40+ Innovative Ways to Use Everyday Objects

Ashley - March 1, 2023

Photo: gardengatemagazine.com

In today’s world, learning how to adapt to new situations is essential. Finding a new perspective on things can change the course of your entire life or the course of the lives of some everyday objects around your home! Rather than go out and buy a new product to fill your home with, people all around the world are learning how to take something they already own and transform it. Not only is this ingenuity great for keeping up with an ever-changing world, but it’s also an excellent way to reduce waste.

Many people are hopping on the trend of upcycling, which is when you take an item and change it into something even better. This list is filled with inventive people who looked at an ordinary object and saw something extraordinary. You won’t believe the innovative ways these people use everyday objects! Get comfortable and ready to take some notes because you’ll want to give some of these ideas a try.

Free Shoe Storage

Who hasn’t struggled to find a way to keep their shoes adequately stored at home? So many different shoe racks and storage systems are available, but they cost money. Try this unique idea if you’re trying to save a little dough and still store your shoes safely. All you need to do is visit a wine store and ask if they have an empty wine storage box. Most stores will happily give this away because the boxes will just take up room in their dumpster otherwise. Bring the wine box home and slide your shoes into the slots made for wine bottles. Your shoes will fit perfectly, and the box is easy to slide under a bed, on a shelf, or in any other out-of-the-way spot!

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Brand New Birdhouse

This might be the cutest invention on this list! Teapots are pretty fragile, and it’s easy for one to get chipped or broken. You might be tempted to throw away your teapot when this happens, but try to look at it from a different perspective. This teapot is the perfect size for a little birdhouse! Small birds can find shelter here when it’s raining and make a nest for their young. Plus, this is the most adorable, idyllic garden decor!

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Organize Your Toolbox

Have you ever opened up your toolbox and sighed at the mess inside? It’s hard to keep all your tools organized, even with separators and organizers. Try this hack to make grabbing a tool out of your box easy. Just use a carabiner to connect all your wrenches together. You’ll never have to dig through a ton of tools again to find a single wrench!

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Keep Floss in the Kitchen

Floss is necessary for keeping your teeth and gums clean and healthy, but it can also help prepare your food! Make sure to grab the flavorless kind, otherwise your food will have an odd and off-putting flavor. Use the floss to cut slices out of lemons, soft cheeses, cakes, and more! This is a safe way to get your kids involved in the kitchen without worrying about them handling a knife. It’ll also save you from having to rewash the same knife a million times!

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Clean With Your Tennis Racket

Many people have an old tennis racket in their closet that hasn’t seen the light of day in years! Put that tennis racket to good use and start smacking your couch cushions with it. The tennis racket will work well to beat the dust out of your cushions. Just make sure to do this hack outside! Otherwise, that cloud of dust will get absorbed into your other furniture, and you’ll need to beat your rug outside next.

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Use Soda Tabs for Hanging Pictures

Soda tabs have become very popular in the DIY world lately. People have found a ton of uses for this little piece of aluminum, and this is one of the best ideas! Use your soda tab to make hanging pictures much easier by drilling a screw into one hole, then hooking the other hole onto a nail. Your picture frame will be sturdy, perfectly centered, and far easier to get onto the nail with this method!

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Use Pool Noddles for Nap Time

Parents are forever trying to find ways to keep their little ones safe. Nap time can be stressful for parents of fussy sleepers, especially once the kiddos have transitioned to a bed without rails. Try this awesome hack to keep your kids from rolling out of their beds! Grab a pool noddle and place it underneath the fitted sheet on your kid’s bed. This will help prevent them from rolling too close to the edge or tumbling right over it! Now your kid can sleep in peace, and you can enjoy nap time without fretting.

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Use Bread Tabs for Labeling Cords

Power strips can become a sea of indistinguishable cables, which becomes a major issue when you need to unplug and move a single electronic. Instead of playing roulette and unplugging cables to see what they go to, get proactive and use bread tabs to label your cables! This will save you serious stress in the long run, and it’s a great way to keep these tabs from ending up in the trash.

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Use Those Legos

Children and adults of all ages love playing with Legos. Whether you enjoy building a simple tower or having several models built and placed on shelves around your home, these little blocks bring a lot of joy to people’s homes. They can also be a huge lifesaver if you’re in the habit of losing your keys! Just attach some Lego blocks as seen in this picture and voila! You’ll never lose your keys again with this trick, and the little Lego man will always be waiting to offer you your charger when you get home.

