The Glory of Garbage

What's good?                    Garbage.

What's bad?                      Tossing it.

What's the difference?     Read on and see!  

10 Best Garbage-Picking Ways to Save Money.

Have you ever looked up and down your street on garbage day? It's unusual to see one lonely can with snug-fitting lid sitting at the curb. Normalcy is the bulging can with bag after bag balanced precariously up to eye level and the lid perched on top of it all.

We throw away so much junk. And many of us pay someone for that privilege. This is totally not necessary. There are so many ways to reuse our garbage and they require very little effort. Now, I'm not suggesting you ninja up and sneakily paw through your neighbor's cans in the wee hours of the morning. Although you can if you'd like and, to be honest, I may have been known to do so a time or two.

This is something we can do from our very own trash cans before they even hit the curb. Read on to learn some easy ways to make garbage-picking fun and cost effective.

1 – Aluminum Foil

Don't toss that foil once it's used. Aluminum foil, even used foil, has so many practical uses. Give it a quick wash once you're done with it (I just swish it around in my dish water) and set it aside to dry. (This works best using foil without heavily baked-on food product. Foil used for baked potatoes or to cover a dish works well. However, if you wrapped BBQ chicken with it, maybe not so much.)

What are those future uses, you ask? Well…

1) Scrubbing with wadded up foil really works and doesn't ruin those expensive scrub brushes. Try it on moss and fungus covered brick and concrete surfaces, dried paint and oil from your garage floor and driveway, cooked-on food from the racks and bottom of your grill, last year's dried dirt inside your flower pots, all that dried grass under your lawnmower.

2) Balls of used foil make great drainage for the bottoms of those flower pots.

3) Trying to start a camp fire on the wet ground or snow? Spread out the foil and protect your kindling from all that dampness.

4) Painting a room and need a break? Wrap your wet brush in the foil and place it in the freezer.

2 – The Shiny Silver seal on a coffee can.

You stumble out of bed, shuffle your way to the kitchen, fumble through the process of making coffee, then EEK!! The can of coffee is empty!!! Wait….wait, don't fear. The world is still a safe place to live. There's a brand new can in the cupboard. Phew! Profoundly relieved, you remove the plastic lid, peel off that shiny silver cover, close your eyes, and inhale deeply. That first whiff of a freshly opened can of coffee is sheer bliss. Stop! Don't turn towards the garbage to deposit that silver shininess dangling from your fingertips. That bit of sparkle has many more uses.

1) Glue a plastic cookie cutter to the shiny silverness and cut around the shape. Makes a pretty ornament for a tree, cute little candy dish or topping dish for a sundae bar, fill with candies and cover with saran wrap and it's perfect for the Easter basket.

2) Cut off the tab, glue lace or a nice slice of fabric around the edge, and place a candle in the center. This gives the appearance of a mirrored surface for the candle and you don't have to worry about dripping wax ruining your furniture. Plus, when it gets too gobbed up, simply toss it….you KNOW you'll be drinking more coffee.

3) Cut into shapes - circle, oval, rectangle - border edges with permanent marker, and use as labels for anything in the home. These are sharp, modern, and look like you actually spent money on them.

3 – Pasta boxes.

There's nothing better than home-made macaroni and cheese. And if you're going to make it, you might as well make a lot because it's even better warmed up. So, go ahead, be brave. Cook the whole box. Pause a moment, though, before flinging that empty box across the room to ricochet off the wall into the trash. (Because you are that good.) It's a neat little box, isn't it? Perfect shape, and it has that cool cellophane window on the front. Hmmm…..

Yes, you have yourself a perfect gift bag. Glue pretty paper or material on it, leaving the window open, cut off the flaps, punch holes in the top and make handles of yarn or string, and you're set. Is gluing too much work? Paint it. Still too much work? Steal….I mean….borrow your child's sticker book and have a blast, the kids can even help with this part. Letting some of the stickers hang over the window adds a bit of flair to the look.

Gift bags and wrapping paper are expensive…..use garbage instead.

4 – Toilet paper/Paper towel tubes.

Okay, fess up. How many of you can walk into your bathroom right now and see at least one or two empty toilet paper tubes in the waste basket? Uh-huh….thought so. Well, stop that. There are far too many uses for toilet paper and paper towel tubes.

1) Do you have a meat cleaver floating around in your drawer but lost the protective sleeve? You know that thing is just lying in wait to snag a fingertip or two, don't you? A paper towel tube can protect those precious paddies in a snap. Just smush it flat, duct-tape/glue/staple the ends closed, and cut a slit in one of the creases the length of the blade. Ta-da! Works on hatchets and axes, too.

2) Uh-oh. The kiddo has a birthday party to attend in 20 minutes and you forgot to buy a gift. No worries. Grab a toilet paper tube, cover with festive duct-tape or even that shiny silver thing from the coffee can, or decorate with markers or stickers (here's that child labor part again, let them do it). Tape one end shut and wad up some ones, a five or two and stuff them inside. Throw in some quarters and wrapped candies and you're set. You can get fancy and poke small holes in the open end, thread ribbon or string through the holes, pull the drawstring shut and tie it off. Or just tape or fold it shut….whatever your imagination, and time constraints, allow.

