How did a nerd like me spend valuable time on a recent public holiday?
Shared here are a few easy, non-fancy ways of organising some leftover stuffs, which was my mini project at home on Federal Territory Day.
I find that organising stuffs can be therapeutic to the soul- besides hanging around with my cat, Giselle.
She was named after the gorgeous-looking supermodel, Giselle Bunchen. Unlike Giselle the Supermodel, people say Giselle the Cat has a blank, resting bitch-face. I find it somehow endearing to me :-D
Back to the topic, eating out is a daily ritual for me as I don’t cook at home. In addition, Kentucky Fried Chicken (KFC) to take away is a quick meal to buy and eat whenever I’m travelling 1.2hrs to/from Labuan - Kota Kinabalu via ro-ro car-passenger ferry.
So, what do you do with any unused packed ketchup and chilli sauce, and tissues from all those take away meals?
Extra tissue
- Flatten each one of them so it’s easier to manage.
- Start by placing one tissue-let’s call it T2, at the opposite direction on top of another tissue (T1) but stack only half of T1.
- Next, take the remainder of T1 that is not covered and fold it on top of T2.
- Then, take another tissue-T3, and place half of it on top of the stack, in the same direction as T1 earlier.
- Fold the remaining half of T2 on top of T3.
- Continue folding all the leftover tissues until you get a neat stack.
- Put them in a box that perfectly fits the height of the stack. I managed to find a box which used to store plastic-packed peanuts inside them.
- Cut out a space on top of the box in the form of a straight line so you can pull the tissue out.
Ta-da! You can decorate and beautify the box if you want, but like I said, this is a non-fancy way to organise your stuffs :D
Packets of ketchup and chilli sauce
I sigh and cringe deep inside when I see packets of ketchup and chilli sauce-that have not passed their expiration or best-used-by date, in the dumpster. A better way would be to return them to the restaurant so other people may use it, or keep it as dips for your future meals at home? It’s easy to store these packets each into their respective containers. But if you are like me who doesn’t have many containers to begin with, then you’ll need to find a creative way to segregate the two in a container that you do already own. Before this, I used a smaller container as I didn't have many packets. Found out I collected a few more packets since the last time I organised these packets!
This time, I used what used to be an ice cream container. To segregate the packets inside, I used a packaging box from a moisturiser cream which I bought some time ago. Open up the box and use it as a separator between the two. You can use this non-fancy method to also segregate other smaller items, e.g., stationery (paper clips | erasers) and make-up (lipsticks | lip balms).
Saving space in our rubbish bin
One of the ideal lifestyles would be to live with a zero-waste attitude and actually living up to that lifestyle. Unfortunately, this is quite difficult for many of us, including myself, to lead. If we really must throw away paper boxes or packaging instead of recycling or up-cycling them, as least tear them up in smaller pieces first before throwing them away in the bin. This is a simple and easy thing to do which can help save up space in your bin allowing them to degrade quicker, and grant more space in the bin to throw any other rubbish (thus potentially reducing the number of harmful plastic rubbish bags used).
Having said this, I do not condone the usage of plastic bags as a form of storage. Plastic bags are harmful. The best bag is always to BYO study bag. Touching on this subject, I found this link to be useful if you want to know the differences between ‘Biodegradable’, ‘Degradable’ and ‘Compostable’ plastic bags: https://www.1millionwomen.com.au/blog/plastic-bags-whats-difference-between-degradable-compostable-and-biodegradable/
There are many ways to organise our things without creating more rubbish and harm to Mother Earth. I’m not an environmentalist-far from it in fact. As person who is practical, I know we can all practice doing small, easier habits to lessen our damage to the environment. Don't underestimate the power of your small actions.
"It's the little details that are vital. Little things make big things happen." - John Wooden
I love to learn creative ways of organising stuffs. So, if you have any tips on organising, please do share them with me and the rest of us who have a thing for organising stuffs-especially those nitty gritty small items we have constantly laying everywhere around the house.
Meantime, please think twice before throwing those ketchup and chilli sauce packets _
Photo credits: All my own