Recycling Made Easy
In this day and age everybody is in a rush. For most there is hardly any time to think about recycling their trash, let alone actually do it. But to be honest, recycling doesn’t have to be difficult or time consuming. What it really is all about, is getting into the habit of doing it, so once you set it all up it’s as simple as picking the right bin.
I think it’s a very personal thing to set up a recycling bin system as not everyone has the same space in their home or feels like using the same techniques. But I’m going to share my separating and recycling ways with you in this blog, maybe it can give you some ideas on how you can set up something like that in your home.
I have a big basket that I use for my paper waste. All paper waste goes in there, empty boxes, milk cartons and just paper I need to throw away. My local council picks up the paper waste every other week, so to make sure the empty cartons don’t start to smell, I rinse them before I put them in the basket.
For my plastic waste I use a big plastic bag that I bring to my local plastic collection box once a week, or more often if needed.
Glass can be recycled too and I usually just leave that in my storage room and bring that to the glass deposit box once a week or less often, I don’t seem to have a lot of glass waste. I also rinse it before I put it away, that way you bring relatively clean glass to the box and it reduces odours when you leave it for a while.
For my green waste I have a little container on my kitchen counter that I clean at least once a day. All my green waste goes in there and once I want to empty the container I dump it in the green waste section of my wheely bin. The reason why I don’t directly throw it in there, is because I have to walk a few stairs to get to the green waste bin, so instead I use the small container and clean it once (or more) a day.
And last but not least, the “normal” bin. It’s just a normal sized kitchen trash can with a trash bag in it (currently it’s made of recycled plastic, but I found out today there is one store in town that sells biodegradable trash bags). All my ‘rest’ waste goes in there. Which honestly isn’t much as I separate most of it. Which by itself is a great thing for people who have to pay for the weight of the trash the council picks up for them.
It’s all pretty close together so all I have to do is pick the right bin, I only have to walk in one direction and just dispose of it. It can’t be easier. I noticed that there are special outdoor systems you can place on your balcony / patio / deck or even inside. They are inexpensive and it looks a lot cleaner and neater. The only downside is that the store is a bit away from my house, so I have to wait until I need more decoration material etc for my new kitchen so I don’t have to make more than one trip to the store. Which of course saves me gas and cuts down on pollution by only going once. So for now I just use the containers and bins.
That’s not all I recycle though. I also recycle water. Yes, you read that right; water. I have a condensation tumble dryer and the water container states I can use the water from it to water my plants, fill up (car) batteries or use it to iron my clothes with. It clearly states I CAN NOT drink it so don’t try that! If you have a tumble dryer, check your manual or water container, you might be able to re-use that water too!
At first I didn’t know how I was going to get the water into my watering can since the hole is somewhat covered by the handle, but from a water bottle I was going to dispose off (in the plastic bin of course!) I made a makeshift funnel to get the water in. So now I can use my waste water from my clean and dry laundry to water my plants and iron my clothes or to rinse the paper / glass waste. There’s a photo below of my make shift funnel. It’s ugly but effective and that’s what counts 
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2 Comments on "Recycling Made Easy"
ha, you should live in sweden! When i lived there i had to recycle a lot. We had our normal rubbish, paper, hard plastic, soft plastic, glass, tins and green stuff. Unfortunatly there is no such thing as a plastic collection box or tin collection box here.
But im about to start recycling again. Im a person that recycles when i think of it but now i bought made it easy for me. Put boxes and bins eveywhere in my room / hall so i dont need to walk downstairs all the time. I am about to ‘recycle’ my cloths and shoes as well. Never dud that before. Some persons are learning hehe. X
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I love recycling. It’s so easy where I live. We simply throw anything that fits the guidelines they gave us into a seperate bin, label it recycling, then put it on the curb every other Tuesday. It’s so simple! I wish it was that easy everywhere… then more people would do it.