Reusing Paper and Cardboard

We have seen the amount of paper and cardboard a family receives in the shopping of food and other things. So we decided one day, let's see how we can use this for good things in the every day life.

First we made a collection area for the two so it would not bother any one or get in the way. We have a fire spot and it is contained, safe to use all year. Here are some of the ways we came up with:

• Use it for fire starters.
• A second use is as ground cover. You do not need to go out to buy black fabric to put in garden. We cut to it to fit around the plants in our garden bed, overlap cardboard edges, and cover with 2 inches of dirt. The result is weed free good looking beds.
• We fish so when cleaning a fish we do it on newspaper or flyers, saves a mess. You roll it up and dispose of.
• The big boxes we save for putting between storage items so no scratches or rubs happen.
• Children need boxes of different sizes for school projects and bringing some things to school.
• When doing a oil change it can have spillage so to have paper and card board down first and then the tools, is time saving and easier.

This is just the beginning ideas so keep it in mind to reuse and not have the landfills full of paper products. Have fun with it. My mom would make us party hats and confetti out of news papers, flyers, ads, and magazines. We made game objects if we lost a play piece, we made one like a little car or mouse. There are lots of things you can learn from libraries and craft shops. The book may cost, but the art will just be paper.

These ideas are the result of living a thrifty life and wanting to lessen the human foot print.