One can make paper on his own out of many types of herbs. It serves a great piece of decoration, one can paint with pastels and write on it.

NOTE: observe safety precautions because you deal with lye that rapidly evaporates and its fumes are very poisonous. So do this all outdoors, in the country. Put on a mask, respirator, rubber or medical gloves.

Take cane that grows along the banks of lakes and ponds, cut it into pieces about 10 cm, put into a large enamelled pan — not aluminum pan! Fill with water and bring up to boiling.

Pour lye into the water: 50 – 100g of NaOH lye is dissolved being stirred in a plastic jar with about a glass of cold water (or better on frozen ice cubes) And gently pour into the pan with the grass. Now better leave somewhere for half an hour not to breathe the harmful fumes in.

Cool the alkaline broth, drain it and wash the grass under running water in a sieve. Yes, this must be done with gloves on. The wash is over when the herb is not slippery when you touch it with bare hands. Remove all the tough stems and get this:

But that's not all. Grind the mass in a blender to get a puree. Add starch to the resulting pulp:

You can not buy an expensive frame for casting paper: take two simple frames and pull a mosquito net with pins. The frame size corresponds to the paper size.

Fill a bowl with cold water. Add a few handfuls of pulp, stir well.

Bring the frame together and put on elastics so they do not unravel.

Scoops up water with pulp.

Wait until the water drips off, remove the top of the frame and turn the mesh on the cotton fabric.

Collect the excess water with a sponge.

Carefully remove the mesh, the grass layer remains on the fabric.

Cover it with another cloth. The sheet is laid over. And so on until all pulp is over. Put something heavy over. Change the wet cloth in a few hours until the sheets are almost dry, then lay them one by one and dry them up to the end in the air.

Then iron and homemade paper is ready!)