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Keep Your Cords Together

Extension cards are very handy to have around, but they are super long! These cords are easily tangled, especially if tossed in your garage or basement with nothing holding them together. You can create a simple cord binder with a couple items from your home office or kitchen junk drawer. All you need is a paperclip and rubber band to make this trick work. Put one end of the rubber band through the paperclip, wind the rubber band around the cord, and clasp the paperclip onto the rubber band again. This hack is easy, effective, and great for using up random household items.

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Upcycle Plastic Bottles

Upcycling is such a great way to reduce waste in the world and get as much use out of ordinary objects as possible. There are lots of ways to upcycle plastic bottles, but this is one of the simplest and most valuable. Simply cut the top off your plastic bottle and then use it to keep plastic baggies perfectly sealed. This is a great trick for bringing snacks out with you, and there are plenty of ways you can use the bottom half of the bottle! Keep reading to see exactly what we recommend doing with the rest of that plastic bottle.

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Never Hammer Your Finger Again

Trying to DIY projects around the home is a great way to save money and learn a new skill, but it certainly comes with some risks. Nearly everyone who has worked with a hammer has experienced the awful pain of hitting your finger instead of the nail. Well, you never have to risk your finger’s safety again with this trick! Use a simple bobby pin to hold the nail in place while you do your hammering. It’s so much easier and will save you a ton of stress.

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Inventive and Rustic Bookshelf

We love DIY projects that give homes a cute, rustic feel, and that’s exactly what this inventive bookshelf does! Do you have an old stepladder in your home that you no longer use? Well, rather than throw that ladder away, use it to create an adorable storage unit in your home. Just slide some boards across the steps and then put all your favorite books and knickknacks on display.

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Compact Clothesline

It’s easy to feel discouraged when you don’t have a lot of space. Many people would simply give up and just head to the nearest laundromat to dry their clothes when dealing with this little space, but if you’re willing to change your perspective on the situation, there’s always a solution! This photo shows how to create a compact clothesline that will still allow your clothes to dry while taking up as little space as possible. You’ll never have to deal with a busy laundromat again with this hack!

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Prop Your Painting Projects Up

Repainting picture frames or small pieces a furniture is a great way to extend the lifetime of these items and keep them looking fresh. Sometimes the painting can be a bit of a hassle, especially when you have to wait for a piece to dry before tackling the next part. This picture shows how to use egg cartons to prop your painting project up so you can paint all the nooks and crannies without constantly flipping the picture frame over. This trick could work for a ton of things like birdhouses, small shelves, and more!

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Recycle Wooden Hangers

Recycling and upcycling are two ways to reuse everyday objects around your home. Old wooden hangers probably don’t look like they have many other uses, but this idea here proves you can always transform one thing into something else! Take your old wooden hangers and create a dish rack out of them to display your favorite dishes in the kitchen or dining room. It’ll give your room a trendy boho chic feel while being fully functional!

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Create An Indoor Garden

This is another great trick for upcycling old plastic bottles. It turns out that old water and soda bottles actually make the perfect containers for creating little indoor gardens! You can grow a variety of plants inside these bottles, and it’s very easy to keep up with. Just cut the bottle in half, poke holes in the bottle cap, thread strings through the cap, and fill the top half with soil. Then, add a few inches of water in the bottom of the bottle, put the top half down into the water, and add your plant!

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Put That Spoiler To Good Use

Many people love taking a road trip. When you go road-tripping by yourself, it’s nice to sit outside and enjoy the town you’ve stopped in while you’re eating. People who go on road trips by themselves often eat in their cars, but the person in this picture decided to turn her car into the perfect picnic spot. She utilized her car’s spoiler to create a little table area and is enjoying her food in peace. This is a great idea that anyone can easily replicate.

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Baby Proofing Done Smart

Parents spend so much money on baby proofing products. It’s truly outrageous how much it costs to cover up any sharp corners and edges in your home once your little one arrives. That’s why it’s helpful to always be on the lookout for simpler and more cost-effective solutions like this! Take some leftover pipe insulation and use it to wrap the edges of tables, chairs, and other furniture. This will soften the edges and prevent serious accidents while costing far less than on-the-shelf baby-proofing materials.

