If the heel falls off a pair of shoes or you get a hole in your jumper, trousers etc what do you do?

Do you just throw it away and go buy a new one?

If something stops working in the exact way it should but is actually still use-able do you get rid or just make do?

My boyfriends computer chair has odd arms, it’s also supposed to vibrate, warm up and massage you. One of our rats decided that the wires looked rather tasty and they chomped through them, leaving the ultimate chill out chair to just be a chair. This was over 2 years ago, the rats have now gone to the great rodent wheel in the sky (not from the wire chomping) and yet the chair still remains just a chair. I have to admit the fact that it has odd arms does slightly irk me and if you sit far enough back in it, the bloody thing falls to bits but it’s not my chair so I shouldn’t really care.

Chris is making do, we can’t afford to be buying new epic chairs anyway, so he’s just grinning and bearing it, mainly because he doesn’t really have a choice but also because he’s not wasteful.

He has a pair of boots that have giant holes in them, he has to put carrier bags inside to stop his feet from getting soaked. Now this is where I draw the line at making do. Just buy some new boots god damn it! ( I love you )

I love the idea of up-cycling, I think it’s wonderful. As our only planet for now, Earth is being inundated with rubbish and we need to find more ways to care for our environment, or at least start taking more ideas on board. We throw far too much away without first using our imagination.

Could you mend that pair of trousers? Find another use for the material? Do you have a friend whose handy with a sewing machine or friends with pets that could use it for bedding?

With the power of social media we are connected to so many people these days, it only takes two minutes to type a quick,

“Hey, anyone need this broken stuff”

One mans trash is another one’s treasure and all that…

Obviously if something is going to cost more to mend or equally as much to buy a new one, then buy a new one, but be mindful of how you get rid of the old stuff.

There’s a house down the road from us and their general waste bin is always full, with the lid open and stuff piled up next to the bin. I don’t understand how they have so much stuff in their home in the first place that they can over fill their bin every week and also why aren’t they donating this stuff? A lot of the stuff is furniture; tables, chairs, children’s toys.

I think for most people it comes down to laziness. They just cannot be bothered to put these unwanted items in their cars and take them to the charity shop. If you don’t have a car many charity shops will come and collect from you now.

We’re so obsessed with the newest, latest stuff that nobody has the make do and mend attitude these days. I know it was more of a war mentality type thing, because there wasn’t much choice then anyway but that doesn’t mean that we can’t adopt some of that thinking for now. The next time you go to buy something really think about why, do you really honestly need a new one or do you just want it? If you need it then fair enough, just try to get your imagination going on what you can do with the now redundant one.

I would love one of those awesome vegetable graters that seems to do everything, it’ll build you a house if you let it, but I don’t really need it. I can make do with my boring grater and peeler 😦

Do you need a food blender to make smoothies and soup? How long is your fad diet going to last? Couldn’t you just use the hand blender and pour it in to jug? Yes you could, stop wasting money!