When I was little, and we had a tuna can

     I was thinking about this blog today when I suddenly had an urge for a tuna sandwich.  That's all it takes, folks!  I wanted a tuna sandwich and one thought led to another.  

     Grama's birthday and two little girls (my older sister and I) made a pin cushion.  Gram was a tailor.  She worked at a department store and night's and her days off, she worked from home taking in all sorts of sewing projects.  She taught herself to make monograms with a zigzag sewing machine and spent three decades monogramming towels, mink coat linings, and ties.  She reupholstered a chair ( a settee) from Versailles possibly from the time of Marie Antoinette!   She sewed custom gowns and we thought the gift she needed was a pincushion.  We filled a tuna can with sand.  Gram taught us that the sand sharpened the pins as they went in and out.  We glued felt over the top then around the sides, stitching the seam together to hold it till it dries.  My sister gave up a ribbon from a doll and trimmed the edge.  I love Google images.  Our pincushion disintegrated with use over the years, but there is a similar example, above.

thehobbeehive.com

   Not to be outdone, here is another site with uses for cast off tuna cans.

I stock and store a lot of food, medical supplies and other things against the time when these things are hard to come by.  But, I thank my God in Heaven for my grandmother teaching me how to make something out of nothing.  I thank her for teaching me to hand sew at an early age, even if it was only simple sachets from satin scraps scented with abby powder.  I am grateful for the years in front of a sewing machine since.  Everything I have made and given as a gift came from Gram.  Without those lessons, there would not have been Halloween costumes, Christmas gifts ans I truly apologize to my niece for the spandex shorts, it was a fad!  

     I would like to inspire and encourage others who have never made anything to look at the trash for craft materials.  I would like to encourage preppers to practice making something out of nothing that can be used for another purpose.  Not everything you will need in a crash or a disaster will need to explode into flames.  Sometimes you just need the everyday things you might have overlooked.  Sometimes you need to replace things that have worn out.  I have a pincushion (actually I have two) but there could be a day when I have none and a container with sand in it is a pincushion. 

     A container with nothing in it is a tool.  Cans could be shovels, pots, pans and the material for cutting utensils.  For that, you will need a good pair of tin snips.  You could rivet together a group of tuna cans to make the biscuit tin or cupcake pan you forgot to store.  I have a recipe for boiled bread.  It is a dark molasses flavored date nut bread.  It is made in a can.  You pour the batter in the can, place it in a drip pan with water in it and bake it.  To get it out, you open the bottom of the can and push.   

www.ask.com 

     So, yes I have posted on the subject of making things from cans before, but I made that tuna sandwich while I was thinking, it's been a long time since I washed a tuna can for anything except the recycle bin, or made boiled bread.  It's even longer since I made a nice pincushion. 

funfamilycrafts.com 

     I don't really want your house to become a recycle bin of cans that are now other things.  But, consider the holidays coming up.  Halloween and Christmas are the perfect occasions to practice piercing cans to make luminaries.  Thanksgiving is a good time to paint over cans and fill them with candles, or candies on the end tables.  Get in the mindset of reusing things, all sorts of things for the time when the dump is the source for materials to make things.  

But if you HAVE to have fire in your can:

logcabincooking.com 

AND if it HAS to explode, the potato cannon is a start!:

Old school tin-can cannonwww.spudfiles.com