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Protect Your Makeup

Picture this: You have your makeup on point and you’re ready to walk out the door when suddenly, your baby spits up on you! Or your dog jumps all over you with muddy paws. Something happens to necessitate you to take a shower, but your makeup has never been done as perfectly as it is right now! So, what do you do? Slap a pair of goggles on to protect your fabulous makeup while you shower! This is a serious time-saving hack that all makeup lovers should keep in their pockets.

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Use Coffee Filters for Dusting

Coffee filters are great for several things around the house. Not only do they provide you with that live-saving caffeine in the morning, but they’re also excellent for stacking between plates to reduce that awful clanging noise and dusting your electronics! Coffee filters are great for removing dust and dirt from tv screens, microwave doors, and knickknacks. If you find yourself with a huge stack of coffee filters and want to use them up, start dusting with them.

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Turn CDs Into Coasters

If you’re from the golden age of music, then you probably still have a ton of old CDs lying around. There’s not much point in hanging onto them for the music these days since everything’s available on Youtube, Spotify, and other streaming services. Instead of throwing your old CDs away, turn them into useful coasters! Just grab some self-adhesive plastic coating, cut it to size, and cover your CDs with it. Your friends will be super impressed when they find out what those coasters used to be!

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Easy Smartphone Speaker

Anyone who’s worked in a restaurant probably already knows this trick, but it bears mentioning. You can create an easy speaker for any smartphone with a simple bowl or cup. Just place the smartphone speaker side down into your bowl or cut and listen to the amplified music as you go about your business. It’s super effective and the only way for back-of-the-house workers to enjoy listening to their music over the sound of the dishwashers!

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Perfect Bagel Holder

Now that you’ve turned your old CDs into coasters, it’s time to find a use for your old CD holders. It turns out these holders are the perfect size to hold a single delicious bagel! Prep your bagel at home, place it in the CD holder, and bring it along to work or an outing with friends. People will be super impressed with your ingenuity!

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Floor Swiffer for Walls

Swiffers are great for cleaning the floors, but they can also be used for cleaning hard-to-reach surfaces along your walls, too! Swiffers are the perfect height to reach above door frames and they’re the perfect shape for scooting along edges where dust collects. You’ll never have to use a dozen different tools to clean your home again once you learn this hack!

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Easy Pancakes Every Time

Pancakes are the best breakfast food in the entire world. They’re a staple for many families on Saturday mornings, and parents are always looking for ways to do breakfast with as little clean up as possible. Mixing up pancake batter and pouring it into an empty condiment bottle is the perfect way to reduce mess and reuse an old container! It also gives you more power when you’re pouring the batter out, so it’s easier to create fun shapes.

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Organization in the Bathroom

Silverware organizers are usually only found in the kitchen, but you can take those draw inserts and use them in many other rooms in your home. They’ll make a great addition to your bathroom organization. Use these silverware organizers to keep your toothpaste, razors, nail clippers, makeup, and more perfectly organized in the bathroom.

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DIY Tealights

What do you do when your favorite scented candle burns down to nothing but a small pool of wax? Most people would simply throw the tiny bit of remaining wax away, but if you’re innovative enough, you’ll come up with a way to put that wax to use. Grab some bottle caps and pour the remaining wax into them, add a wick, and bam! You have an instant, easy, DIY tealight candle. This is an excellent way to make use of old bottle caps and save every last drop of your favorite scented candle.

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Easy Magazine Holder

Keeping a few magazines in the bathroom may have gone out of style now that everyone has a smartphone, but some people still enjoy having something physical to look at while they’re doing their business. Use an old clothing hanger to keep a few magazines ready to go in the bathroom. This is a great space-saving hack, and it provides you with a way to save your place! Just hang the magazine over the clothing rack on the page you were reading, and you can pick up where you left off when you return.

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Good To The Last Drop

Nutella is a delicious spread, and if you’re a true Nutella lover, then you probably want to get every last bit out of the jar. But it seems like these jars were designed to trap the last few delicious morsels and make it impossible for you to scrap out every last bit. Someone came up with this ingenious idea of adding a big scoop of ice cream to the Nutella jar. As you indulge in your ice cream treat, you’ll also be able to scrap up the last bit of the Nutella. This sounds amazing!

