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CynthiaWVirginia -> RE: What are some products you bought for one reason, but found many unusual uses for, ? (10/24/2010 5:34:25 PM)
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Good idea, Toppingfrmbottom, to start this thread.
I have used coffee filters for my nails, when I have an uh-oh that splits one into the quick...I cut a piece to fit and use Crazy Glue.
For paper cuts, and when one of my furbabies scratches me deep, I use Crazy Glue to seal it shut. (Never an infection yet.)
I use white party streamers to "toilet paper" my tree outside for Halloween. The streamers are easier to remove and I like how it flutters in the breeze.
My car is a product I bought, right? LOL...I have used it to cook food while we were camping or fishing during the summer or on a hot day. I put cans of ravioli or something on the dash board and an hour later when I opened the cans the food was hotter than heck. ;) I've made tea this way...and someday if I get my hands on solar foil, I will bake a potato then pull some butter or sour cream out of the cooler. (I don't like sandwitches while fishing or camping.) Car rides are excellent for shutting up colicky babies who can scream for hours and hours and hours...
I have bought those little chemical light up sticks that are supposed to fit into some plastic mouth piece so kids can have fun with it...and I have duct taped this to a bobber while fishing at night. I chose different colored lights for my son and I so we would know which fishing pole was being played with. When I have socked it out far into the trench, I use a slider on the bobber...one time I saw my bobber had "drifted" back to the pier, lol, took a long time reeling in the line without feeling any resistance then...I felt the catfish fighting. My son knew where to use the net to help me get it out of the water because that bobber slid down to mere inches above the fish. It was pitch dark and our citronella candles were back at the dock. I would have broken the line without that light to guide me.
I'm sure lots of people have done this...used a thigh high fishnet stocking with a ball inside as a gag. It was a lonely only because the second stocking got eaten by the washing machine or something.
I've used an old ten gallon fish tank...as a "wormery". We kept having nightcrawlers left over and they would often die in the fridge before the following week, so I bought worm bedding at Walmart and we started dumping our leftover worms in there. The worm food was cheap and also at Walmart. Then my son and I did a flashlight search after a rain to catch nightcrawlers to add to our worm farm, lol. That was fun.
I've used empty cans for different things, like a tuna can to cut biscuits from dough, and a small tomato sauce can to cut a circle in buttered bread to drop an egg into.
I've used a sewing needle to remove a little shell from each end of an egg so I can blow it out, rinse, and decorate.
Oh! We found this one out by accident and continued it each time we are picnicing...they sell in six packs at several stores, little plastic bottles of KoolAide...pointy top with a butterfly twisty to open it. My kid drinks it down to an inch or two left in the bottom and it makes an excellent wasp catcher. I prefer using the red ones.
In the bathroom, I have a tall square shaped blue plastic Kleenex cover type box. I put an empty Kleenex box inside and cut the top off of the cardboard. Inside I store my "hair doughnuts," those little "Os" of stretchy terrycloth I use for my braid. Um, yessss, I have a lot, lol.
I bought wooden jump rope handles to use as flogger handles, and went to a sewing store and bought ribbons...instead of making lots of little bows, I used it to make knotted ribbon floggers.
I buy candles to rub my thread on when I have to sew something by hand...it causes less snarl ups.
Oh, lol. I buy dog flea shampoo...and have no dog. I mix it in water until the water is a little slippery and put it into a spray bottle and use it to kill spiders, flies, ants, etc. I pour about a gallon of this mix into huge ant nests that are too close to my home. In the past I have mopped my floors with it to kill fleas and flea eggs/hatchlings, and I have used it in a steam cleaner for rugs, etc. I have even used dog flea shampoo to kill lice, both as a shampoo and as something to wash clothes in that couldn't stand the hot cycle of the washing machine or dryer.
There is a collapsable laundry bag that has a spiral wire going around it. In my living room is an area that has a tall hutch, and a huge cat leap over to the entertainment center, with the back to the staircase, maybe two inches of steps that are past the railing. We attached this "soup can" type of laundry bag to the ceiling beam, and put a fuzzy blankie inside. The cats have used it daily for years, either using it as a safer jump point to get from the entertainment center or the stairs, to the coveted spot on top of the hutch. Some snooze inside. My son cut a window in the side and sewed some clear stuff so they can look through.
I bought a topless crystal decanter at a second hand store...and use it to grow ivy in my kitchen. I have several bottled plants there...yes, I was a kid in the seventies when this was popular, lol.
I bought glitter pens...because I wanted to use the green one as eye liner. Too bad it ran out and the dollar store stopped selling them. I loved the purple one too...I wrote letters to friends with the pink one, lol.
Pillow cases I've made double as laundry bags.
Years ago when my kid was little I used to buy waxed paper for him to sit on so he could go down slides faster.
When my kid was little, I put glittered glue around all edges of a drawing in a coloring book to help him stay inside the lines. Something I learned from his special ed teachers.
I found ice cube trays at Big Lots that had the entire alphabet, half on each tray, I believe. I would have my son close his eyes, and trace inside them with his finger while we said the letter out loud. Sometimes I had wet ice inside, and other times I had fine sand or rough cat litter. It was fun, and never used to make ice for drinks...but I think I made jigglers with it once, and put the darker letters inside a more clear, pineapple or lemon flavored jello. I cannot remember what I spelled out, probably something like "I love you" or something like that as a surprise.
My neighbors were throwing away a large plastic cat litter container, Tidy Cats Crystals whatever, and I asked to have it. Two of my cats are very bad furbabies and rip open bags of cat food just because they can. I have two huge beehive type dry catfood dispensers, so unlimited food is available 24/7, they are not ripping it open because they are hungry or because this food is different and more special...they are just ornery little heffalumps. I store their dry catfood in this Tidy Cat container...it's cat proof. Now I need to buy a few Tidy Cats like this just because I want the container...my preferred cat litter is sold in paper bags. Right now I have to keep them in my car trunk because Anyanka enjoys ripping those bags to shreds with her teeth, spreading out the litter then napping in it. Aargh!
I used a similar shaped container, I bought a different brand of concentrated dry laundry soap just to have this container to use afterward...to store my rock salt in. The city doesn't salt our hill, so I go out there and salt down an area at least 5 car lengths long, to prevent anyone from skidding and having an accident. Sometimes I walk higher up and down the road, putting a hand full of salt where one of their tires would go, about every 6-8 feet. There is a very steep hill a few car lengths away downhill, at a side street, and I am the only one who thinks to salt it down. <rolls eyes> One year while I was shopping at Walmart the roads iced up. Everything is on a hill, so of course the freeway ramp was up a hill. We couldn't get home, so I walked to a gas station and bought all of their things of table salt (there was no rock salt), and salted my path to the on ramp and waited about an hour for it to work, then I drove home. Nowadays I keep that old laundry soap square bucket in the trunk and am ready to use the rock salt if necessary.
I used to keep animal food in the trunk in case I found a hungry stray, but my minivan doesn't have a separate trunk and my cat, Griz, leaps in to the vehicle when we get home to see if there are any more bags of animal chow and rips them open and snarfs it down. I need to get another cat proof container in my car...this past year I haven't stored anything and really regretted it on one occasion. By the time I bought food and came back, the dog was gone.
Btw, those Pounce jars have a nice snap top and are good for storing stuff. I buy those instead of ones in little plastic bags because of this.
Last one. ;)
Those plastic bubbles from vending machines that hold junk for kids...I put some fireflies (for maybe up to an hour, then I release them) inside and turn off the lights in the living room so that it is startling when one of them lights up. My cats go nuts.
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