Do It Again

I've been doing some Spring Cleaning recently and discovered, like I do every year, that I keep way too much useless stuff. So, it's time to throw stuff out, right? Now, more than ever, it's important to take to heart the philosophy of the three R's. Reduce, Reuse, and Recycle. Now my personal favorite, because I hate to get rid of anything that's even remotely possibly useful for future reference, is Reuse. So I thought I would share some of my favorite "reuse" projects that I've done before.

• Old clothes that don't fit can be donated to your local thrift shop if they're in good condition. If they are ripped, stained, or otherwise broken you probably don't want to donate them. In this scenario I usually cut them up and use them for sewing patches, appliques, quilts, or other sewing projects. When my son was in school they made backpacks out of ripped jeans.
• An old dresser with broken tracks makes a great puppet stage. Remove the backing and all drawers. Then cut the backing to 2/3's of the original height and staple gun it to the front. Paint it all in whimsical colours and add a curtain rod and some nice little curtains. Then children sit in the back and lift they're puppets in front of the curtain for the show. The empty drawers standing upright and bolted together to a sheet of plywood make a new bookshelf (depending on the size and shape of the drawers).
• Old computer parts such as broken keyboards and mice, an empty CPU tower, broken printers and scanners, or a shorted monitor can be combined to create a pretend computer for smaller children. Or, for older children you can take them apart together to theorize about what when wrong, why it doesn't work, and what all of those little chips do. (My dad used to do this with me when I was seven and I never forgot how cool it was)
• broken bits of pottery, ceramic, or glass can be pieced together with grout to make custom mosaic tiles. (admittedly I haven't done this one yet, but I found some broken pots in my storage shed while cleaning and I'll be buying the grout this weekend to try it out. I'll tell you all about it and get some pictures up when they're done)

There's so much more you can do, but it all depends on what you have. So the next time that you find something and wonder to yourself why you don't throw it in the garbage, try to think outside the box. It might be more useful than you thought it would ever be.

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