, making the outfit and deciding the skin tone. Outside the realm of supernatural creatures and princesses (because NOBODY is "snow" white), skin color, like recycling, is a passionate topic for me. Growing up, most stores only carried a few black dolls, and most of those were often so light they passed for white with a deep tan. I remember wondering why stores needed "one hundred" shelves of white barbies when we only get "two" black ones. "Would they ever make a Muslim doll?" Those memories became the driving force behind my third doll.

"Around the world, nearly a million plastic beverage bottles are sold every minute."

The five tiers of my single purchase or subscription service represent the five types of people I imagine making a doll. The newbie needs all the tools included. The hobbyist probably has all the tools and simply requires the materials. The second-time newbie doesn't need the tools but requires replenishment (thread, gluesticks). The experienced crafter wants a booster pack for their basic kit, and the repeat crafter wants a super booster for their creative process. Couple the kit with detailed instructions on crafting a doll and strong encouragement to use as much recyclable material as possible. Do-it-yourself Earth Dolls is a pretty answer to an ugly problem.

"The desire to create is one of the deepest yearnings of the human soul." -- Dieter F. Uchtdorf

My third doll was based on a polaroid I snapped of myself in the bathroom mirror, a little Muslimah with a flower hijab. Her orange abaya was sewn from a deconstructed pillowcase, and her flower hijab came from one of my own. I immediately wanted to make more. Using a white fabric pencil, I traced each doll's hijab pattern and carefully cut it out, then did the same for the abaya. Next, using my tried and true technique, I began constructing the head. Snip, snip, snip. Strips of newspaper lay in neat piles on the floor. I hummed a tune and wound strip after strip around the developing sphere. Snip Snip Snip. Rolls of newspaper were cut to size and glued to the head. Pieces of packing foam were molded to my desired shape. That night, four heads laid perfectly on a painter's palette to dry. By morning, the chirps of birds wandered from afar. The summer breeze knocked on the window, and the scent of morning dew filled the room. It was a perfect day to paint a doll.

"Nearly 70 million barrels of oil are used each year to make the world's polyester fiber, which is now the most commonly used fiber in our clothing. But it takes more than 200 years to decompose."

Customers with a bit more time on their hands could always simply purchase the tutorial videos separately. Aside from a few major projects like princess dolls, dolls made from oversized bottles, and customs, almost every doll I make will be included as a tutorial. I plan to offer three tiers. "Basic" will include two complete tutorials on constructing a doll frame, one for a glass bottle and plastic. It'll also include a yarn hairstyle tutorial and outfit wrapping techniques. "Inspire me" will include everything from the basic tier as well as three completed doll tutorials. Lastly, "Moviegoer" will be a monthly subscription that comes with a lifetime purchase of the "basic" and "inspire me" tiers, as well as a constantly updating library of completed doll tutorials, fabric layering techniques, and short miscellaneous videos.

"A business that makes nothing but money is a poor business." --Henry Ford

Varying shades of brown squeezed out of beaten bottles of acrylic paint. White and black capfuls of paint lined the palette sides with splatters of rainbow in between. I began wildly mixing colors and swatching them on a discarded piece of paper. In the end, a combination of espresso brown, cherry cobbler red, banana yellow, lapis lazuli blue, gold, and black yielded the color I deemed perfect for my darkest doll. For the lightest, I opted for pure white paint with the slightest touch of cream. Hastily, I jotted down the hues on their sketch pages. Mixed ratios of the darkest and lightest shades produced the two medium tones. Each doll received multiple layers of paint. Next, I turned my attention to the outfits. Surprisingly, abayas are simple to sew. The patterns were merely two pieces of cloth stitched together, with the excess fabric rolled up to serve as the sleeves. A few snips of my scissors to remove extra threads, and the outfit was complete. All that remained was to glue the heads on and wrap the hijabs around the head. The end result was my first and proudest collection—a group of five Muslimah dolls with my first and only self-insert.

After getting "No taxation without representation" out of my system, I turned my attention to my main passion. Which, of course, is conservation of mass A.K.A recycling. The sketch basically drew itself, a doll based entirely on nature.

"Just because it has the recycling sign doesn't mean it actually gets recycled."

The last branch of my new Earth Dolls enterprise would be RRR or Retail, Residential, and Repurposing. A play on the three R's in reduce reuse recycle, RRR is how I'd get more material for my dolls. I imagine myself, a 5 foot 2 ball of energy, walking directly into my nearest craft store and demanding to speak with the manager, not letting a single soul leave until I get those sweet damaged crafts. But in reality, I'd be writing email after mundane email asking corporate giants, of which less than 11% are implementing recycling strategies, to recycle their items…to me. Crazy, I know, but as my mom always says, "You get to ask; they get to say yes or no." The second R has two parts. The first is encouraging people to recycle as many things as they can. The second is people sending any old unwanted items to me. I'd have to make a detailed list so I don't end up with pounds of dirty diapers and old pizza boxes, but most people act responsibly when given parameters. To reduce carbon emissions, I've played with the idea of setting up a drop-off location, or asking they only send in the things once they reach a certain weight. The cardboard it's packaged in won't be an issue since it's a hot commodity in doll frame making.

