5 R’s of Waste Management: How You Can Make A Difference by Reusing

We live in a very wasteful society, we think nothing of throwing away perfectly good food, clothes, toys and just things that we no longer like.  The amount of landfill in recent years has grown beyond recognition. Yet it need not to be this way. There are the 5 r’s of waste management and we should be questioning everything that we are getting rid of, and also buying, using these principles.

The 5 R’s of waste management are Refuse Reduce Reuse Repurpose Recycle and if we take this approach we will see a reduction in waste and also save and even make money. We have put together 7 everyday things that we can fix and reuse rather than throwing away.  I am planning to make this into a weekly series and over the next five weeks, we are going to take one R and write our tips on how you can implement it. This week in the 5 r’s of waste management we are using reuse.

7 Things That We Can Fix and Reuse To Save Money

• Reheel shoes, I am a heavy walker and often wear out my heels.  I have in the past thrown away shoes that I loved because the heels were worn.  I hadn’t ever got shoes reheeled before this year but it makes such sense.
• Rewire plugs, I have a cute looking puppy who took a shine to wires.  First up it was the Christmas tree lights and more recently my very expensive steam iron.  I could have cried I was so cross but instead, I rang dad! My dad was able to rewire the iron saving me buying a new one. When an electrical appliance stops working, it worth checking plugs and fusses before binning. 
• Sew up hems. In the past, I have been guilty of putting clothes into the charity shop rather than spending just a few minutes fixing hems.
• Do you have a Costa habit or find yourself regularly buying take away coffees? Then invest in a reusable cup. Many places give a discount if you are using your own cup as opposed to using a paper cup.
• When children outgrow trousers look to see if you can turn them into shorts with a bit of handiwork with a pair of scissors.
• Cover clothes with small holes with patches. We can get some really funky cool ones for kids to use their clothes. Alternatively, use some other fabric to fix clothes up.
• Kids that love crafting will craft with anything so keep buttons, tissue paper etc as children will be able to do something with it.

Reusing things is clever and saves money. In today’s society, it is good to understand the 5 r’s of waste management and we should be teaching these skills to our children.  If we think back they are often how our parents and grandparents did things. In recent times we have become far too wasteful and we need to step back and look after environment more.  Otherwise, we are creating long-lasting damage that will affect our children’s children.

What do you reuse or fix rather than binning?