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We’ve had an email from Katy:
Cleaning out my mum’s cupboards I’ve found some tatty straw tablemats and a set of coasters that must be as old as me! Can I compost them?
Maybe. A cautious composter might want to leave them out – you don’t know if the straw has been treated with anything and the thread used to hold them together might be synthetic too – but if you were less concerned about things like that, the straw ((or similar woven wood, if it’s not actually straw) would probably rot down pretty quickly once it got warm & damp and you could just remove the thread if it remained intact.
However, before you throw them on your compost heap, you might want to consider reusing or upcycling them first.
How about using them to make a fun casual bag or purse? There is a how-to on Craftster on making a bag from a big placemat – I’m sure it could be modified if the placemats were smaller and not embroidered. Very floppy straw placemats can apparently be made into hats as well.
Is the tattiness just at the edges? Perhaps they could be neatened up with a bit of sewing – attach any stray strands back into the mat and/or cover the edges with strip of fun fabric. If one side is tatty or stained but the other side ok, they could be covered with a thin layer of fabric – the straw would still protect the table.
Any other recycling ideas?
Categories: household, items, kitchen
Posted by louisa
on 15 October 2010
We’ve had an email from Sue:
I have a pile of old placemats and coasters, some with a cork backing and some felt-backed and I just don’t know what to do with them.
I have used a few for my kids to paint and stick on but I’d love some more ideas.
We’ve got a placemat underneath the cats’ food dishes in the kitchen (to stop food spillages/flickages from going all over the floor) but all the other ideas I can come up with – using as drip trays under paint cans or plants – need them to be more tray-like instead of being flat.
So any suggestions?
Categories: household, items, kitchen
Posted by louisa
on 10 October 2008
Whitney has emailed us, asking about margarine tub lids:
i’m trying to do my part and make sure that i recycle everything that i can, or at least find a way to reuse it. i recycle my #5 containers of cream cheese, margarine, etc, but have nothing to do with the lids, which even if they are also #5 they are not accepted in my recycling.
any ideas of what i can do with them? typically i just put them under plant pots, but i can only have so many plants. and i thought about making coasters, but i don’t really use coasters, so i’m open to some new ideas!
When we get this type of tub, we tend to keep both the lid & the tub to reuse for leftovers instead of Tupperware or use as small storage boxes in other parts of the house (eg, we’ve got one for batteries, one for fuses and one for shoe polish in our misc cupboard). But there are a lot more uses for the tub part than the lids so I imagine there are a lot of lids going in the bin — let’s see what we can do with them :)
Funnily enough, a lot of my ideas are the same as the ones from Monday’s handicapped tags – add them to your tool box for use while decorating/painting, cut them up for plant markers in the garden, cut the rim off and shape the remaining plastic to use as a dough scrapper etc.
Anyone got any more original ideas though? :)
(Photo by cogdogblog)
Categories: items, kitchen, packaging
Posted by louisa
on 3 February 2012
We’ve had an email from Stephannie:
Just having our lounge curtains replaced and got a lot of fabric swatches to check out colours etc before hand. Not sure what to do with them now. They’re mostly about A4 size with fractions of big patterns on. Thought about little coin purses or pin cushions but patterns don’t really work for that.
A friend of mine at uni got a book of (admittedly plain) curtain fabric swatches and sewed them together to make a patchwork curtain for over their draughty door. That needs a 60+ swatches though, so probably more than you’ve got.
Earlier in the year, I was looking at basic fabric doorstops – basically cubes with a handle. If you’ve got six swatches that are good colour matches, that might work.
Or colour coordinating mini-quilt padded coasters – where the general colour is more important than the pattern. We’ve got some little padded coasters with cloves in them so they let off a pleasant aroma when “activated” by a hot drink.
Any other suggestions?
Categories: clothes and fabric, household, items
Posted by louisa
on 19 November 2010
After last month’s straw placemats and coasters post, I got thinking about plastic “disposable” tablecloths – the type people buy as a cheap way to decorate their table for children’s (and other) parties.
They’re usually thin sheets of plastic, either brightly coloured or covered with character pictures – so they seem like ideal candidates for upcycling — any specific ideas?
They’re also good as table/floor/everything covers for during messy crafts sessions – or use a no sew poncho pattern to turn them into splash-proof ponchos for very messy art activities!
Of course, it would be better to reduce in the first place – buy multi-purpose washable textiles or easy-clean oilcloth ones. Or if you don’t want a bunch of 5 year olds to ruin your best linen, cover tables with cheap blank newsprint/sugar paper and let the kids decorate it themselves — the best bits can be cut out and kept as a memento and the rest can go into your paper recycling.
As for actually recycling plastic ones, they’re usually made from HDPE (resin code 2) like carrier bags – so can be recycled alongside shopping bags.
Any other ideas for reusing and upcycling them?
Categories: Christmas, Easter, Halloween, household, items, kitchen
Posted by louisa
on 3 November 2010