"The worst enemy to creativity is self-doubt." --Sylvia Plath

Tree was a big doll made from a half-gallon tea bottle, and her outfit consisted of cuts from an old sofa cover and the pants of my sixth-grade school uniform. A bead from a broken pair of earrings made the snap on her dress. Paper mâché trees and twisted tissue roots framed her face. She represented my urge to reduce my carbon footprint and help the environment. A mature tree removes almost 70 times more pollution than a newly planted tree. One tree can absorb as much carbon in a year as a car produces while driving 26,000 miles. The quintessential oxygen producer, trees are essential to maintaining a healthy ecosystem. I practically ran back to the sketchbook; my nature obsession was officially in full swing.

"Coffee cups can't actually be recycled unless separated by a special machine."

The last R has two parts. The first part being the sanitation of the items so they can be repurposed, and the second being the shredding, bending, cutting, weighing, and sorting of material for my doll kits. This would make all three sections of Earth Dolls sustainable. Whether people want to simply buy a doll, make one, watch the tutorials, or just donate to the cause, there's a little bit of something for everyone. With more than $500 billion of value lost every year due to clothing underutilization and the lack of recycling, imagine if even one percent of that was conserved.

"Of all the words of mice and men, the saddest are, "It might have been."--Kurt Vonnegut

A tropical doll, a flower fairy doll, a plant queen doll, the sketches drew themselves. I dug through boxes of paraphernalia, pulling out whatever I thought might be useful. Beads from an old friendship bracelet, artificial flowers, deconstructed shirts and pants, yarn, bottle caps, chain clasps, jewelry charms, feathers, sticks, ribbons, ANYTHING. I spread it on the floor and doused the dusty treasures in disinfectant. I then reached for the cup that held the tools of my trade: a seam ripper, pencils, scissors, a white fabric pencil, paint brushes, and a hot glue gun. Using an old headband, I pushed my afro back and rolled up my sleeves. It was time to work.

"Any plastic material with food residues on (or in) it CANNOT be recycled."

My now-defunct Etsy(aside from my ever-growing favorites list) is a testament to the time it takes to make a doll. What started out as a break while I juggled basic adulting like university classes, jobs, absent sleep schedules, and prior engagements turned into a full-blown hiatus. And you can't make dolls if you can't afford to make dolls. So to my follows dismay, I never reopened my shop. Even now, I get the occasional stray message about when I plan to start selling again. But for now, the hobby remains a piecemeal catharsis.

The last and most tedious part of any doll is, without a doubt, the hair. Except for two, all hair is made from styled acrylic yarn. The process of deciding the hair length, winding it between two objects, and cutting it to size takes more time than the entirety of designing, cutting, and stitching the outfits. Each strand of yarn is folded in half and glued onto the doll's head individually. Because the strands are folded, the initial length of the yarn is much longer than the final result. Unfurling, measuring, and cutting the skein often takes hours.

However, styling the yarn-- particularly making curls, has always been the biggest challenge. To make curly hair, each piece of yarn has to be untwisted individually. This can take days, depending on the length and number of strands of hair. Princess Aurora Elegantina Di Malva took three days to separate each strand of her 16-inch pink hair. I can either leave the yarn twisted for straight hair or press it with an iron after it reaches its curly state. For wavy hair, the curly untwisted strands are brushed until the curl loosens. The hair must first be soaked in fabric softener to make it more pliable and then slowly and lightly brushed to loosen the curls. Brush too fast, and the yarn fuzzes up. Brush too hard, and it becomes straight.

"A piece of plastic can only be recycled about 2-3 times before its quality decreases to the point where it can no longer be used."

From the moment Captain planet asserted, "Protecting the planet is everyone's job!" the message was clear. It's essential to keep the earth healthy. As I aged, the sentiment only grew. Worldwide, 73 percent of beach litter is plastic, and the washing, solvents, and dyes used in manufacturing are responsible for one-fifth of industrial water pollution. In 2016 NOAA's Okeanos Explorer vessel searched the Mariana Trench and found plastic waste. I repeat, the Okeanos Explorer vessel searched the deepest part of the ocean at a depth of 10,975 meters (36,000 feet) and found PLASTIC WASTE. If a doll I make can sit prettily on a shelf while keeping even a single plastic bag out of the ocean, I have no complaints.

"You actually can't come to see anything by speaking only of ideals, because everyone has a different perspective of the world."

After a doll is finally completed, I write her backstory. Names, hometowns, and hobbies. Where they're going and where they've been. All of it helps to bring her to life. A final once-over is given to confirm nothing is out of place, and I set her on a shelf beside her sisters. Just as the evening's moon begins to project a soft glow through the gaps in the torn-up clouds. I close the window and begin to pack up my crafts.

"You can pick your friends, you can pick your clothes, you can pick your nose, but you can't pick how global warming will affect you."

In the early morning, I sit at the kitchen table and sip lukewarm coffee with crumpled sketches of my next adventure. I decide to open up a window that was shut, and a fragrant breeze blows through the room. I glance up at the roman clock that hangs above the "EAT" sign on the kitchen wall. Exactly 8:02 am, it's time to make a doll.