Local artists have given old objects new lives and a fresh dose of meaning for the 10th Annual Recycled Art Show at the Art Alliance, 818 Pike St., Lemont.

All of the artwork in the 2004 show, In My Mother's House, incorporates recycled materials as a celebration of Earth Day.

State College sculptor Carrie Lyons has contributed a few pieces to other Art Alliance shows in the past few years but said she is hoping her latest piece, "There Are Always Flowers," will get her back into the local art scene.

"Lately, I've been sculpting babies instead of pieces," she said. "I have never put anything in the Recycled Art Show before. I have a couple of kids, and I don't get a whole lot of things done these days."

Lyons was inspired to make her bouquet of candy wrappers, wire and paper bag flowers while making lollypops with her son.

"I was thinking about things in my mom's house, things she always had there. She always had flowers in her house," Lyons said. "We had all the wrappers on the countertop, and I thought, 'That would make a neat flower.' "

Sylvia R. Apple of Stormstown had a somewhat different inspiration for the piece she's entering, a 5-foot-5-inch angel sculpture.

"I never had a grandmother, and at some point, I had the idea to make myself a grandmother," Apple said.

She created the hollow, life-size angel out of doilies, handkerchiefs, wire, mattress ticking and other materials she thought she'd find in her grandmother's house. A lamp inside the sculpture makes "Grandmother Angel" appear to glow.

While Apple has been involved with the Art Alliance for about two decades ("It's my artistic home," she said), newcomer Suzanne Bruening is anxious about entering her first two pieces in In My Mother's House.

"I've wanted to [enter things in Art Alliance shows], and I just sort of got my gear in line now," the State College resident said. "I'm trying to let my guard down a little bit and have the public see my stuff."

Bruening uses comic strips and comic books to decoupage glassware, and she is entering a bowl, a pitcher and a plate in the Recycled Art Show.

"It's not really my mother's kitchen. My dad does all the cooking," Bruening said. "My mom is really sentimental toward her glassware. This is something that I made and something that she might possibly like."

The type of art Bruening creates is especially apt for the Recycled Art Show, she said.

"They always talk about 'starving artists,' but all my pieces are recycled from something else," Bruening said. "I'm trying to make art on a limited budget. I'm proud of it, not only for the environment, but the creative venture as well."

The show runs all weekend, with a reception from 7 to 9 tonight and exhibit hours from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. tomorrow and from noon to 5 p.m. Sunday.