I love a good repurpose. It doesn't have to be mine, either. I love hearing about and seeing what others do too, when it comes to using things for other than their original purpose.
I've been slacking lately, but did a couple small repurposes. I repurposed a fridge drawer to use as a pet water bowl. I'm tired of the plastic ones that get crusty brown mineral deposits on them that I couldn't get off with ten pounds of TNT, so we'll see how it works out to clean an enamel drawer. It should be a lot easier.
I also have been repurposing the flip/shaker lids from Parmesan cheese containers. They fit nicely on regular canning jars. I like to store things in mason jars, and so far I've repurposed the lids and jars to store cocoa powder, cornstarch, baking soda, dehydrated onions, and today's idea, vital wheat gluten. I'm using vintage, unique quart and pint jars for the jars and like that a lot. The flip tops make it easy to level stuff measured in measuring spoons by scraping them under the edge of the lids.
We also repurposed some stainless steel sinks and an enamel sink that we salvaged, and made small table gardens from those. Which I have yet to plant, but at least they're ready to go.
We wanted a small picnic table for our deck, to fit in a specific space. So we cut down our six footer into a three-footer. It still needs paint but I think we're going to like it.
What has everyone else been up to on the repurposing front?
not really doing as much repurposing lately as 2/1.
I find things like identical vaccumns and buy the 1 at a g sale for parts.
I do have a school table on my front porch waiting for me to clean an area. It will be a sm. appliance table. So the bread maker,waffle maker and toaster can stay out all the time w/o clogging the bar
I use 110 camera cases as diabetic kits to store sticks,needles,meter and swaps together. That way i have 1 up and 1 downstairs.
I been thinking about it some more and have come to the conclusion Ddad burnt me out on re-purposing things.
Every plastic Burger King container was for seedlings
We used dish detergent bottles as "squirt guns"
My playhouse was recycled wood
My swingset was pipe he screwed together and it had a chain around an old board
He was king of the baby jar screws and nails
master of the screw box,cigar box,film cannister coin collection
I was lucky he was clever but It meant I never got new. So I guess repurpose means poor.
Which is so funny as anyone who knows me knows I am the queen of estate sales,G. sales and zero hr. at the church bazaar????
Most of what what you mentioned sounds real familiar from my own childhood.
I went through a period in my twenties when secondhand stuff wasn't good enough for me or my family, at least if it came from a rummage sale. Man, the crap I got from my classmates when I was in school and turned up wearing a secondhand dress that had belonged to someone in my class the week before! Not good enough for MY kids! Then we moved to Minneapolis where buying secondhand was a lot more anonymous and it was easy to get stuff cheap that looked like new and often WAS new, adopted five more kids to go with the three we already had, and secondhand shopping became more of a necessity. But I didn't really repurpose so much then.
Then we moved to Hooterville and now it's just not possible to go to the store and buy all the things we need. Plus we've accumulated a lot of stuff by this stage in our lives, so it seemed dumb to buy things if we had something we could make work for what we needed and couldn't buy, or needed and didn't want to buy.
I often repurpose stuff because I often just can't find the stuff I want, like the six-ounce juice containers that are tight enough to survive being in a cooler bouncing around in the truck for a thousand miles at a time, or the old freezer baskets I'm using now for pantry space in the camper.
Now I just plain love the challenge, and love getting stuff that's unique. I can't afford custom furniture, for example, unless I come up with it myself, so if I get a chance to repurpose something like the antique Singer sewing machine base and the antique oak table top I put on it, I'm all over that. Love it.
I don't feel poor or cheap repurposing stuff, but I can understand why it might make someone feel that way. Sometimes the things that happen in childhood just never quite leave us.
I think repurposing is great in theory but yes Ddad was obsessed.lol. ok not kidding. And also it depends how it comes out. DH is famous for Frankencords. I really dont feel ok w/ that when we live almost across the street from a hardware and we have the $3. Towels are for life. We use them,then the kids got them,then the floor after mopping or dog feet follwed by "bad puppy" clean-up. Is that reusing than re-purposing?
Anyway,something I need to work on for the future.
I used to think Estate sales were creepy and irreverant.It changed for me when companies started doing the selling not the relatives.
