Trash to Treasures
(Recycling and Re-use)
I don’t live here now, but my potting shed stood as a monument to recycling. My bumper sticker ought to read, “I brake for junk!” Lumber. Hubcaps. Ladders. You name it! My husband sees these for what they are – trash. I see them for all they can be – a garden bench, a bird feeder, a trellis. Besides, I believe in recycling, I say, as he rolls his eyes. (Doesn’t that justify it just a little?)
People actually throw away perfectly usable materials, like bricks and picket fencing. Oh, the need I have in my garden for such goodies! The bricks became the floor of my potting shed and a pathway leading around the side, and the picket fencing was transformed into a gate across a small deck to keep the pygmy goats out and the dogs in. The potting shed itself was constructed using 14 reclaimed windows and two doors, B-grade dog-ear redwood fencing bargained for from a local building supplier’s “bone yard”, and the unwanted bricks from three friends’ back yards.
Give me “pre-owned” goods with chips and chinks, nicks and notches, faults and flaws. Character, that’s what it’s all about! Just how much character is there in a chain link
gate?With some old found corral fencing
cut to gate-size, screwed together, a
handsome antique window inserted in the
middle, and the whole thing hinged onto the
corner of the house near the Altissimo
roses – now that’s character. So far, I’ve
replaced three chain link gates with my own
wood creations, one more to go. Until I come
up with a new design, I’ve camouflaged that
remaining gate by hanging another old window on it! Continue reading this article at More Trash.
