#Livesustainably contest entry: Reusing or Upcycling

Our local recycling center doesn't accept either glass or any plastic aside from 1 and 2, so I tend to reuse those items as much as possible. When I saw that the Sustainable Living Contest this week was "reusing and upcycling," I went on a scavenger hunt through the house!

I hoard save glass jars and find other things to do with them, like homemade skin care products...

....and storing and dispensing my essential oils... My neighbor uses Stevia, and saves the glass bottles (with built in droppers!!) for me, since my bigger bottles of oils don't include droppers.

...or random things like fridge-pickling peppers, capturing fireflies, storing loose change, or below, my egg profits. In fact this is a photo of an overlapping reusing effort. I bought that plastic honey bottle on the right a couple years ago. Now all I buy is local honey in glass canning jars, like the one on the left. It's hard to drizzle or measure a small amount of honey out of the glass jar, so I put it in the plastic bottle (I'm out of honey at the moment!) I didn't pull down the attic stairs to go up and take a pic of the Yoder's honey and jelly jars I've amassed. They're perfectly good canning jars, so I can use them to can produce this summer! :)

Empty yogurt (and similar) containers make great freezer storage for leftovers...


It literally just dawned on me, looking at this pic, that that date should be 1/8/18!

Some obvious ones: composting materials...

....and egg cartons. These are all from other folks. Seems like every time I see a friend, they say "I've got cartons for you!"

I rinse and reuse large Ziplocks; haven't had to buy any in forever. Sadly, some of my "old" ones that had impressively lengthy lists on them finally just wore out :(

We have at least half a dozen of these cups from a local restaurant and use them for scooping bird seed, chicken feed, bath water, holding pens, etc.

My sewing room is a trove of reuse in action.

I hoard recycle ok, ok, I really do hoard fabric....my family members save for me anything worn out that's made of woven cotton, flannel, old uniforms, etc.

All but the upper right pile is old clothes

Uniforms and denim

I turn them into things like this throw blanket (I even reused the buttons off the shirts I cut up)

Or this rug (I have several of these scattered around):

A friend who is a member of the local quilting guild knows somebody who makes cat beds, and stuffs them with fabric clippings and scraps. So I save all my scraps for her:

Cereal boxes become pattern pieces (though at least I can recycle the remainder of those)

Empty spools are saved for when I have bits of colored thread left on a bobbin after I finish a project. I'll find another use for the thread later!

The hefty plastic bags (especially the bigger ones with zippers!) that bedding items come packaged in, come in handy for my own completed sewing projects.

And I LOVE reusing the plastic bags, that clothing is shipped in, for when someone buys an item from my Etsy shop. I make sure to tell them "I'm sending your placemats in an upcycled Old Navy bag," for example :) I had one customer thank me for recycling! (Not only is it good from a recycling standpoint, but have you ever calculated how much extra postage you pay for the weight of the cardboard box? Oh my gosh!)

Thank you @livesustainably for creating this contest!