I try not to get too tacky. I usually won't piece together a bunch of cords or do stuff like that. Things have to look right to me and be safe. My mom will use any old piece of junk and call it good enough no matter how bad it looks. It's like she has a blindness to stuff like that. So she'll have some crappy piece of junk sitting on a thousand dollar antique oak hutch or something like that, and doesn't even think about it how terrible it makes that beautiful hutch look, like no one cares. Or she'll use some wire bread ties (any color) to hold something together that, if it was fixed properly, would look really nice but since she didn't take the extra time to find the right thing to do the repair, it just looks trashy. Drives me crazy. OTOH, she thinks I'm too picky about stuff like that and shouldn't care if something that could look nice looks bad, so we're even. LOL.
I've been wondering for a few years now if I'm a perfectionist. That's a new concept for me because I've never seen myself that way, and I will do things that don't look so nice if they function well and don't show.
He he, I am very much a function over form kind of person, much like your mom. For me, whether or not it works for me is so much more important than what someone else thinks it looks like. I am like this in most areas of my life, from clothes to cars to home, etc. I don't really care if someone thinks it looks "trashy" as long as it works for me, since I am the one who lives with and deals with it on a daily basis (whatever it might be.)
Ironically, as I am getting older, and particularly as I am getting my house ready for the market, I am finding there is a place in life for form as well. Though, it was never a matter of not appreciating how something looks. I can certainly see and appreciate nice looking things. I guess I just took the "never judge a book by it's cover" thing way to heart lol.
I don't care much what other people think about how I do things and what it looks like, but it bugs ~ME~ if something that could look nice with minor effort looks like crap instead.
A great example of what I mean. I often joke about "useless flowers." I like to keep a garen and will put the effort in to tend the garden because I get veggies out of it. But the sole purpose of having flowers is about how they look. Therefore, I (currently) have no flowers in my yard at all. (There will be shortly though because they now serve a purpose in getting my house sold faster ) I did however put my strawberry patch in the front. And if my HOA would have allowed it, I probably would have put the rest of my garden in front too, its a better location.
Anyway, the veggies serve a purpose for me, the flowers don't so despite the faxct that I can appreciate that they look nice, I don't bother with them. Its not woth the extra effort to care for them just so they look pretty.
But back on topic, I like repurposing things. I often use butter tubs and other containers from food to hold leftovers. I have cut old clothes up to make new things for the kids. I have used things like yogurt cups to start seeds in.
I think thats it w/ me too. My broke cousins did crap w/ old jars every year for Grandma. she even said something once. How many decorated coffee cans and peanut butter jars do you needs.
I used my baby dresser that was my Dbros,that came from the curb,that was once Dmoms fabric storage as a baby dresser for Ds and then an art supply cabinet before i donated it to the womens shelter for the abused. Did you follow that.lol
Should have had wheels on it.
I have a dozen coffee cans in the garden with a gasline out the bottom with a rock in each and cut the lid out to hold a screen wire for watering my tomatoes and bell pepper plants..I place the hose at the root of the plant and fill it with water or feed for the plants..works for me..and saves water...
I also use bed sheets..Usually white and dye them them color I want for curtians..I don't just throw them up at the window but sew them into curtians..
My late Dh took skids we got from work for free and made cabients and even the counter top for the sunroom..
I am useing a dresser (vanity style) for computer desk and the nightstand holds the printer..
We're considering moving to another town and we're in agreement we will not buy a house that has an HOA. I wouldn't have a bit of problem putting a veggie garden in the front yard or seeing the neighbor's veggie garden in front, either. Although I probably wouldn't put my recycled sink gardens in the front unless I could figure out how to make them look less sink-y.
yeah, we are hoping to avoid an HOA next time we buy too. Generally speaking, our HOA has been pretty good here and we have a nice pool, playground, tennis courts etc that our dues pay for. And for the most part, they are pretty reasonable with their rules. They are stupid and don't manage the money well but in terms or being nasty or having strict rules or interpretations of rules, they haven't been terrible.
But, we will still be looking for something without. When we are ready to buy, we are hoping to get a little bit of land, something on the outskirts of the city.
The thing that would worry me about an HOA is that it might be reasonable in the beginning, but can change depending on who is in charge. I've heard some are better than others and some are less strict than others, but we just don't want to take the chance that someone else gets to arbitrarily make rules for a property ~we~ own. Besides, we'll want to do stuff like have our camper set up in the back yard or maybe ~gasp~ in the driveway, and be able to have clotheslines and put up fences and paint our house whatever color we dang well please. We're just weird that way, wanting to make our own choices about our own stuff.
