"Repurposing" things - what have YOU done? Or what do you have that needs a purpose?

Working_Mum

I have started to use glass jars etc to store food in my fridge rather than use clingfilm - these may be a cool size for odd bits of soup, beans etc and could sit in your fridge door??

Just googled them and they're a funny shape I think?? I decant a lot of stuff from big into little so they'd be a good size for fabric conditioner or laundry liquid??

GHB

Chinese supermarkets sell gallon (or metric equivalent) bottles much cheaper than anywhere else. The last bottle I bought was around £4

calleyw

GHB wrote: »

Chinese supermarkets sell gallon (or metric equivalent) bottles much cheaper than anywhere else. The last bottle I bought was around £4

I don't have one local. Amazon works for me as free delivery as have prime and £13.46 for 4 x 5l litres. Making it £3.36 delivered per 5l's.


Yours


Calley x

bsuije

Working_Mum wrote: »

I use an oil pourer for washing-up liquid (decanted form a larger better value size bottle!). Looks nice standing on the sink.

That reminded me - I use an old liquid soap bottle for the washing up liquid. I think that maybe it dispenses a bit too much with a full press, so going to try wrapping a rubber band around the plunger bit , to stop it from going down too far (something like this -> https://www.pinterest.com/pin/23573598027853254/).

unrecordings

I'm terrible for keeping stuff that might be useful. Here are some highlights (apologies for any duplicates):

Encona/West Indian Hot Pepper Sauce bottles sealed with corks. I had about a dozen of them and they were my herb/spice collection pretty much throughout the 1990's - I still use a couple for peppercorns as they're really good for refilling a traditional peppermill

Continental style flip top pop bottles (probably a perennial favourite on here) - great for storing coarse sea salt when you have a spare wine rack

I do the trouser leg thing too (using the legs from worn out trousers to make simple bags). It's a fairly old school tradition in photography for keeping things like lenses safe, but is easily extended to things like phones, tablets etc etc. Cargo pockets are great too, just literally cut them out.

Two litre plastic milk carton. We cut the tops off a couple of these and use them to keep tubes of tomato puree/harissa upright in the fridge door

More to come maybe...

Savvy_Sue

When a shirt wears out, I take the buttons off. Obviously that means you end up with a lot of not quite matching shirt buttons. So I use the old-fashioned hair pins - the long U-shaped ones, not the Kirby grips with one straight and one shaped side - to thread each shirt's buttons on, and then twist the ends together.

GreyQueen

You cab also tie a set of buttons together on a piece of yarn, takes moments to thread them through using a big needle.


My preferred button storage method is a bit slower but I sew them in sets onto a small piece of thin scrap card, such as from food packaging. Then add them to a jar which, once full, is donated to the chazzer. They love button jars and sell them the same day in most cases.

DigForVictory

Savvy_Sue wrote: »

So I use the old-fashioned hair pins - the long U-shaped ones

Where do you find them? I have eight, getting increasingly bent & have struggled to source more other than by the thousand or fiendishly overpriced (by the etsy enthusiasts) modded for Brides...

[Deleted User]

On a trip to Gothenburg in Sweden a few years ago we were most impressed and amused to see Ikea big blue bags being used as growing containers for fruit and vegetables, very successfully too. There were a lot of them in the harbourside by a big block of flats full of gorgeous produce including courgettes and leeks, seems like a fab idea if you have limited garden space. Ideal to store folded flat too rather than having containers to stack up until you want to use them again.

DigForVictory

One of the godmothers uses her IKEA bags as laundry baskets. (She irons for the relaxation - but at least I get where she's coming from with the IKEA bags.)