Recycled Items in YOUR Home

Recycling means more than just stacking up your newspapers, rinsing out your food cans and toting that Big Blue Bin to the curb. That of course is if you are lucky enough to have one. The complex I live in doesn't have any so, once a month I head to the recycling center.

Recycling involves processing used materials into new products to prevent waste of potentially useful materials. This is done by a special process depending on whether it is paper, glass, aluminum, etc. But of course this is not the only way. What about reusing what you already have for a different purpose.

That is what I want to know today. What items (if any) in your home do you reuse?
Do you throw something out only to go buy a new container for storage? Or, do you have items stashed in any and everything you can find?

Below I want to share some (but not all) of my recycled items. I grew up with my grandparents (born in the early 1900's) so they saved everything. I acquired that trait as a kid and now have come to realize how good it really is.

One of the funniest recycled items I can remember as a kid were my bookends. They were bricks from and old farm building we tore down, covered in a pink/purple flannel from an old pair of PJ's to match my purple room.

OK, so enough about the old days, we can we do or reuse now.

1) Once in awhile I get bottled water (in plastic) or bottled tea (in glass). These are brought home, washed and reused. Now I don't reuse the plastic ones very long and I don't make frozen water in them, but they do get recycled.





2)Old candy contain is now a Stevia canister.








3) Old food boxes are cut down for magazines, papers, pamphlets, etc.












4) Old Christmas tins are now used for storage of cat food.

The dogs get one too, it's filled with toys. Once the lid is take off they have no problems getting what they want, even my dog Koda and his head is as big as mine. lol




5) Old shoe boxes get used for everything., and I mean everything.
As you can see they get a post it note stuck on them and then placed
on the shelf. These three are loaded with batteries and their charger, camera and electronic equipment, and computer and Zune equipment.








I have old coffee containers filled with plants. Old pill bottles and mint cans filled with pins, paper clips, buttons and Christmas lights. There are glass bottles full of pens/pencils and reused for flower vases.

My list could go on and on but the point is that recycling means more than just taking something to the recycling center and making someone else do the work to make it something else. Be creative. Save the Planet and Save some Money.

So, my quest for you this week is to look around you house. Look at what you use and what you throw out. Can something be reused and for what? Let me know.

Recycled items can also be used for crafts. Check out this link to learn more.
Reduce Footprints: Repurposeful Crafting

Best Foot Forward---In A Recycled Shoe

While sitting here on the back patio, enjoying the 90+ degree weather, I notice that the flip-flop tan has already started. Now I hate shoes, but when it’s a 110 degrees, your feet and the asphalt become one.

Hmm, that makes me wonder. How many shoes do I own? Well I’m not a big clothes person and I’m pretty sure I have more shoes than clothes. OK, so I was wrong, I only have 12 pairs. Flip-flops, sandals, boots, dress shoes and tennis shoes.

Now the US Census Bureau reports a population of 306,359,330 as of today 5/5/09. Times that by just 10 pairs of shoes and you have; 3,063,593,300. That is a lot of flippin shoes.

Shoes are made of Leather, Plastic, Resin, Rubber, or a Synthetic Rubber. Which brings me to my next question, Why do we need to use synthetic rubber? I’m thinking I see tons of old tires every where, couldn’t we just use them.

A few tire facts:
*It takes half a barrel of crude oil to produce the rubber for just one truck tire.

*Producing one pound of recycled rubber versus one pound of new rubber requires only 29% of the energy.

*In India, tires are cut up and used to make durable and inexpensive shoes.

*A burning tire can leach 2 1/2 gallons of waste oil into the ground, threatening the ground-water.

*Americans discard 280 million tires a year, (only) 25 to 30 of which are re-treaded or otherwise reused.

*About eight out of every ten tires in the U.S. wind up in landfills or "stockpiles." An estimated 2 to 3 billion tires are currently stockpiles in the United States.

*At one site near Modesto, California, 8 million tires were stockpiled as of 1991. By 1995, through recycling efforts, that number was reduced to 2 million, although they receive 20,000 tires daily.

These facts make me really like a company I found in the UK called; Worn Again. They makes shoes using 99 percent recycled material including discarded suit jackets (outer, lining and buttons), parachutes, prison blankets, ex-military long johns and towels, car seats, scrap leather and recycled rubber. No two pairs of shoes are exactly the same. And their shoes are 100% recyclable. What a great idea, and talk about being stylish with a one of a kind pair of shoes.

