Volunteer Take-Home Projects
As you may have inferred from our name, Austin Creative Reuse is a creative organization! Not only are the people involved in with ACR creative, but we also incorporate creativity into our processes.
When we were in a small, 1600 sq. ft. space, there was only so much room for incoming donations, let along for people to work in that area. Not all of our volunteers were fans of such close quarters, so we gave folks the opportunity to take projects home to work on and then bring them back to the center when completed. When the pandemic started and we made the decision to close the center to the public, we pivoted quickly to doing work from home ourselves. As we began to accept donations again and welcome volunteers back into the center, we changed our informal take-home process to a very amped up version.
With so much time at home, people were eager to contribute and do something to keep their hands busy. We saw an average of 30 projects going out our doors each week that resulted in over 600 volunteer hours per month. We’ve continued to offer take home projects even after we welcomed volunteers back into the center. Most of the take-home projects are sorting and packaging all the tiny odds and ends that are donated. A perfect activity for you to do while watching your favorite streaming service! These activities are also great for families, special interest groups, church groups, scouting groups or homeschool co-ops. We provide all of the materials needed to complete the project, as well as detailed instructions on what to do.
If you'd love to turn these before photos into their after counterparts, then take-home projects are the volunteer opportunity for you!
By being creative in the ways that we offer our community opportunities to engage with us, we are able to keep our expenses low. In turn, this keeps the materials available for purchase at our center affordable and ensures that income limits are not barriers to creativity. Processing 25,000lbs of materials; buttons, beads, fabric, paint brushes, and more each month takes many hands! We are truly grateful for all of the contributions that volunteers choose to make to help our reuse dreams come true!
Learn more info about becoming a Core Volunteer in order to sign up for take-home projects. If you're a group looking to inquire about a take-home project please contact volunteer@austincreativereuse.org
Keep on crafting, y'all! 😊