Throughout our daily lives, it’s pretty inevitable we accumulate a lot of stuff. At a certain point, we all have to clean up and clean out our lives before we start to look like an episode of Hoarders. Now we’ve already covered how to make a little bit more room in your closet for a good cause but what about the rest of your house? Here’s a few helpful tips on how to reuse and repurpose common household items and also where to recycle some harder items such as old electronics.
- Bottle Caps: For a simple and easy DIY project, pick up some small magnets and glue at a craft store. Attach the magnet to the back of the cap and suddenly you’ve got custom fridge magnets for your latest crayon masterpieces or important reminders.
- Old, Worn Out T-Shirts: Old tees make perfect rags for cleaning your house and are ideal for polishing furniture and countertops. Take the scissors to your old tee to create smaller strips out of the shirt to make it easier to clean with. Instead of going through paper towels or messing up your washcloths, keep a tee rag collection to use every time you clean.
- Large jars lids: Keep these lids for organizing small items in drawers like screws, pushpins, paper clips, staples, rubber bands, etc.
- Newspaper and cardboard boxes: If you have enough room to store these items, old newspaper and cardboard boxes are great things to hold onto as packing materials. When moving time comes around, it’s one less thing to stress about and have to spend money on!
- CDs/DVDs/Hard Drives: How many of us have an old CD collection or an old computer we have no idea what to do with? Well, if you live somewhere near NYC/New Jersey, you’re in luck. There’s now a company called Back Thru The Future which is a woman-owned electronics recycling and data destruction company in northern New Jersey. All you have to do is drop off your unwanted electronics and they’ll take care of the rest. If you don’t live near NYC, the National Association for Information Destruction will be able to direct you to a recycling location in your area.
- VHS Tapes: Most of us probably have a few of these lingering in our homes largely because we have no idea what to do with them. Alternative Community Training, a Missouri nonprofit which provides jobs to people with disabilities, runs a VHS recycling program. The best part is VHS donations are accepted through the mail.
For more recycling tips, check out these articles on Woman’s Day and Real Simple.
