Archive for the ‘recycling’ Category

« Older Entries

When to get rid of boxes

Monday, May 10th, 2010

Empty boxes take up a good portion of our home’s limited storage space. From computers to cameras, old cell phones to toaster ovens; what once safely housed our expensive purchases, now takes up valuable real estate in our closets and garages. The tragedy here being that most people keep these boxes unnecessarily for years. So what boxes should you keep and which do you toss? (aka recycle) Here’s a great guide…

Boxes for electronics or kitchen appliances should only be kept for the duration of the product’s warranty or the receipts return policy. Anything after that period is just stealing space. To avoid this, put your warranty expiration date on your boxes to notify you when it’s safe to discard them. If you don’t have a filing system with a “manuals and warranties” file, slip the store receipt and warranty into a plastic bag. Mark the bag with the expiration date with either a Sharpie or a label maker, and affix the bag to the box with tape.

Note: the only exception to the warranty rule, is if you plan on selling your recently bought Nikon D90 someday or that vintage Nintendo NES. In this case, most ebay fanatics love to receive their purchase in it’s original box. However do not abuse this rule.

<3 Brooke

Tags: ,
Posted in Uncategorized, recycling | Comments »

What can’t a coffee filter do?

Tuesday, May 4th, 2010

CoffeeFilter

Being friendly to Momma Earth isn’t just about drinking out of the latest and greatest stainless steel water bottle. It’s about recycling, conserving, and most of all, being creative. Like using what you already have, rather than buying new. I know it’s hard. Especially when there is a product for everything. I mean, why use a spoon from your kitchen when you can buy a green plastic avocado pitter from Williams-Sonoma?

The challenge is knowing “do I really need this?” My mom made me ask myself this every time we went clothes shopping. But mom, wanting and needing those tapered leg acid wash jeans are two different things! I digress. The point is, why buy new, when what you already have might serve the same purpose. For example, many items in your home that you thought could only do one thing (because that’s how they are cleverly advertised) can really double as two, three, sometimes four products.

What are they you ask? Well, one such miracle tool is the coffee filter. Did you know that a coffee filter can …

1. Cover bowls or dishes when cooking in the microwave. They make an excellent shield for those unsightly splatters.

2. Clean windows, mirrors, and chrome. Coffee filters are lint-free so they’ll leave windows sparkling.

3. Protect your china. Separate your good dishes by placing a coffee filter between each.

4. Filter broken cork from wine. A mesh strainer might not catch all the small bits.

5. Protect a cast-iron skillet. (if it’s been well seasonsed, use a paper plate so the oils aren’t absorbed)

6. Recycle frying oil. After frying, strain oil through a sieve lined with a coffee filter.

7. Weigh chopped foods. Place chopped ingredients in a coffee filter on a kitchen scale.

8. Hold tacos. Coffee filters make convenient wrappers for messy foods.

9. Stop the soil from leaking out of a plant pot. Line a plant pot with a coffee filter to prevent the soil from going through the drainage holes.

10. Put a few on a plate and put your fried bacon, French fries, chicken fingers, etc. to absorb the grease.

11. As a sewing backing. Use a filter as an easy-to-tear backing for embroidering or applique soft fabrics.

12. Put baking soda into a coffee filter, wrap with a rubberband, and insert into shoes or a closet to absorb or prevent odors.

13. Use them to strain soup stock and to tie fresh herbs in soups and stews.

14. Use a coffee filter to prevent spilling when you add fluids to your car.

15. Use them to wrap Christmas ornaments for storage. LOVE THIS.

16. Use them to remove fingernail polish when out of cotton balls.

17. Use as a disposable “snack bowl” for popcorn, chips, etc.

Oh, apparently they also filter water through coffee grinds. Who woulda thought! So make the most out of what you have and get creative with your stuff. The planet and your pocket book will thank you.

Brooke

Tags: ,
Posted in recycling, tips | Comments »

Recycling trophies? Who knew.

Wednesday, February 10th, 2010

RoshamboAwards

Recently while organizing a mother of 4 very cute and athletic children, Heather and I encountered our very first recycling stumper. Normally we have a place for everything to go – batteries, old cell phones, expired paint, no problem. But what do you do with 4 bags full of unwanted sports trophies? Yes, these are 4 very talented children.

Well, first I did what any curious person would do, I Googled “recycling sports trophies.” To my dismay, I discovered that only a handful of trophy shops (Awards Mall and Lamb Awards and Engraving) have started recycling programs in which they disassemble your current trophy, add a new top or plaque, and voila! New trophy. Unfortunately however, none of these shops were local, and I didn’t want to spend money on postage or gas to get them there. So I went to plan B.