Here in the US we have;

Planet Shoes, Based in Waltham, Massachusetts, Planet Shoes is a lifestyle shoe retailer dedicated to selling comfortable, stylish and well made shoes at value prices. Online since 2001, we specialize in Active, Comfortable, Healthy, Earth Friendly products with a flare of fashion. They use recycled materials, are members of, 1% For The Planet (1% For The Planet is a rapidly growing network of companies that give at least 1% of their annual sales to environmental causes every year. There are more than 450 members in 34 US states and 14 countries. 1% members have contributed more than USD $12 Million to environmental causes.) They are also a proud partner of the Carbon Fund and you can do your part by picking CarbonFree Plus Shipping at checkout. Every dollar received from CarbonFree Plus shipping will be sent directly to the Carbon Fund. More Information about Carbon Fund please visit CarbonFund.org.

Flat Tire;
The soles of all their shoes contain crumb rubber from recycled scrap tires to make them more comfortable. Crumb rubber not only allows them to make a better shoe, it also helps reduce the number of scrap tires deposited in landfills.

E-Waste, Please Recycle Me

A friend of ours stopped by last night for a visit, she had a tale to tell that wasn’t all to uncommon for this part of the country (Arizona). Last fall during one of monsoon storms a lightning strike struck a power pole near her home causing the power to be out for several hours. For one reason or another our local power company never repaired her pole before switching power on to full capacity, which in turn caused all electrical plugs in the house to malfunction. Power strips were melted and all electrical devices (TV’s, DVR’s microwave, radios, etc.) were fried. She was very lucky to arrive home in time to throw the breakers before her whole house went up in flames. Her next problem came when she tried to get rid of, or recycle the electronic equipment. She said, “It took some time, but I finally found a place”.
I had two thoughts;
1)What is in these electronics that can possibly be so bad that no one wants to take them ?
2)Where do I take them and why is it so hard to get rid of them when they are everywhere you look?

Electronics to be recycled are called e-waste.
Old televisions contain up to 8 pounds of lead, which was supposed to protect the viewer from radiation so most landfills will not take them.
“The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency estimates that 82 percent of televisions (20.6 million units) were disposed of between 2006 and 2007 – and that occurred primarily in landfills. This means only 18%, or about 6.3 million sets, were recycled.”

It is reported that Americans throw out 130,000 computers every day, most of which almost all is recyclable. A circuit board contains copper, gold, silver, platinum and palladium, as well as lead. These are all chemical elements that when broken down or recycled should be worth money. Other components include glass and plastic. Printer cartridges also do not belong the landfill. Certain kinds of toner dust contains a hazardous material, as do inks used in inkjet printers. And don’t forget about the extras like keyboards, speakers, mice, cables, etc. You may even ask questions like; Where do you sent the parts to be recovered and what do you do with the materials? Do you wipe the data clean or can you give me information so I can do it.

VCR’s, DVD players and stereos fall into the groups above, all containing chemical elements, plastic, metal, etc. All of which can and should be recycled.

Two web sites I found to be very useful were:
http://www.thinkgreen.com/home
This is the Waste Management site which gives lots of info recycling Do’s & Dont's.
http://earth911.com
You type in what you need to recycle, where you live and it will give you all the closest places with address and phone numbers.

myLot User Profile

What's Your Score

I was recently going through my emails and web sites from last year when I happened upon this wonderful web site. I do love the web and emails, it reminds me of how much paper we used to waste, writing letters, getting junk mail and of course printing stuff out to read again later.

Any way the web site was earthlab.com and you can get to it from their banner above. I pulled up the site, typed in my email and pass word and there was my score from last year. My ECP (earth conservation plan) score and my carbon output score. Now my score for last year was below the average for my city and for the US in general but could I be doing better this year. You bet, I re-took the test and dropped another 19 points. The nice thing about this is that it keeps your history and shows that you are making a difference.

It even has a place to enter your pledges. Things that will in the end lesson your carbon footprint. You can read other peoples pleges and then add your ideas for more. Below are three of the ones I entered with their tips.

#1 NO pesticide use in the garden;
Blend 1 garlic clove, 1 small hot pepper and a quart of water in a blender, then pour the mixture into a spray bottle. Spray it on your inside and outside plants, and this recipe will help keep the pests away in a natural way.

#2 Seperate plastic lids from the bottle;
The cap on your recyclable bottle is not made out of the same plastic as the bottle, and is not recyclable. By leaving the cap on, the purpose is defeated because the entire bottle will be discared at the recycling plant. Make sure to remove the cap before tossing your bottle into the recycling bin.

#3 ?Recycle your dryer lint;
Yes, you can compost dryer lint! Just make sure that if you use dryer sheets, they're chemical-free.

This site just has so much to offer and the fact that you can check back every so often to check your progress is great.