Recently something different appeared in our office bathrooms. It was large, round, and very industrial in appearance. Something you might come across in an airport during your holiday travels.

I don’t normally consider myself to be a fussy gal, but my backside prefers a little more softness than this roll provides, especially during the cold, dry winter months. My inner voice worked hastily to calm me down. Perhaps this was a short-lived mistake and would soon remedy itself.

The days passed and the rolls kept appearing. Were they some new type of self-replenishing rolls? Was this the new protocol for our office? What was going on?? Questions had to be asked.

It turns out our office supply vendor had delivered the rolls by mistake. When notified about the error, they determined the expense to send a delivery person to retrieve the rolls was more than the rolls themselves. We were advised to keep or destroy them ourselves.

Our offices are located in the Pacific Northwest. We subscribe heart and soul to the Reduce, Reuse, Recycle philosophy. These rolls were not going into the landfill! Furthermore, our purchasing manager had determined the way to encourage us to use up these rolls of scratchy oppression was to delay re-ordering the gentle, fluffy, pillow-soft sheets preferred by animated dancing bear families on our televisions until we had depleted the supply sent in error. Fair enough. After all, how many more rolls could there be? We must be near the end by now.

THERE ARE STILL 2 FULL CASES IN OUR SUPPLY CLOSET! (please provide the horror movie soundtrack in your head as you re-read that sentence.)

Enough is enough! We’re creative types – time to apply a little creative thinking to solving this issue. She said we needed to use it up but didn’t specifically say that it had to be used as originally intended. I’m sensing a loophole…

So, I took a long strip into my office and sprayed it with Walnut Ink. After drying, I tied it together and created a quick flower for my hair.

Maureen saw the path I was on and used Memento Ink, Shimmer Spritz, and the Essential Glue Pad to create a candy cane for her office.

As usual, our very creative Katie raised the bar with her lovely reindeer using Creative Medium, All-Purpose Ink, and a little glitter.

We’ve made a dent but still have to far to go.

Help us out. What crafty projects have you created with unexpected household items?

Post a picture on our Facebook page and you could win your own roll of industrial toilet paper. (Who said creative thinking couldn’t apply to prizes?)