Strange Recycled Items

People can get downright creative when they find new uses for old things.

Like a comment I got about using empty formula cans - apparently they can be used for physiotherapy. I'm still trying to mentally picture that - do you get people to roll them and then chase after them? Do you try to stand and balance on it, like log rolling? Do you balance them on your head while walking? Ooops, no, that was my supermodel training. Needless to say, good thing I'm not a physiotherapist!

My grandmother, who has been green her whole life, has one of the most creative, yet bizarre, items that she reuses.

She has a pencil holder that is actually the plastic casing that holds rifle shells. For people in most parts of the world, they would probably not know what this is. But here on the Rock, let's just say most of us are quite well aquainted with many things firearms related. No, we aren't into street gangs - we just like to hunt for our food. After all, what better way to get hormone-free meat.

Teachers are also very inventive when it comes to recycling items. Memos from the principal can easily be turned into paper airplanes for studying flight. (At this moment, I am crossing my fingers that my principal never reads my blog.) I have seen egg cartons turned into beautiful flower bouquets for Mother's Day, milk cartons can become buoyancy projects, and egg cartons become sorters for buttons, beads, Fruit Loops, you name it.

Another interesting idea from Assiginack Public School is the use for bread tags. Or, I should say, uses - plural. I remember as a student there, learning to count with bread tag counters, how to create multiplication arrays, how to divide, how to throw them at people when they weren't looking...(this one came from the students, not the teachers). The "old" teachers there ( I'm sure I'm gonna get in trouble for that one) used to have these things by the bread-bag full. My mother, a now-retired teacher, was famous for her bread-tag punishment. I'm not going to post it here, and any of you out there who got in trouble as a student will know exactly what I am talking about. For those of you who don't, be sure and ask her sometime. I'm sure my daughter will become very adept with a bread tag and a pencil next year when Grandma is babysitting...

Students also can be creative when it comes to reusing items. Many old pen tubes have successfully been turned into vessels through which to blow spit balls. Of course, students now think that they have come up with something new. We all know that we were doing the same thing twenty-some years ago.

One of the more obscure uses for items that I have given new life to is old magazines. You can roll these up to stick inside your tall boots when they are not being worn. This way, the tops of the boots can't fall over and become creased. I'd like to claim the brilliance of this for myself, but have to confess that I did actually read it in a magazine somewhere ( I'm sure someone would have ratted me out).

I'm sure there are many more ideas for ways to reuse and recycle items that are unique or maybe just a bit weird. I did briefly consider using old pantyhose as produce bags, but that is just a bit too unsanitary and even a bit creepy perhaps. However, the pantyhose and a tennis ball do make a great party game - be sure and ask me about it sometime (and no, it's nothing x-rated, it's for kids, people!).