Useful Useless Item Edition 3

     I've been quite lax on blogging lately but hey life happens right? Get it in when I can. (:


    My useless item I want to tell you about today, is (drum roll please) egg cartons. Yes you read right. The type that have lids are best for reuse in my opinion. Just look at how customizable the size and shape is! you just have to be a little creative when you cut them. You have to use something along the open end to cover. 
     Using crafting glue, various materials, and some thought egg cartons can be decorated in a large variety of ways. But now for some actual uses. One that I find interesting is as an organizer for buttons, threads, needles (you can stick the needles into the carton to hold them in an upright position), and other small sewing necessities. I love that you can stick the needles in the carton and not have to worry about being stuck when you go to grab one. For those of us who tend to over organize you can get very specific using egg cartons.
     Egg cartons also make great little caddy's for your make up drawer in the bathroom. Sure it can't hold large items. Try using egg cartons for the basics you use daily- sponges, single shadows, liners (you can lay them down the middle of the carton), small applicators, tube blush or small blush pots, etc. It makes it quick and easy to find your daily items.
      Try using egg cartons as craft supply holders. Egg cartons make great places to store scrap materials, shells, gems, pebbles etc. Egg cartons could even be used as paint pots for paints from larger containers. Add glitter to some, glue to others, and it keeps them all separated but together while you work on your project. 
      These are just a few suggestions for uses for empty egg cartons. Hopefully even if these uses don't apply it'll spark your own creativity to find a use for egg cartons or any other useful useless item!

Useful Useless Item Edition 2

I missed a few Sundays and this Sunday is Christmas. So I'm going to give you my useful useless item tonight.
I love magazines of all sorts. They usually pack great articles with ideas, tips, information, etc. And most have gorgeous photography. I can, however, only read the same magazine so many times before I'm thoroughly done with it. I'll clip recipes and other tidbits I like that I know I'll use continuously.Then it's just another useless item in my home.
I hate to just throw them away and only so many places will take magazine donations (and mostwon't take ones I clip from). Sure I can recycle them but like I said they have such gorgeous photography in most that I feel like I'm destroying art.
A thought I've picked up along the way (yes probably from one of my magazines) is to find uses for the sheets in the magazines.
One idea is to take an interesting page from a magazine and frame it to make a beautiful piece of artwork.
Another very fun thing is to use multiple pages as wrapping paper. You can combine sheets of various colors, backgrounds, etc to create unique wrapping paper.
Or use it to background a cork board for messages. Take some of your favorite pages and paste them to you cork board. Gives you a place to organize plus a creative unique piece for your home. When doing this, my thought is to create a collage of pages in different shapes.
The possibilities can be endless if you just look around. Hey even use them to decorate the empty diaper boxes you're putting to other uses! Hope these have sparked some ideas for you and maybe cleared out some clutter in your home. Enjoy your weekend and have a very Merry Christmas!

Useful Useless Item Edition 1

    It's easy to get a lot of useless things around the house. Especially with four small- well not so small but young boys. My husband & I can certainly attest to that.
So with that thought in mind, I've decided to start sharing my tips for making a seemingly useless item useful. I'll have one item every other Sunday (who knows may work it inwhatever day I can (: ) to give some possible uses for.
    My first has to be empty diaper boxes (as we have a 7 month old & these things seem to accumulate like rabbits here). Any empty box for that matter, can have many other uses. I'll give you my top three and any suggestions are welcome.
     Revitalising use number one: turn it into a mail pouch. We use one on the kitchen table to hold our mail and at the end of the day we sort through it. You could easily "upholster" the box to give it more of a decor item. Try collaging together some old envelopes with stamps, maybe some postcards as well.
     Use number two: a sock hold. Place the box at the spot where the socks of your household are taken off ona regular basis. If you have kids you could let them make sock puppets out of oldworn socks or mateless ones. Then adorn them to the box.
     Use number three: a makeshift bookshelf or shoe shelf. Take 2-4 boxes and place together. Use packing tape on the edges where they connect. Use at least two layers and one all along the outside of the boxes. Decorate or adorn however you please. Use as a shoe box, turn on its side to use as a bookshelf or slide under a bed to store bed linens.
      I could give a hundred more but I'll leave the rest up to your creativity. I'll bring you another useless item turned useful next Sunday! Enjoy the tips!