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DIY Hand Scrub

Hand scrubs tend to be too rough on the skin during dry seasons, especially in the winter. However, there are still times when you need a good scrub to cut through grease or oil on your hand. Rather than deal with chapped hands from a store-bought hand scrub, try this gentler DIY version. All you need is a tablespoon of dish soap and sugar. This combination will easily clean your hands without drying them out.

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Easy Tricks for Removing Strawberry Stems

Strawberries are a delectable treat, but it can be tedious and messy to remove their stems. You’ll never have to worry about messy fingers again with this hack! Just push a straw through the bottom of the strawberry, and it will pop the stem right off. We definitely recommend using metal straws for this hack because they’re much sturdier, and you’ll be able to wash and reuse them, which cuts down on waste!

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Outdoor Speaker Amplifier

Have you ever wanted to bring your speaker outside so you can listen to your favorite tunes while doing the yardwork? Here’s an awesome hack that will allow you to hear your music from anywhere in the yard and protect the speaker from the elements. Simply grab an empty (and clean) trashcan, place it on its side, and put your speaker inside. The trashcan will amplifier the sound from the speaker and protect it from rain and wind.

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DIY Lantern for Camping & Emergencies

Whether you’re in the middle of the woods trying to enjoy a peaceful camping trip or stuck at home during a power outage, it’s helpful to know some DIY lighting tricks. This is an easy way to create a DIY lantern that will provide you with a ton of light even on the darkest of nights. Just grab a headlamp and wrap it around an empty milk or water jug. Turn the headlamp on and enjoy!

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Pool Noodle Wrist Rest

More people are working from home than ever before these days, and while it’s great for certain things, it can be really difficult on your wrists if you don’t have the proper equipment. Thankfully, there’s an easy hack you can do at home to support your wrists while you’re working. Just take a pool noodle, slice it in half, and use it to support your wrists while you’re typing! Say goodbye to sore and cramping wrists!

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Keep Your Suede Clean

Suede jackets, shoes, and bags used to be all the rage in the 90s, and this style has circled back around in the past decade. While suede is a very stylish material, it tends to get dirty and scuffed pretty easily. Instead of spending big bucks on fancy cleaners or sending your shoes to the cleaners, grab this simple tool from the stationary aisle the next time you go shopping. A basic rubber eraser works wonders for removing stains and scuff marks from suede. You’ll be impressed at how well this simple hack works!

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Wax Your Snow Shovels

Shoveling can be a tough task, especially if you live in an area where you get multiple feet of snow several times throughout the season. However, you can make this task significantly easier on yourself with the car wax you’re probably keeping in your garage. Use the car wax on your snow shovels and watch in amazement as the snow easily slides off your shovel. You won’t have to deal with giant blocks of snow sticking to your shovel again with this hack!

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Food Strainer Wall Art

What do you usually do with food strainers once you purchase a new one? These kitchen tools often get thrown away or donated, but you can use them to create some gorgeous wall art in your home. Place small bulb lights on the walls and cover them with your food strainers. It creates a comfortable, rustic and unique aesthetic that will impress visitors and put a smile on your face every time you see it.

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Stop the Drips

Doing your own painting is a great way to save money and create the perfect aesthetic you want for your home. However, it can be a little tricky to keep the paint drips from getting all of your clothes and floors. However, this hack will prevent that from happening from now on. Just grab an extra large rubber band, wrap it around the paint can, and use it to wipe the excess paint off your brush. This is a super easy hack that will save you a lot of time.

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Popsicle Drip Catcher

Popsicles are a delicious treat, especially when it’s hot and humid out! However, these soothing treats tend to be very messy and kids will end up with their hands coated in the sticky treat. This hack provides a perfect solution to catch the popsicle drips. Grab a cupcake liner and push it up the popsicle so it rests right underneath the frozen treat. Now you can enjoy your popsicle without having to carry around a ton of wet wipes!

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Vintage Candle Holders

Finding new ways to use old items is the key to recycling and upcycling. When you have a bunch of old metal funnels around, you’re probably tempted to throw them away. However, if you flip them over and put in some long candles, they’ll look like gorgeous vintage candle holders! This hack could seriously start a trend for reusing old items as candle holders.

