DIY Life

I can't believe I forgot to tell you all about my weekend! I rummaged through an abandoned home in the middle of nowhere this past Saturday, and stumbled upon a bit of a gold mine... if you consider vintage glassware to be gold.

Yes, that's right! I scored a few old soda bottles from the local junkyard and they couldn't be cooler. Only problem? I was having the hardest time ridding the interior glass of mold and other grimy build-up.

Luckily, a friend suggested I use denture-cleaning tablets to dissolve the grime, and I honestly had my doubts. Wow. Boy, was I wrong! The tablets instantly melted away the grease, grime and mold... leaving spotless soda bottle vases that are sure to make a splash the next time I host a dinner party.

Incredible! I ran the glassware through one cycle of the dishwasher and they look brand new. Here's to double duties -- denture style!

You're bound to collect a handful of glow-sticks this summer. They get passed out at firework shows, holiday barbecues, and just about any other outdoor summer evening event. So what do you do after the festivities are over? Well, at our house, we typically find them hiding in the sandbox, lost behind the toy-box, or tossed away in the trash.

Kish, over at Instructables, re-purposed his into this funky glow-stick lamp. You'll need 15 glow-sticks and a plastic bottle; one commenter suggests using a glass bottle instead. If you chose one with an interesting pattern you could get a really cool effect.

This would make a fun accessory for any dorm room, kids room, basement or kitchen (sure, why not!). Check out the video for full instructions.

[via: Daily DIY]

As I have said many times before; almost everything has more than one use, and I believe it is our duty as inhabitants of this planet to recycle as many items as possible, sometimes reusing the same item over and over again.

Plastic soda and water bottles are items that can be reused. Join me after the break, as I give you a list of things that you can reuse plastic bottles for, which I found over at Green Home.

When is the last time you cleaned out your liquor cabinet? You've used and replaced your favorites many times over, but you've probably never made it to the back of the shelf, uncovering those less popular bottles.

Not sure if that bottle of Bacardi is still good? Ask your bartender!

Dave gives the quick rundown on liquor expiry. He outlines the basics, and by keeping them in mind you'll avoid sipping rancid rum. Explaining the "half-life" of distilled spirits, he dispels the mystery that shelving a 17 year old bottle of scotch for 20 years makes it a 37 year old bottle.

Understanding your liquor's shelf life, and making sure that you store the bottles tightly capped, in a dark place, and free from extreme temperature will keep the quality of your drinks high.

The other day, I found an interesting and easy decorative glass vase tutorial over at CasaSugar. I thought to myself, "That's pretty cool for around the house, but I bet it would also be perfect as a wedding centerpiece." In fact, it turns out that the project originated at DIY Bride.

This is really as simple as picking up some rub-on transfers you like, along with a clear glass vase that has a smooth surface. After making sure the vase is completely clean and dry, just cut around the transfers you like, then use the burnishing stick that comes in the package to carefully rub designs onto the vase (exactly as you would if you were rubbing them onto paper).

The transfers are sold in almost any store that carries scrapbooking or other craft supplies. Thousands of designs are available, but if you can't find any rub-ons that you like in your area, the DIY Bride post has a list of online resources.

This project is as versatile and stylish as your imagination (for example, the right transfers would make it great for Mother's Day), but this is not exactly a new tip: a few months ago, this concept also ran in the Winter, 2008 issue of Somerset Life magazine, where it was used to decorate glass bottles and jars. Please join me after the break to read more about the appealing ideas that were presented there.

Each week, Diane Rixon brings you Avant Yard, a look at all your lawn and garden could be. Diane shows you how to give life to everything inside your fence. We promise that your yard will be the greener "other side" and the neighbor's envy to boot. Alright, we don't really promise, but you get the idea.

Is there a dead tree in your yard? Let it live on -- repurpose it! Here are a bunch of suggestions, with an emphasis on projects that are both easy and inexpensive.

LEAVE IT ALONE
1. Leave it standing. If it's not a danger to people or structures on your property, of course. Let it be a home for birds, bugs and assorted critters.
2. Leave it standing and turn it into yard art -- hang colored bottles from the branches or string it with colored lights that change with the season.

CUT IT UP
3. Use planks for fencing.
4. Build a big brush pile, which is a fantastic refuge for wildlife.
5. Use it for garden mulch. You will need to hire a mulching machine or mulching service for this, however.

There was a time when I had such a huge collection of empty beer bottles, I didn't know what to do with them all. I was too lazy to recycle them and get the deposit, so they just keep kept sitting there, mocking me. And it's not a cool collection, you know? My brother-in-law has all sorts of unique beer bottles from all over the world, many unopened (but most of them empty, of course). He displays them proudly, and I feel jealous. Not an intense, burning jealousy, but more of a mild, passive-aggressive jealousy. But this isn't about him and his cool bottles, it's about me and my regular ones. Well, I guess it's about anyone that has beer bottles, but please stop interrupting and let me finish my story.

Okay!

So back in the day I had lots of beer bottles, and didn't know what to do with them.

That day was yesterday.

But today I have a mission! I turns out that you can make some pretty cool shelves out of beer bottles. Don't believe me? Have a look at Hacknmod's gallery of beer bottle shelves, suggested to us by a reader, Joe.

The ones like those pictured here that have holes drilled out for the necks of the bottles look like they would be more stable, but they also look like a lot more work. My shelving unit is going to rely on gravity and balance. And epoxy. Lots of epoxy.

Instructables user huirub has a great new tutorial on how to transform any clear bottle of booze (or non-alcoholic clear liquid, if you want to be boring) into a cool accent lamp. Using readily available LED stickies, this simple project doesn't require any wiring or soldering, making it ideal for those of us who can't tell the difference between a volt and a vole (whatever that is).

The original tutorial calls for Dot-It LED lights (~$6 USD per unit), but I imagine you could get away with using any low-profile LED light source. If you're not afraid of building your own LED light array, however, this little tutorial might come in handy. I could envision this making a really cool bar backdrop if you had enough multi-colored alcohols and LED lights. Or, better yet, program the LEDs so they pulsate to the beat of some groovy music. It would be just like Waltzing Waters, only not as lame!

[via Instructables]

Most people recycle plastics and other materials to help take care of the earth. In some areas, such as rural neighborhoods, recycling programs are not yet in place and it is hard to recycle all of your bottles, newspapers, and other materials. If this is the case where you live and recycling is near impossible, you can still help reduce landfill waste (a little) and conserve space in your trash can without having to buy a hulking trash compactor to install in your house.

All you need is a pair of scissors to make this world a better place. When you throw away any milk cartons, cereal boxes or other similar items that generally take up a lot of trash bag space, simply cut from one end to the other with scissors. You may want to buy a pair of scissors to dedicate to this task so your good scissors aren't always full of garbage juice, and affix them to the side of a cabinet with velcro, or put them in a nearby drawer.

This deconstruction of trash is an easy way to be sure you maximize the space in your trash bag and it doesn't take more than a minute. In general the bulky items that take up too much space are the ones that aren't gross, like milk jugs, cereal boxes, and other food containers.

Another quick tip to reduce wasted space in your trash bag is to simply fill up the empty space with other trash. Put paper plates, and other trash into an empty cereal box. Easy as pie, but not pie you would want to eat, more like pie past its prime. All it takes is a conscious effort on your part to put smaller things inside bigger things as you throw things away. Perhaps you don't want to be that intimate with your refuse, but doing so will keep things flattened and maybe even help the environment, just a tiny bit!