A bit of a no-brainer this one since a piece of string is a cat toy but I’m currently getting major head rubs from one of our cats (Boron) so have cats on the brain (literally).

Ok, so we’ve got the piece of string. Or the piece of ribbon you get on new clothes (that holds it on the hanger in the shop but isn’t needed on drawer-dwelling clothes once you get them home) – we’ve got those tied to every door handle about the place wanting to distract a passing cat. Ours also LOVE a piece of ball chain I got with a name badge once upon a time – if Sili hears us moving that anywhere in the house, she’s there in a second.

On a similar level, my mum and dad’s cat Holly goes nuts for little chocolate wrappers and the aforementioned Sili loves the idea of receipts (but quickly gets bored of them as soon as she has them).

A little (but not much) more involved, I often stuffed one old sock with another torn-up old stock, thrown in some cat nip and added a few stringy things on it to be legs/tails, et voila! a mouse/octo-mouse.

So what are your favourite recycled/reused things to make cat toys from?

(Photo of a manic eyed Boron, some string and a whole lot of movement)

Following on from last week’s little bottles that are awkward to clean post, we’ve had an email from Agata:

I’m really into manicures! I use lots of nail varnish and I have lots of empty bottles – any idea what to do with them?

Most nail polish bottles I’ve seen are glass so lid and brush aside can probably be recycled (I’m assuming the recycling process would clean the glass enough to get rid of the varnish residue). But obviously reuses are more fun.

So suggestions?

(By the way, we covered leftover little bits of nail varnish about two years ago.)

Loads of people will be wigging out tonight in honour of Halloween but by the end of the evening, their wigs will be somewhat worse for wear.

Cheap novelty wigs aren’t really made to be used again and again, and have a tendency to shed all over the place when brushed or washed.

But what else could be done with them?

Curly ones would probably lend themselves better to used as stuffing – since they’re bouncier – so that’s one thing. What else?

Other Halloween-related posts:

• How can I reuse or recycle things to a make a Halloween costume?
• How can I reuse or recycle post-Jack-o’-lantern pumpkins?
• Not a post but just a FYI: we scooped out our pumpkin last night, made pumpkin & ginger soup with the innards and are drying the seeds. John’s going to carve a spooky masterpiece into the shell this afternoon then once we’re done being all together ooky, I’m going to use it to make a couple of bird feeders. Hurrah for Halloween!

(Photo by andybahn)

A question from my mum – something she mentioned on instant messenger a few weeks ago but I forgot until now ;)

The night we were chatting about it, she had just found a collection of them in a drawer during a clearout. The bottles she has are brown glass, about 6cm (2.5inches) tall but pretty narrow, with a plastic cap and a plastic thing at the top to make drips happen. Other, equally small bottles, come with a pipette instead of the drip thing.

So basically we’ve got some very small bottles that will be tricky to clean out – any suggestions?

Mum thought kids could use them for playing shop – since they’re more kid-size than adult-size – but couldn’t think of anything else. Ideas?

If you thought my fingernail question was icky a few weeks ago, you might want to look away now.

We’ve had an email from Anne, who says “my suggestion is dog poop!”:

I don’t have a fenced yard, so I walk my dog, so I have lots of little bags of dog poop. I’m told it’s not ok to use in a vegetable garden–maybe a flower garden? any other ideas?

The vegetable thing (or compost heap for use of vegetable garden thing) is because poop from carnivores or omnivores can contain harmful organisms that aren’t destroyed during the standard composting process. (Some hot composting systems claim to be able to do it but I’m not 100% convinced.)

To be on the safe side, I probably wouldn’t want to include it in compost to be used anywhere – because the neighbourhood kids go through phases of digging in our garden and they’re not opposed to eating while doing so, and also I’m not organised enough to keep track of what’s a poo-bed and what isn’t, so would probably end up planting carrots in poo-central or something.

But that does beg the question: can anything be done with it instead of just winging it into the landfill? Any suggestions to minimise the landfill impact (biodegradable bags?)?

(Photo by Minita – I went with a picture of a cute (albeit sad) dog instead of its poo. I thought most people would prefer that. Plus, John and I just played a caption contest thing with it: “you mean I have to stop pooping until someone comes up with an answer?” etc :) )