New Year's Re-Solutions

We're on the brink of a brand new year, but as we consider our resolutions, let's try to make the year one of the few "brand new" things we look forward to. Make some "re-solutions" instead of "resolutions" by resolving to reuse items and materials as much as possible in 2013. If you no longer have a use for something, donate it, sell it, or give it to a friend or relative who can benefit from it. Need something you don't already have? Look around at what you DO have and try to come up with a way to re-make your current under-used possessions into the "new" item that you need or want. If that turns out not to be possible, try to find what you're looking for at a thrift store, or online from a previous owner. Consider sharing items that you only use some of the time with friends and neighbors instead of owning something exclusively. Investigate how to recycle or donate most, if not all, of the items you might normally consider trash. There really are companies that will take just about anything--from old hole-ridden clothes, to used shoes, to your old furniture--I'll write about some of these options in the coming weeks and months. Try your hand at composting to turn even your food scraps into something new.

However you decide to approach the challenge, do your best to find as many ways to reuse in 2013 as possible. Our resources truly are precious; it can be so easy to forget that living in a privileged nation where most of us have want we need. Always remember that not all of us do in this world, and that if we do not value what we have been given, the day may come all too soon when resources that were once plenty are scarce. Show your gratitude for what we have by refusing to see any of it as waste. "Waste" is a failure of the imagination, a misnomer, a miscategorization. Be more imaginative in 2013. Seek out new friends, new experiences, new memories, new hopes, new dreams, new ways of looking at things, but not new things.

Peace, and Happy New Year! ~ Joy S.

Cap-tivating Whistles

People who know me well know that I have a minor obsession with, and modest hoard of, metal bottle caps. I just can't toss them into the trash, or even the recycling bin. I love the different designs and colors that can are printed on them, and their size and composition mean they can be easily repurposed into lots of things. I've used them to decorate bird houses and make magnets. I've glued them together and attached floral wire to make Christmas tree ornaments. When I make Christmas tree ornaments out of old painted light bulbs, I sometime use them for "hats" on the snowmen, penguins, Santas, etc. that I paint. I've used them as mini paint pots when my kids are making art and need just a little bit of paint from a big jug o' paint. They make great mosaic fodder. They can be made into beads and other jewelry. They can adorn belts. I've even seen them turned into cool fishing lures. And now that spring has sprung, and I'm outside listening to my glass wind chimes, I'm itching to try making some bottle cap wind chimes.

But I would never have thought of the application I just came across, and it may be just about the coolest bottle cap reuse yet. Loran Scruggs uses bottle caps and pieces from old tins to make working whistles. Check out her Etsy store at http://www.etsy.com/shop/BottleCapWhistles. The use of the caps for the whistle sides shows off the artwork on them. I'm delighted to see some of the same caps I've saved because of the unique animals or other graphics used in her whistles. My kids would recognize them as matching some of our Christmas tree ornaments. She even has a whistle with one of my favorite caps--an owl from Hitachino Nest Beer--as her profile image. I have bought that beer just to get more of those caps (it's not bad beer, but the cap is the real draw for me). Now I desperately want some of her whistles for me and the kiddos. If I ever decide to unload some of my cap hoard, I may have to see if she would accept them. Reuse, bottle caps, and kid friendly items--this makes me smile.

Loran's other items include toys and art made from caps, tins (like old Altoid tins), and cans. Very creative!