Next I called around to the local Boys and Girls Club and YMCA, just in case they started a recycling program and merely lacked a PR firm to get the word out. Surely the eco-friendly Santa Monica chapters had thought of something like this right? … Negative. At this point I was ready to throw in the towel. And that’s when a little birdie suggested that I create a posting on Craigslist for “free trophies.” Yes, yes, that’s perfect I said. If you post it they will come!

And you know what, they did! I got so many replies in fact, that I was forced to become selective. I questioned each trophy applicant for their intended purpose and made sure it was a worthy one. And slowly, bag by bag, the trophies disappeared. The first recipient was a law student from UCLA, who repurposed the trophies for a charity roshambo tournament – that’s fancy for rock, paper, scissors. He was so considerate to my cause, that he even followed up with a pic of the trophy refurbishment (see above) – thanks Isaac! Next, was a production assistant who wanted my trophies for film props. Sweet, my trophies are gonna be famous! And lastly, was a soccer coach, who just like me, was a true environmentalist at heart.

So what have I taken away with me from my recycling adventure? That anything can be recycled if you just put your mind to it!

Brooke

Tags: , ,
Posted in Uncategorized, recycling | Comments »

Where do unwanted sweaters go to die?

Saturday, February 6th, 2010

Has your closet become a cemetery for unwanted or forgotten articles of clothing? Do you find that you never have anything to wear but have tons of clothes in your closet? Don’t feel bad, you’re not alone.

As a professional organizer, the most common item we remove from a residential space, is clothing. Men, women, and children alike, outgrow, outwear, and eventually get tired of their attire. Somehow that “favorite shirt” magically transforms into an outdated relic that steals prime real estate from your incoming purchases. And most often, people just leave them in the back of their closet to die. And you wonder where that smell is coming from!

So how do we solve this closet crises? It’s simple really. Your options boil down to a few of the following…  donate to a friend or family member, donate to charity, fix it, or trash it. But wait! Before you think about trashing that sweater because it’s not worth the money to fix or because it’s never coming back into style, think about repurposing it with Reknit!

Reknit is a small mom (no pop) shop, in which you send in an old sweater (could be the one your ex-boyfriend left that you decided not to give back) and in return you receive a newly knitted item from your old fabric. Genius I know. And what’s even more cool, is that each month Reknit makes the old material into a new article of clothing, which is voted on by the users of the website. For example, during the month of February, if you send in said sweater, you’ll receive back a pair of cut-off gloves.  h|b <3’s Reknit!

Brooke

Tags: ,
Posted in new products, new services, recycling | Comments »

Rain, rain, don’t go away!

Saturday, January 23rd, 2010

When I think of the perfect rainy day, I imagine sitting by a fire, doing a puzzle, while drinking hot cocoa with those little marshmallows that dissolve way too quickly. However the thought of burning what used to be a perfectly good oxygen producing tree, is a bit of a buzz kill for me. Until I discovered the eco-conscious Java Log that is.

The Java Log, which is made from your small decaf mocha latte with nonfat milk’s waste, diverts  around 12 million pounds of coffee grounds from landfills per year. And amazingly emits up to 78% less carbon monoxide than it’s common wood counterpart. Meaning less strain on mother earth and more reason to support your 4 dollar a day coffee habit.

Ah, now if only I could find mini organic marshmallows and recycled cardboard puzzles. Hmm.

Brooke

Tags: , ,
Posted in new products, recycling | Comments »

How to recycle your tree

Tuesday, January 5th, 2010

If you weren’t fortunate enough to have your Living Christmas Tree picked up by friendly little elves this year, but you happen to live in Los Angeles county, here’s a tip from ol’ St. Nick, on how to discard your tree…

If your tree is small enough for the green bins:
1. REMOVE all ornaments, decorations, tinsels, and stand from the tree
2. CUT tree in pieces to fit into the green bin
3. PLACE the tree pieces inside the green bin for regular pick-up on collection day, where it will then be recycled into compost and mulch

If your Christmas tree is too big to cut and place inside the green bins:
1. REMOVE all ornaments, decorations, tinsels, and stand from the tree
2. PLACE the tree next to your green waste bin on collection day, for the city’s curbside recycling program

* don’t procrastinate – the program only goes until January 16th, at which point you might have to make alternative arrangements, and nobody likes a sappy backseat.

Happy New Year!

Brooke

Posted in recycling | Comments »

T.P. Trauma

Thursday, October 15th, 2009

Did you know that a family of 4 uses about 240 rolls of toilet paper a year? That means that every American in the United States, roughly 300 million and counting, uses at the very least 50 rolls of toilet paper a year. That’s 5 trees per person, per year! Holy poo!