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Save the Ice Cream

We already discussed how to keep your posicles from dripping on you, so now it’s time to talk about how to prevent ice cream cones from dripping. Ice cream cones are notorious for melting and dripping all down your hand and wrist, creating a sticky mess that requires serious effort to clean up. Try this neat trick the next time you and your kids grab an ice cream cone. Stick a marshmallow in the end of the ice cream cone to prevent dripage. The best part of this hack? The marshmallow will absorb all the melted ice cream and you can eat it afterward as an extra treat!

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Keep Your Brown Sugar Soft

Brown sugar is a necessary and delicious component of many recipes, but it tends to get clumpy after only a short time. Marshmallows are the perfect tool for keeping your brown sugar moist and usable. Marshmallows are made of water, sugar, and gellatin, which makes them perfect for keeping brown sugar moisturized. Just make sure you’re storing both in airtight containers!

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Carboard Tubes for Organizing Cables

How many cords do you have lying around in a box or cabinet? Probably a ton, and it’s probably a giant pain when you need to pull out a specific length. Well, you’ll never have that problem again once you organize your cords with toilet paper and paper towel tubes! These tubes are the perfect size for holding folded up cords and you can write on them with permanent marker to indicate the size of each cord. This will take your home organization to the next level.

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An Easy Trick for Threading Needles

Anyone who enjoys sewing as a hobby or a means of repairing old clothes understands the utter frustration of trying to thread needles. It seems like the thread always wants to fray at the very tip and is impossible to push through those tiny holes. However, if you take some hairspray and spray the thread, it will keep the delicate fibers together and make it significantly easier for you to get it through the needle.

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Super Hot Doritios

Are you ready to lit a fire, but don’t have any reliable tinder around? Well, grab the bag of Doritios you were planning on eating around the campfire and toss a handful into the firepit! Doritos, like many other chips, are surprisingly flammable because they’re full of grease. These work very well in a pinch to get a flame going and they’ll hold the flame for quite a while!

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Upcycle Your Old Skateboard

This is a trick parents and the young-at-heart will absolutely love. Skateboards don’t last forever, but you don’t want to throw your old one away. After all, you had lots of adventures and happy times together. Instead of tossing your old skateboard, take some sturdy rope and hang it up around a solid tree branch! You’ll have a DIY swing that you and your kids will love for years to come!

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Make A Perfect Sandwhich

Making the perfect sandwich has never been easier than this! First, you should check your toaster to make sure it can comfortably hold two slices of bread in a single slot. Then, you place two pieces of bread into a slot and wait. When they’re ready, you’ll have perfectly crispy outsides with fluffy, soft insides. You’ll never go back to toasting your bread the old way again!

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Make Fancy Mosaic Tables

This is the perfect project for rainy days when you, your partner, and your kids are ready to transform an ordinary object into something extraordinary. All it takes is some glue, CDs, and plenty of patience! Since CDs aren’t really useful anymore, it’s time to transform them into something else and give them new life! Smash up your old CDs and glue them onto a table surface like seen in this photo. You’ll be left with a gorgeous mosaic table that looks great with the rest of your patio furniture.

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Reuse Plastic Bags

Reusing plastic bags is an excellent way to cut down on waste, but it can be difficult when you have a particularly stubborn knot in the bag. Most people will give into frustration and rip the bag open, but there’s another way that will save your bag! Follow the steps in this picture to twist the bag to untie stubborn knots. You’ll get several more uses out of your bag this way.

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Hair Straightner Storage

Photo Credit: onegoodthingwithjillee.com

Potholders are designed to protect you from the heat, but they can be used for more than just cooking! Hair straightners get very hot and you need a safe storage option for them. If you’re looking for a cheap and easy solution, try using potholders! They’re the perfect size and they’ll protect the surface you lay it on from the heat.

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Email or Snail Mail?

In an epic example of combining the old with the new, we have this mailbox made from a broken computer. While email and similar technology are becoming the go-to methods of communication, there’s still a need for snail mail. Throwing your old PC on a mail box post is a great way to recycle your PC and give your neighbors a laugh. Plus, there’s way less chance of a mailbox made from an old computer getting damaged by wind and rain than a traditional plastic mailbox!

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