2016 Trash for Turtles

Now into our 4th year, our “Trash for Turtles” project continues to evolve. Keeping with our message of reducing, recycling, and reusing plastic, I worked with a local graphic artist “Miss Hosanna” to create a cool t-shirt design that we could sell to raise more money for the Georgia Sea Turtle Center. It was fun working with her and coming up with a design that both kids and grown-ups would like! We worked with Sunset Ts to print the design on Recover brand t-shirts made from 100% recycled plastic bottles. They were so soft and stylish! We sold 169 of them in all…and counting!

To sell t-shirts and spread my “Trash for Turtles” message, I set up an information booth at several local events (like this one at our local Eco-fair) and made presentations to several local pre-K groups. I also wrote a letter to the editor of our local newspaper and ran an ad in the newspaper asking my community to help. You can read about those efforts here.

And, of course, we stayed true to our beginnings. Four years ago, we started this project by doing road cleanups and recycling aluminum cans. This year was no different. In all, we conducted seven road, river, beach, and lake cleanups in our area. We also collected recycled cans from citizens and businesses in our local community. All combined, we collected and recycled another 13,440 (or 420 lbs) aluminum cans. Some of our family in Oklahoma even recycled their cans and sent us a donation, which was super awesome!

With the help of our supporters, near and far, we were able to raise $1,458.36 for the Georgia Sea Turtle Center this year!