We’ve had an email from Siddharth:

How do I recycle plastic bird food bags? The brown paper ones I can just throw into the paper bin, but the recycling facility doesn’t accept the woven plastic ones.

I suspect there will be some overlap between these bags and the plastic sacks we get when bulk buying rice.

Suggestions over on the rice sack page include making them into shopping bags, aprons or using them as a groundsheet/roof-liner for kids’ playhouses.

Cut into strips, they could also be used as ties around the garden – we always have stuff out there that needs tying to other stuff ;)

Any bird seed bag specific suggestions?

We’ve had an email from Maja:

my daughter Tayeliee is in her “think-pink” state – everything around her must be very pink or very cute.

Her room is already stuffed with pink vases, pink lamps, pink chairs etc. but I think there is some trash-treasure that could be nice room deco. I don’t know exactly how to say it… well, is there any way of recycling trash into cute room decos for a 15 yr old?

I think it’ll depend on what she’s into really but when I was that age, I had loads of CDs and remember decorating old shoeboxes with salvaged, scratched-up vinyl records (45s) to make CD storage – I liked the clash of the old and the new.

Other ideas: if she likes candles, you can made trash-candle holders out of old tin cans (punch holes in the side with a hammer and nail to make pretty patterns) or CD cases; repurpose fabric from old pink clothes to make hanging storage pockets and, I don’t know if it’ll match Tayeliee’s version of cute but as I’ve said before, I think these little guys made from old plastic bottles are utterly adorable.

Any other suggestions?

(Photo by thesaint)

We’ve had an email from Emily, asking about “wax paper/ parchment paper / aluminum foil boxes”:

It seems like they would be good for doing something more with, considering the long jagged edge / blade and all.

Funnily enough – and proof that everyone out there is READING MY MIND – I was thinking about this just the other week. My grease-proof paper box has plastic coating on the jagged edge, which makes it better for tearing but worse for recycling. Grr.

So any suggestions for reusing them – whether metal or plastic, or just a cardboard box?

And what about reducing them in the first place – anyone know of any particular companies that make refill rolls to save getting the whole new box each time? I seem to recall that some supermarket value brand in the UK is box-less but I can’t remember which one – and suspect that’s just wrapped in plastic instead anyway.

(Photo by Ilmari Karonen, c/o Wikipedia)

Blooming heck, it’s chilly. I’m knitting as fast as I can at the moment to keep us decked out in snuggy socks, hats and scarves – and hoping the needle-on-needle friction will create a bit of warmth too.

(I know in the UK we don’t get really cold winters like in Central/Eastern Europe or in parts of the US/Canada – by those standards, it’s tropical here right now – but because of that, we’re not prepared for it. Two hundred schools were closed in West and North Yorkshire yesterday but we only had 2 inches of snow on the ground. Also: the worst bit about working from home: you can’t use the “there are no buses running” excuse for a day off. Bah.)

Anyway, despite the new woollies and the fact I’ve got a blanket, two cats and laptop on top of me while I write this, I’m still chilly so have been gulping down more than my fair share of hot drinks. John and I have a leaning tower of teabags in the kitchen at the moment (it’s too cold to go to the compost bin after every cup) and our collection of hot chocolate tubs is growing daily.

We’ve got a few of the plastic screw-top jars in the cellar – perfect for our ever-growing random fixings collection, or random allen keys and packets of veg seeds. In the kitchen, they’re too big for spices really but perfect for pulses or dried beans (most of the jars we use are semi-transparent once you remove the label so you can just about make out what’s what and how much is in there).

But what else can we use them for?

Amongst our friends, mushrooms are a bit like Marmite: people either LOVE them or hate them to the point of inventing fake allergies about them. John and I are firmly in the “love” category but have a bit of a problem with the plastic tubs they often come in because we go through so many – we try to buy loose mushrooms (preferably in a paper bag) wherever possible but still go through one or two of these boxes a week.

I used to use them under plants or to hold seedlings in the greenhouse, but the greenhouse is now used by a local stray cat as a home and I’ve got better saucers/pots around the house.

We also used to use them as a pre-compost-bin counter top bin in the kitchen – ideal for tea bags and the like – but now we’ve got a proper little bin with a lid for that sort of thing.

So what can we do with them instead?

The tubs – deep trays really – are quite thin plastic so not heavy duty for most reusing-as-storage purposes. I guess they could be used as dividers in drawers but we have a severe lack of drawers in this house (none in the kitchen, two in the living room, none in the bathroom, and just a chest of drawers in the bedroom) so everything is already in boxes on shelves.

Other suggestions?

(As for recycling, none of the tubs I’ve checked over the years have had a recognisable identification mark on the bottom – sigh – anyone know what they tend to be?)