3) Fill with cat nip and jingle bells, wrap it and the ends with shiny duct-tape, and watch your cats go wild.

5 – Used Paper Towels.

Aren't you just so proud? You spent the morning cleaning every mirror, window, and shiny surface in your home with glass cleaner and paper towels. And the whole house sparkles. Well done! Now, just look at that mound of dirty paper towels. There's really nothing on them but dust and cleaning product. What to do…..

Here's what to do, put them in the bottom of your kitchen and outside trash cans BEFORE you put the bag in. These “dirty” paper towels will absorb any oozing created by holes in the bag, keeping the bottom clean. And the cleaning product already in them will help maintain a clean odor in the stinkiest area of your home.

6 – Empty Skittles, M&Ms, etc. bags.

We love us some fruity and chocolatey treats, don't we? And we buy the smaller bags so we don't eat as many. The problem is, we just buy those smaller bags more often. Well, maybe that's just me. But that's a whole lot of bright, colorful stuff most people can relate to and it's being wasted. Gasp! Cut the ends off those bags, cut up one side and wipe the white part with a Clorox wipe.

1) Fold in half, punch a hole in the corner, thread with ribbon, and you have a cool and unique gift tag.

2) Do you remember that toilet paper tube gift we talked about earlier? Awesome cover for that.

3) Fold the bottom up a little over a third of the way, glue the sides, then write your child's name on the white part at the top. Pin to a bulletin board and you have a great little pocket for allowances, lunch money, or chores.

4) Don't cut it up, carefully peel open one end, eat the candies yourself, place a twenty inside, then glue the top shut. Great little gag gift that's really a gift.

7 – Old Pillows.

Did you get wonderful, fluffy new pillows for your bed this Christmas? Nice! Before you kick those old ones to the curb, though, let them do some work for you. Damp basements are not fun to deal with, especially in the winter months. Place those old pillows around the basement and they'll absorb some of that moisture from the air. Don't wait too long before tossing them, though, or they'll get pretty nasty.

8 – Dish soap, shampoo, etc., bottles.

1) Finally squeezed out that last drop of dish soap? Good. Don't throw it away yet. Neatly cut it off about four inches from the bottom, peel off the label, and wash. You now have the perfect little sponge holder to set on your sink.

2) Are you as tired as I am of razors scattered all about the shower? And then they lay in the spray and get rusty. Not to worry if you have an empty shampoo bottle or such lying about. Neatly cut the bottle off five or six inches from the bottom, peel off the label, and wash. You can then attach this oh-so-expensive razor holder to your shower wall anywhere you'd like using double-sided tape. And if it starts to get gunky? Toss and repeat.

3) We all have toilet bowl brushes. And whichever style we choose to use, those things still end up inside our toilet bowl. That's something we don't want flitting willy-nilly about our bathroom. Take an empty Clorox bottle and cut off the top, then use this to hold that brush. You don't even need to wash this one since any Clorox left inside will only help matters.

9 – Kids' School Papers.

Every single week the kids bring home a mountain of papers, homework assignments, in class practice, tests…..it never ends. You oohhh and ahhh appropriately, marveling at their skill and knowledge. And then what. That's a huge chunk of their life and history, not to mention paper, to waste on the trash can. But it's just so much to keep around. Try this instead:

1) School pictures are here and oh so cute. What a wonderful gift for extended family. Now, to buy the frames and matting for every family member. Nah, waste of money. Use that schoolwork as your matting, it'll be the perfect backdrop for that treasured picture. And it'll be so interesting to watch how their writing and knowledge changes each year along with their looks.

2) Do you scrapbook? What better way to display those unforgettable moments than to place a picture on top of that test your child was so proud of. Just make sure the grade shows.

These next tips are only for those amazing individuals who somehow remain uber organized during all of life's chaos. Not for the faint of heart.

3) Wrap your child's engagement, wedding, and baby shower gifts in their grade school papers.

4) Still have all of your not-so-little one's schoolwork organized by year? Each year wrap your grandchild's birthday gift in their parent's school papers from the same age.

5) Many of these papers have blank backs. Fold it in half and turn it into a birthday, graduation, housewarming card.

6) Having a picture booth at your bundles of joy's graduation party? A montage of all those papers mixed in with some school pictures would be a backdrop they'll never forget.

10 – Keyboards.

Most of us have computers with the requisite keyboards. And don't we just love it when we spill a drink on the keyboard, completely ruining it? Time to bring in the new and take out the old, right? Well….not exactly.

Those letters, numbers, and symbols pop right out there. Did you know that? How cute is a gift wrapped in plain paper with the birthday boy's or girl's name and age spelled out in keyboard keys. Or decorate a child's bulletin board with CTRL, ALT, and DEL keys. 

Just remember, if you can buy it in a store, you can probably make it out of your very own trash.  The neighbor's trash......well, that's your call. 

As always, take your time leaving but hurry on back.  :)