<p>When a sock develops a hole, I turn it inside out and use it to lightly dust computer screens.</p>
<p>The coffee I buy comes in a plastic “can” with no sharp edges. I keep one on the kitchen counter for the kind of trash that just multiplies when I’m cooking. It saves me trips to the big trash can, and helps to keep garbage separate from paper, etc. By the time one gets nasty, I’ve emptied a new one to replace it.</p>
<p>When I buy chicken for stir fry I wrap it in one of those bags at the store that is meant to catch leaks. When the chicken is cut up, I use the bag for marinating. I’ve never had a leak yet.</p>
<p>I used to cut down gallon plastic jugs to enlarge the opening. They make handy handled trash containers you can toss when full. Also useful for storing toilet brush and toilet pumice wand.</p>
<p>I think styrofoam should be outlawed. It has been, in some places. I’ve stopped buying a lot of things because they come in styrofoam. When I go to a restaurant, I bring my own reusable containers to take home leftovers. I cringe at restaurants that serve everything in styrofoam. A few minutes’ use and forever on the planet.</p>
<p>Styrofoam can be recycled in our town. Maybe you should lobby your government to get a better recycling program!</p>
<p>I reuse take out containers and put hats and scarves in shoe boxes. I use German bier steins for holding kitchen implements. No interest in drinking beer in those quantities! I use old spice jars to freeze vodka for pie and hold cut up ginger in vodka because otherwise my ginger goes bad before I finish a chunk. Old mustard jars that still have a little mustard in them are great for vinaigrette.</p>
<p>I live in the Pacific NW and we recycle and compost just about everything, except Styrofoam. I am looking at the guideline from my waste collector and they have 3 pages of recyclables and 1 page of things go into garbage. Seattle forces restaurants to use corn-based take out containers but the neighboring cities do not.</p>
<p>I guess if I can’t recycle or reuse, then I’ll have to reduce and stop buying from places using Styrofoam. Sigh. They make such good food…</p>
<p>I repurpose clothing. I’ve made tote bags out of shirts and tons of drawstring bags also. I took my father in laws old button down shirts and made several baby quilts for grandchildren/great-grandchildren.</p>
<p>I use newspapers, brown paper bags, and cardboard, as well as cardboard sections of big boxes, as weed barriers in my garden (I lay them down on paths and between large perennial plants and then cover them with organic mulch. They save me a lot of weeding and are biodegradable.)</p>
<p>I use pasta sauce glass jars as casual vases for informal arrangements of flowers from my garden.</p>
<p>I have used old stockings with runs to tie my tomatoes to their stakes.</p>
<p>I cut up old cotton clothing and sheets, especially flannel, to use as dusting/polishing/cleaning rags.</p>
<p>A bed pillow developed a tear in the side gusset, so I ripped it along the edge, dumped the fill in a clean garbage bag and cut the quilted pieces down to a 16 inch square which I stitched on the sewing machine. The fill from the bed pillow was enough to make a firmly filled 16 inch square pillow form, so there was no waste.</p>
<p>Then I took an old college t - shirt H was about to throw out because it had a hole under the arm, and made a pillow cover from instructions I googled online.</p>
<p>Oil paint. At the end of the day, I scrape off my palette and put the mixed colors in new empty tubes (I buy them by the case). Then seal them up. They make great grays and browns.</p>
<p>I’m not sure this is technically a “repurpose” but I save and use the stoppers from Leese Fitch Sauvignon Blanc as bottle stoppers for other partially used bottles of wine and have used them in bottles of olive oil when I accidentally destroyed the cork. So far, I’ve never found any sort of bottle they don’t fit.
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<p>Reading all this provides the same warm fuzzies I had as a child reading Hints from Heloise. Something to do with the moral correctness of thrifty behavior. </p>
<p>My additions to the genre-NY Times and other newspaper plastic bags get saved for cat litter bags. Plastic mushroom containers are saved to corral odds and ends. Any cotton knit worn out is saved and cut in rag sizes for painting projects or cleaning. I rarely use paper towels, as any spills or cleaning are handled with rags. A pile builds up the basement, and gets washed with bleach every few weeks. Any plastic bag with handles or paper bags are given to St. Vinnies to use again for their customers.</p>
<p>I make homemade gluten-free Irish cream for my Dad for Christmas every year. I used to put it into tall carafes which he would feel compelled to clean and ship back to me. Now, when I’ve finished a nice bottle of whiskey or something similar with one of those reusable capped corks, I clean it out and fill it up with the good stuff for him. When he’s done, he can recycle the bottle. </p>
<p>When I had some extra this year, it went into an empty Frapuccino bottle which I hope no one mistook for Frapuccino! They are about the same color.</p>
<p>Plastic packaging from our new recessed LED lights made great disposable paint trays! :)</p>
<p>In our house plastic bags have 9 lives (lunch bags, bags for packing clothes for trips, etc.) unil they meet their ultimate end - as cat litter bags.</p>
<p>I use small plastic tubs – especially the ones from Noosa yogurt – for dog treats, food, and water when showing. Makes it easy to always have supplies for her. I keep a stack in the pantry ready to fill.</p>