Recycle For A Life Cycle

The writer Christopher Pike said it best when he said, “Nothing is as it seems. Black can appear white when the light is blinding, but white loses all luster at the faintest sign of darkness.” Everything in our homes has the ability to be something else. My late Grandmother Miller reused her cigarette boxes to make tiny Santa’s to hold Christmas money. I have even seen Pinterest posts on turning old toilet paper rolls into mini boxes for party favors - the internet really does hold everything you could ever need. There really is nothing better than opening up a cabinet or a drawer and seeing everything laid out neat and orderly. As much as I love this aesthetic, I am not at the point in my life where I can go to the container store and pay $20 for drawer organizers. Things that fit in one house don’t fit in another, and even if they do, they may not fit the ‘vibe’ I am going for in the new space. My house still has drawer organizers and containers for everything from snacks to colored pencils, and I didn’t spend a penny. Here are my ideas on how to recycle items in your home to live out their full life cycle.

In the Living Room

The living room in my current home is not large; therefore, I haven’t been looking to really add items or consolidate what’s there. However, I have been able to repurpose other items from the house to elevate the space.

I do try to update every week or so are fresh flowers that I put in a juice carafe in the house when I arrived. This apartment came fully furnished with a kitchen full of utensils. Using the carafe as a vase, the perfect reuse of item fits the need I have. My flowers now have a great home, and I pour the juice out of a carton, like normal.

There was also a silver serving platter in the kitchen when I arrived. I repurposed this to be a table tray. I added my candles, succulent planter, and Chilean horn to complete the tablescape. It makes the whole setup feel a bit more cohesive and pulled together.

Everywhere I live, one of the first things I try to find is a place to house my art supplies. This whiskey box was the perfect size to keep all of my items. The cardboard's sturdiness is also perfect for the daily pulling on it when I grab it out of the cabinet. I made some dividers out of the sides from another box. This helps keep all the similar items together and makes the organizer unction better overall.

In the Bathroom

The bathroom is my solace at the end of the day. The rest of my house can be crazy, but everything feels off if my bathroom is unorganized.

This week I found eucalyptus and wanted to add some to the bathroom. I was able to find an old oil dispenser in the kitchen, which I repurposed as a vase for a few stems. It surprisingly looked very modern and got the job done. Clear glass always looks modern and works for an array of purposes.

I house all my skincare, hair care, and general body stuff under the sink. This space is notorious for turning into a game of Jenga every time I open the door if I am not careful. To keep like items together, I recycled some items headed to the recycling center.

My lipsticks and lip care products are housed in a tray I made from a distilled water jug. The plastic is very sturdy, which is essential when sliding it in and out of the drawer. I also cut it to any angle, so it slopes down to the front making it easier to reach in and grab the product I need.

My razors are kept in an old box from a set of massage balls I picked up. At the same time, my miscellaneous items are kept in the box from a mug I purchased. I have seen some people painting recycled boxes to make them look cohesive; however, I adopt the mindset that good enough works just as well. Fortunately, in this case, both the boxes have straight white sides that I usually keep facing front. When looking for items to reuse, remember that anything can be altered to look like a full set if needed. Painting, modge-podge, collage, etc., allow you to bring your organizing vision to come to life.

In the Bedroom

My drawers are anything but organized. Having a more minimal wardrobe, you would think that my drawers wouldn’t be messy, but they can be. To combat this and find my items quicker, I created some dividers for my bra drawer to separate my sports bras from my everyday ones. I repurposed another box in my underwear drawer to separate the different styles. This means that I know exactly what I am grabbing on the rare mornings that I am getting dressed in the dark. I never thought I would be talking about the organization of my undergarments online, but hey, if it can help, then I’m here for it!

In the Kitchen

My kitchen is by far the largest area of the house that needs the most organization. The kitchen in the apartment I am in now has tall cabinets and only one shelf to set items on. This has led to some inventive uses of recyclable items from my house and neighbors. When I have an organizational problem, my first place is the recycling room on my floor.

That is where I was able to find this distilled water jug that I turned on its side to use as a riser in the cabinet. This addresses two problems: the raised platform keeps the chips from being crushed, and it also keeps items pushed to the front, ensuring that I am using everything in my cupboard.

This is a perfect example of how tall the cabinets are. In this cabinet, I like to keep the snacks and bread, which I try to keep to a minimum. Here I took three wine bottles, again found from my floor’s recycle room, and some very sturdy cardboard to create a raised shelf specifically for the bread. The snacks are kept in another box that has been repurposed to keep them all standing up. The overall aim is to make it always to see what I have and keep things from going bad.

All plastic items have the potential to have another life cycle. My fridge used to have loads of open vegetables and fruit now I keep them in repurposed plastic containers - the one here is the bottom of a strawberry container. These plastic containers are great at seeing what you have and are very easy to wash when you are done with the items inside. My cinnamon is housed in the box that some peanuts came in. Not only can I see the cinnamon inside, put the lid on top snaps shut, keeping it fresh. There are not many drawers in my kitchen, but I cut two two-liter bottles in half in one of them. These halves now house my wine corks. This was such a lifesaver since wine corks have a way of rolling around in drawers and getting under everything. This solution was quick and, more importantly, free!

Every item I mentioned that I use to keep my house together was totally free and was headed to the recycling bin. The phrase 'recycle for a life cycle’ means use items to the fullest. For some, it means washing Ziploc bags and reusing them, and for others, it can be simply turning a jug on its side to keep items pushed to the front of a deep cabinet. Just because you can’t buy fancy organizers doesn’t mean that you can’t have the home of your dreams. Get creative and give your items another life. The possibilities are endless.