It is always nice to work with a longtime friend, and this month, that is exactly what we did! We made trophies for our friends over at ICU baby to acknowledge the outstanding efforts by their volunteers, fundraisers, and participants of their 2021 HOPE Parade — a walk in support of NICU families.

Seven of our Little Star trophies which are made from 51 grams of unrecyclable plastics in ICU baby blue resin. 357 grams (about 3/4 of a pound) of unrecyclable plastic pollution was recycled into these trophies, which is equivalent to 700 plastic straws.

When we collect our plastics from cleanup events or community donations, we sort everything by type, and then by color. Any PVC (#3), unlabeled PET (#1), heavily contaminated plastics, and indiscernible plastics are removed due to the potential dangers involved in recycling them via heat. And, since our local recycling programs will not recycle these nor commit to keeping our recyclables out of landfills, these plastics are shredded together and stored for use in our trophies, coffee tables, lazy rivers, and epoxy wall art.

We cherish our longtime friendship with ICU baby and are honored to be able to work with them to fulfill their mission to support families with a baby in the NICU.

And, as a fun closing note, these 7 trophies pushed us over our 31kg mark! We have now officially recycled 31,235g (68 pounds!) of plastic from our local communities. Hooray!!