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?)

We’ve already covered recycling or reusing dead ones but Trevor has a question about recycling schemes for pens that still work:

Here at the School of Health Studies we get inundated with promotional pens from various medical and drug companies.

Most of these pens never get used and just fill up our desks draws. Is there any way of recycling them so that they can be used in third world schools or something?

I suspect most medical and drug companies aren’t going to pay any attention to a request for “no more pens, thanks” so it makes sense to want to pass them on to someone who’ll use them.

So does anyone know of any schemes to send school supplies to third world countries - or deprived ones closer to home?

(Photo by Zonnekoe)

It’s that special day when children (and big kids) up and down the land will open their Tweenies/Hannah Montana/High School Musical/perhaps even Christmas-themed advent calendar and “enjoy” the piece of grey-ish lump claiming to be chocolate. Only 24 more greyish lumps until Christmas, hurrah! say the children.

“Chocolate”-filled advent calendars only really popped onto my radar in my early teens and I have a sneaking suspicion that before then we used to just use the same advent calendar each year - the doors carefully pressed closed again when everything went back in the loft in January. Even if that wasn’t the case, they’d have been easier to recycle because they were just sheets of cardboard rather than the present cardboard/plastic/cardboard sandwiches.

So any ideas for reuses? I guess the cardboard could be torn off for reuse/recycling but without the cardboard, is the plastic at all sturdy enough to be used for Zac Efron* shaped jelly moulds or whatever?

And, to avoid this waste in the future, anyone know of any good reusable ones - or got instructions on how to make them?

(On a related note, I’ve updated our Recycle This Guide to Recycling At Christmas for 2008 - but if you can think of anything else to include or great suggestions I’ve missed, do let me know.)

* He’s the dreamy hunk guy in High School Musical. I know far more about all this stuff than anyone could ever want to know. I also can identify/name each of the Jonas Brothers and know the difference between Selena Gomez and her BFF Demi Lovato. No self-respecting 29 year old should know this stuff. Bah.

We buy all our tea and coffee from Just Coffee People. Contrary to one interpretation of their name, they don’t just sell coffee - they sell tea (black and herbal), sugar and hot chocolate/cocoa - and it is all AWESOME. The Tanzanian tea is the best we’ve ever tasted - it’s spoilt us for every other type of tea - and I’ve heard the same thing said about the coffee by other caffeine fiends. Plus, as well as helping growers overseas through the Fairtrade programme, it’s a socially inclusive company focused on community regeneration, providing trading and employment for people with all sorts of disabilities.

(Unfortunately it’s a Yorkshire-only operation at the moment - they’ll either deliver your stash to your door or you can buy it at various places around Leeds.)

Anyway, the reason I’m mentioning it here is because of the packaging: like lots of fresh coffee these days, everything comes in plastic bags. Whatever can be done with them?

I know my favourite wire woman Alison Bailey Smith uses coffee bags (as well as other random packaging) in her work - and the Just Coffee People ones are a lovely dull gold so crafty ideas are a definite possibility - any other ideas?

(Some details about the type of coffee bags I’m talking about in case you’re unsure: they’re quite a thick but flexible, heavy duty opaque plastic. Most are gusset type bags, around 8-10cm (3-4inches) in width, just less than that deep and about 15cm (6inches) or so tall. Most of the ones I’ve seen aren’t ready resealable - we just use a peg on ours.)

We’ve had an email from Tony asking about recycling cork - but NOT wine bottle corks (which we covered back in the day):

I am looking at ways that cork (in slabs not wine bottles unfortunately) can be recycled.

Given his email address, I suspect he’ll be particularly interested in large-scale industrial recycling ideas not crafty reuses for each slab/piece - but we’ve got some thin sheets of cork (a former noticeboard) to reuse too so ideas for both case are welcome.

Anyone know any companies that take large pieces of cork for recycling? Or have any ideas (other than noticeboards) for surplus around the home?

(Stock photo by raichinger)