How do you recycle? - Page 2

[shelbean91]

I guess we're really lucky. We don't have to sort anything. We have a black barrel that goes to the curb on Sat and a blue barrel for recycling that goes out on Wed. They (the city) also gave us a small (13 or 20 gal) container for inside the house. When the small container is full, we dump to the big blue barrel in the garage, then take out on recycle day. We rinse before putting in the container, but even that's not totally necessary. They even have printed on the side of the containers what is recyclable and whats not (which plastics, etc.)

[vegmom]

I did not read every post here but I am a recycling fanatic. We recycle everything.
When living in an apartment in the chicago suburbs we did not have recycling pickup. What we did was have a recycling closet and every month or month and a half we would sort everything and take it down in my truck and drive 45min to the closest recycling facility. Dh luckily supported this.

Now we have recycling pick up every two weeks and we still end up only setting out the recycling once a month. Everything just gets piled in the garage and we sort it once a month a set it out to the curb.

The trick here is that the recycling has to be clean so it does not get stinky.

[famousmockngbrd]

We have a big cardboard box that everything except glass goes into. The glass just sits around on the counter until I get sick of looking at it and take it out to the recycling bin outside. : We have curbside recycling too, and the only thing we have to sort out is the glass (lucky us). And even then some people STILL don't do it (like my Mom!) I always get mad when I drive down the street on garbage day and see people with their garbage cans overflowing and no recycling bin out on the side of the road. It is no harder to throw it in the bin than it is to throw it in the trash, people!!

[darsmama]

Thank you for the great ideas! This is why I love MDC!!!

[UnschoolnMa]

We are very big on recycling. Well, Dh wasn't but he is coming around lol. We have bins supplied by the city. One is for glass, and the other for paper/cardboard/plastic/foil etc. We only have to seperate colored glass from the clear kind. It's really easy. We keep our bins outside near the garage, or sometimes in the garage.

[liawbh]

Originally Posted by 2much2luv

The recycle center here doesn't even take everything. Any ideas on what I can do with "thin" cardboard...like mac n cheese boxes type stuff? We eat out of a box way too often and they don't take those boxes.

OUr curbside won't take paper or paperboard (thin cardboard). THe recycling center says they don't take it either, but when we went, the people working there said it's OK in with the corrugated cardboard/paper bags.

[JenniferH]

The only thing we can recycle locally is aluminum cans. I just went today and walked the rural roads picking up drink cans. People are just throwing money out the window! Right now cans are selling for .50 per lb.

We have a scrapmetal place that buys cans, but nowhere to recycle plastic, glass or paper locally. I wish we had the .05 refund on bottles....I'd be a millionaire! I couldn't believe the number of beer bottles that were tossed out.

I may pick them up anyway and send them to work with my husband. He works in Memphis and I'm sure he could find a place to take them up there.

What I did was buy two big garbage cans with locking lids and put them outside my back door. I rinse and crush cans inside and hang a small grocery bag on my kitchen doorknob. When it's full I dump it in the garbage can out back. When those are full they will go to the scrap yard. I estimate that one of those cans can hold about 35 lbs, but I'm not sure. Guess I'll have to weigh it to find out.

[Irishmommy]

Moving this to Mindful Home Management...

[UUMom]

Our town has limited curbside recycling. They will take cans, glass bottles and number 1 & 2 plastic. They also take new paper separetly, but we no longer take the papers, as we read on line. I have a bin in my kitchen for these items. When it's full, I transfer it to the town bin I keep in the garage.

Other items, such as cardboard boxes, & cardboard food boxes, like cereal boxes etc are taken by us once or twice a month to a nearby city recycle center. I keep that stuff in a small bin under my sink. I can flatten up the smaller annie's shells boxes, fi, so that they fit in the larger one. It's amazing what i can cram in there. Our recycle center says the same as another poster--put them in with the corrugated cardboard.

Magazines and fancy catalogs either get donated to the library and/or Goodwill or Savers. What my library does not want, mag wise, they save to sell at books sales. I do the same with books & videos we no longer need. I drop this stuff into one of our flat-bottomed canvass library bags that sits by the door. we go to the library every week, so it doesn't pile up too badly.

We use old mail, as long as it's not glossy paper, as starters in our fireplace, which we put in with our woold in a large basket by our firplace.

All egg cartons are saved to bring back to the farm, where they wash and reuse them. I keep those in a plastic bag under my sink as well.

We have a small composter in the yard (got from the town cheaply). All non -animal scraps go there.

As for outgrown clothing, I have a couple of bags in my hall closet. One is for family friends. one is for donations. Whey they are full, i put them in my car. When I see the friends/family, I unload the bag on them. If I drive by Goodwill or Savers, I drop it off.

I have another bag in my closet for consignment stuff, and I have my ebay stuff in my old 'hope chest' in my room. lol

None of it takes up too much room as it's dispersed through the house. :LOL

[greenmansions]

We have curbside recycling. Small bin in our kitchen under the sink that gets emptied into the big municipal bin they gave us. They take most paper and lots of the lower-numbered plastics.

They are adding curbside composting in the next month or so - we will be getting a big yard waste bin that we can throw almost any compostable materials in including paper products and our kitchen waste. That is way cool.

When I lived in Chicago our condo building did very little recycling - just the basic newpaper and aluminum cans. I used to haul all my other paper including magazines into work and recycle it there.

[AngelBee]

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[pilesoflaundry]

We are supplied with a bin by the city and we have to bag them in number 2 plastic bags (like the ones from the grocery store or target) so I just reuse the bags from when I go shopping. I hang a bag on the kitchen door and when it's full take it out to the bin. We don't have to seperate anything here so I fill up a bag really quick! Just rinse everything and you won't have a problem with animals or bugs.

[Ravin]

Mixed recyclables go into cardboard box just outside the door in the garage. Food goes down disposal. Everything else goes in trash. Mixed recyclables get put out Thursday night in big blue bin for pickup Friday morning, other trash ditto in big black bin Monday night for Tuesday pickup.

We just moved. Prior to that we were in an apartment complex that didn't recycle and I admit my lazy self didn't take the stuff down to the neighborhood center. But now that it's easy I'm thrilled to do it.

[MonieMama]

We have a great curbside recycling program, so it's very easy for us to recycle! We have a paper sack in the kitchen closet and one in DH's upstairs office. When those fill up, we empty them into our plastic recycling bin outside. It gets picked up every 2 weeks and has cut back considerably on our trash. About 2/3 of our total garbage is recyclable...so it feels good to be doing that rather than filling up a landfill.

[IdentityCrisisMama]

We have like 8 different types of recycling. We have curbside plastic & metal, compost and garbage. I take glass, paper. There’s other stuff too like batteries, hazardous waste and etc.

It's not hard and you get used to it anyway.

With the things I have to bring, I just put them in a big container and separate them when I get there. That seems to be the best thing for us.

I also recommend calling your city to be sure you’re not missing out on some collection service.