You know what spring cleaning gets you?
Stuff. Lots of stuff to get rid of.
Sure, you can take the usual routes — hold a garage sale, cart it off to Goodwill, take out a classified ad. Or you can entertain yourself in the process of purging.
We’ve cooked up a few fun ideas for lightening your load. You know what they say about all work and no play.
A swap party
Swap parties are a great excuse for socializing in the name of recycling. And while you’re splurging on that third slab of brie, you can rationalize that you’re sacrificing your bikini body to save the environment.
Swap parties work best if you choose a category — purses, home accessories, sporting goods, CDs, whatever. Everyone brings one or more gently used items in that category and gets a chance to take home an equal number of their friends’ things.
Real Simple magazine has swap party ideas on its website, www.realsimple.com. They’re in the “Holidays &Entertaining” section, under “Everyday Celebrations.” Or just Google “swap party.” You’ll find plenty of ideas.
A charity auction
This is a variation on the swap party theme, except you sell your unwanted things to your friends and donate the proceeds to charity. It adds an element of competitive excitement as you and your BFF go paddle-to-paddle over that coveted Gucci belt.
In the interest of full disclosure, it should be reported that this idea was brazenly lifted from the letters section of Better Homes and Gardens magazine’s March issue. It was just too good not to share.
Whatever doesn’t sell goes back home with the owner, or collect the unwanted items and give them to charity.
Get creative
There’s nothing novel about turning castoffs into crafts. What is new are the avenues for doing so.
The Internet has opened up a wealth of opportunities for creative types to share ideas and show off the fruits of their labor. Can’t think of what to do with Grandma’s old canning jars? A quick Google search for “canning jar crafts” will probably turn up more projects than you have jars.
One good local resource is Clever Nesting (www.clevernesting.com), a blog maintained by the creative duo of Devona Brazier and Colleen Penn. The two Akron, Ohio, residents share ideas, experiences and instructions for creating everything from Crock-Pot cozies to heart-shaped crayons.
While the blog isn’t specifically devoted to reusing items, the two clearly have a heart for recycling.
Some other good online resources are the recycled-crafts sections of CraftGossip.com (recycledcrafts.craftgossip.com), CraftBits.com (www.craftbits.com/recycled-crafts) and Make-Stuff (www.make-stuff.com/recycling).
Or why not form your own online group devoted to turning trash into treasure? Google, Yahoo! and Facebook are a few places where you can start groups devoted to a common interest. You might even use them to swap materials as well as inspiration.
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