Reuse it!!

This will be a kinda complaining kinda I am so proud of that kid post

I am talking of course about Zach

This boy is for lack of a better word obsessed with saving the planet he loves that we are gardening..he loves that we make do with things we have and do as much as we can ..within our limits to save energy

but sometimes this child can take things too far ..even for me

I LOVE to reuse things I always have . the cheapskate in me hates to throw away something that MIGHT be useful

scraps of ribbon and fabric containers etc

but after a while you start to accumulate SO MUCH that you really have to declutter in order to find ..well a flat surface to put things

Right now our mudroom (the room by the back door) stores our off season jackets and shoes as well as a large garbage can full of styrofoam (that I am still trying to figure out what to do with it I am leaning toward mixing it with potting soil but most of the stuff we buy already has it in there)

then we also have our large recycling bins and the cardboard some of which ends up in the burn barrel (yes we burn it)

We have a bin with newspaper and corragated carboard for gardening and then the bags of shreaded paper

we have a bin for alluminum one for tin cans and glass and plastic

This room also holds a full sized freezer and a shelving unit and a fridge freezer combo

this "big" room is a mess

the newest additive to this MESS

is

a bag of holey socks

yes a walmart bag of holey socks

WHY??

well Zach said when I was about to toss the holey socks into the trash

MOM!!! You CAN'T just throw those away!!

Ok he is like me he did not just say this is was actually VERY loud and very dramatic and he was then saying things like
"those will sit and ROT FOREVER!!"

OK I said he was smart but really now it would not take forever for these cheapo socks to rot!!

I said great so what am I supposed to DO with old holey socks??

he said

Sock Puppets

I said WHO wants 35 sock puppets??

....ummmm we can come up with something that will reuse the socks AND make something useful

So I sat down and thought about it

the kid slays me I swear!

SO two ideas I came up with for reusing these things are

draft dodgers

I make them usually out of old towels I roll them up sew them into a tube and stick them in front of drafty doors or windows saves energy and keeps me from feeling like I wasting things

I could use the socks as the stuffing of a tube made from fancier fabric and sew them up and stick them in front of the doors

I think this might become some weirdo Etsy thing that will probably NOT sell but what the heck it will get the boy off my back about it

My other idea was

making a non disposable "swiffer" style floor cloth from the socks

it will require two socks cute them open to fit the sweeper thing and sew them together I bet this would make a great wet wipe for the floor too

now I just need a few minutes to actually sit down to sew all this stuff

but right now the large LARGE piles of shoes that are in assorted disrepair are calling my name

hmmm guess I better look online to see if any schools in our area are taking part in the Nike recycling program thing where Nike takes the shoes (tennis shoes only) and recycles the shoes to make the rubber mats that go underneath playground equiptment

heavy sigh LOL