We aren't supposed to have clotheslines...but I put one up anyway. Like 2 years ago. No one has said anything. Although, I just tied a line (well two) from the tree to the fence. All I have to do is cut it down. Probably in another week or so, sign goes up next week I hope.
The house I am hoping to move to already has a line in the yard. And I am pretty sure they don't have an HOA, but even if they do, we only plan to be there for 4 years.
I wanted a corner desk unit with regular desk with drawers, file drawers and computer desk. I went to an auction primed to buy one, but the price went too high. When I came home I got to thinking that I had most all the parts to put together my own unit. So now I have a corner unit set up as follows: 2 drawer file cabinet, old wooden desk, corner cut from 1" plywood supported by an old 2 drawer file cabinet, a second 2-drawer file cabinet then my computer desk. Makes for a sweet set up although not matching. Maybe some day I'll get it all painted to match, but for now I'm just enjoying the practical and no cost solution. The old 2-drawer cabinet supporting the corner section is not accessable, but since it was headed to the curb repurposing it as the support was a good solution. Even the plywood and paint for it were repurposed/reused from other projects.
One of my favorite repurposing projects was one dh did for me many years ago. He bought an old sewing machine with a nice desk type cabinet at an auction for $5. We discarded the old machine and he fixed the hole in the table top so that I had a solid flat surface for my newer machine. The desk has 3 good sized drawers to hold the sewing stuff I use regularly. The only cost was for paint and new knobs for the drawers. The knobs were purchased in a package of 6 off a sales table. Three are on the sewing machine, 2 on a cabinet I repurposed for the kitchen and one replaced a broken knob on my tea kettle.
The unit I repurposed for the kitchen was a heavy metal night stand on casters that the nursing home discarded so no cost. I sanded and painted it and use it for my KitchenAid mixer. I didn't have room on the counter for the mixer so the rolling stand is a good solution as its countertop height. I started with the mixer on a typing table but it too low and wasn't sturdy enough. The night stand has a formica top that was in good condition so I left it as is. A big plus is the stand has a drawer and a door with two shelves inside the door. Perfect for storing attachments for the mixer, my recipe boxes and vacuum sealer. Cost sand paper (on-hand), paint (purchased) and the 2 knobs (already had).
I agree on no HOA. I'm sure many work fine, but when they go wrong it can be an expensive nightmare. I know of one instance in AZ where multiple lawsuits ended up costing everyone major dollars. When you sue your homeowner association, you pay for their legal fees as well as your own! However, if you cannot get the HOA to function as it should suing can be the only answer.
This is little, but when I rehomed my birds, I kept the three coconut nests that had not been used and I'm going to put artificial plants in them. At least, with a little luck that will work.
This is a weird one, but weird is sort of what I'm known for.
We dug the smoker out of the garage yesterday. We've never really used it, don't really know how, but decided since it's here, we need to learn. So we looked it over and decided we needed something under it since it's on a wood deck. We also hate how low it is. We discussed various ways to raise it up. Concrete blocks would have worked, but we also want to keep the smoker away from the deck rails and the house siding, so that means it'll have to be moved every time we use it and the blocks would be so heavy.
We salvage sinks, as I've mentioned before, and I looked out in the yard this morning and noticed we had a single-basin enamel sink sitting out there, not doing anything for us. It looked about the right size, and as it turned out, it was. We removed the old faucet, flipped it over, drilled three holes in it, put bolts through the holes, and now the smoker can sit on it with the legs positioned so the bolts will keep it from slipping off the sink. It looks goofy but since it should work great, I'll get over it. The sink raises the smoker about seven or eight inches, making it easier to work with with less bending. It's also lightweight enough to be moved easily.
So I guess this is a double or maybe triple repurpose. The sink started out as a normal sink, got trashed, got salvaged for use as a planter, then got turned into a booster seat/heat mat for a smoker. It's had an adventurous life, for a sink!
We got the smoker all cleaned up and ready to go, so now it's time to figure out how to use the darn thing.
I had been wanting a table to sit our very heavy grill on. I wanted something simple that I could paint a bright color to pop against our log house. I'd been looking forever, but didn't want to spend much. I was telling dh exactly what my vision was, and low and behold he disappears and returns with an old sofa table that had been in his shop since we got married 18 years ago! It was the perfect height, length, everything but was missing the glass that had been in the middle. Soooo....dh measured and cut a piece of plywood, I painted it my favorite periwinkle blue, and it is perfect! I love when that happens.
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