Ok, I was wondering.. what does everyone do with the empty spools? I tossed three yesterday and kept thinking I wonder what could be done with these..surely art projects? I know recycle to the end.. but someone was requesting them for a science project in the classifieds and it made me think maybe there are ideas. Post them so we can all rethink our tosses of all those wonderful little spools!

I have only recently run out of thread on my spools. But the spool had chips in it so I threw it out.

I have been to craft fairs and such where they make Christmas ornaments out of them. Most of them were tole painted reindeer, santa's, or snowmen.

Here are a couple of sites with ideas. The first one is a hand carved Santa. I could never do that!

http://www.etsy.com/view_listing.php...ng_id=34943283

http://passionateaboutcrafting.blogs...ing-spool.html

Those links both show wooden spools. I didn't even know they still made wooden spools. What brand of thread uses wood?

I toss them to my cats. They roll on the floor nicely and they enjoy them. Sometimes the dog gets in on it by fetching for the cats :-D

Yep! Cat toys!!!

My boyfriend has a pet quail so I figured he could play with that (the quail, not the bf). Well, the quail didn't quite get it. So now the bf blows through the spool (it's an aurifil) and makes this whistling sound that irritates the quail. He (bf now) loves it...

LOL, poor quail.

I must admit that I've been saving them. so far I have two of the little bitty ones that come in travel sewing cases. I am positive they are good for something. I'll be watching this thread to see what you all come up with.

our childrens program couldn't do a project because we couldn't find wooden spools. We used to make a knitted cord using them to knit it. Anyone remenber these from the old days?

ok to sound incredibly dumb here why couldnt you use the plastic ones? spray painted they are any color you want.. Cat toys tried it they love them with the thread on them then I chase the string down all over the place til I find the darned thing. I have lots of kitty helpers when I sew. GRRR. I am thinking there are some lot more crafty crafters here who might have a few more ideas.. come on.. we must have 10 million between us easily.