So how do we cut down on the waste created by our own? Recycle people! I’m not sure if you are aware, but the cardboard cylinders inside T.P. rolls are made from the same material as the insides of paper towel rolls and packing boxes. And if you recycle those, what’s stopping you from walking a few extra feet and recycling that expired T.P. roll? No excuses people, haste makes waste!

Brooke

Tags:
Posted in recycling | Comments »

Everybody clutters

Monday, September 14th, 2009

When teaching clients about our organizational methods and tricks, often times we hear “you must have the most organized home.” And every time I answer the same. Well, yes we do, we’re perfect! Ha ha. Just kidding! I say “believe it or not but professional organizers are people too, we are not perfect.” I repeat, NOT PERFECT. And like many people, we often have our own clutter issues. I myself have one. Not a big one, not anything you would notice, but I know it’s there. What is my shameful secret? Magazines! Dun dun duuuuh!

PuppiesHighlightsI can’t help it! I like the pictures. I like the brief but informative articles. I’ve been doing this since I was a kid! It probably dates back to the days of Highlights. You know, those magazines you find in the waiting room at the dentist or pediatrician’s office. Those hidden picture games were the best! Anyway, it got so bad in college, that I found myself lugging around boxes of saved magazines from apartment to apartment. And those boxes were heavy! Finally I had an epiphany. Why torture myself and my roommates any longer, when a simple solution was but an extra step away.

I realized that more than 50% of a magazine’s content is advertising. And that I really didn’t want to read EVERY single article. So I came up with a method. Before reading a single line of text, I would sit down and flip through every page, tearing out anything that looked interesting, from pictures to 3 page articles. I would then put those pages into a folder titled “articles to read,” which I would then peruse and discard (aka recycle) at my leisure. What this did was remove any unnecessary distractions from my reading time, and allow me to keep only the articles I wanted, rather than stacks of magazines with ones I didn’t.

I’ve even taken my method a step further. From time to time, I will revisit my “saved articles” file, (which is where the good stuff goes from the “articles to read” file) and discard the ones I no longer wish to keep. For the ones I still want, I’ll do a quick Google search to see if I can find them online. At which point I save them electronically, and recycle the printed version. Such is the case with this article I found from 2008, which I like to forward to people in efforts to get them to recycle everything down to their toilet paper rolls. If you have a moment, check it out.  LA YOGA Mindfulness Challenge

brooke

Tags: , , , ,
Posted in organization, recycling, tips | Comments »

Don’t waste your e-waste!

Tuesday, September 1st, 2009

E-waste is a popular name given to electronic products nearing the end of their “useful life.” Computers, televisions, VCRs, stereos, copiers, fax machines and cell phones are the most fashionable in e-waste collections. After pick up, many of these products are reused, refurbished, or recycled. So 311_logowhat’s the problem you ask?

Well, researchers estimate that nearly 75 percent of old electronics are stuck in storage somewhere, (maybe your grandma’s attic?) largely in part to the uncertainty of what to do with the unwanted materials. And what most people don’t realize, is that many of those old electronics contain lead, copper, and other potentially toxic substances. So holding onto those keepsakes will end up being hazardous to your health! And I’m sorry, but if your Nintendo NES isn’t coming back to life, no matter how many times you blow in it, make the wise decision to free up your closet and recycle that relic!

Now if you’re lucky enough to reside in the beautiful country of Los Angeles, discarding these items is as easing as 1-2-3, or in this case calling 3-1-1. After providing your name and address, you’re given a pick up date, at which time you’ll take out your e-waste, drop it at the curb, and wait for the Tooth Fairy to magically liberate it. But if you’re a business that wants e-waste collection, you have one extra step to take. Rather than the lush curbside service that residences get, businesses have to physically take their e-waste to one of the many S.A.F.E. centers located throughout the city. A small price to pay for a toxic free work environment.

brooke

Tags: , , , ,
Posted in recycling | Comments »

h|b <3’s Pottery Barn!

Wednesday, August 26th, 2009

PBbottleChandelier

Everyone said this green thing would be a trend. Prius’ would come and go, people would soon forget about Mother Earth, and we would return to our old conspicuous consumer ways.  However, that doesn’t seem to be the case. In fact, you know something has caught on to being mainstream, when major design companies like Pottery Barn, have adopted green philosophies in many of their product lines. Case in point, their latest take on a formal chandelier. Made from re-purposed green-glass wine bottles and iron, this wine bottle chandelier perfectly illustrates how being green can not only be good for the environment, but look good too!

brooke

Tags: , , , ,
Posted in Uncategorized, interior design, new products, recycling | Comments »

« Older Entries