Creative Ways to Recycle Coffee Jars and Coffee Cans
Coffee Jars as Kitchen Containers
You can recycle coffee cans and recycle coffee jars instead of adding them to the waste stream. Why? To limit waste, thereby benefiting the environment, but also to find a practical second use of an everyday item. This is a great practice for you, but also for your children — turning ’trash’ into art projects or useful items is an eco-friendly, earth-saving habit that we all should develop. So, how can coffee cans and coffee jars be recycled?
If you normally buy the same brand (as most people do) you can build a fairly large collection of jars that can make a good addition to your storage shelves in the kitchen. Use them to store snacks, pasta and even items which you regularly need for your daily cooking.
Before you use these jars you will need to remove the adhesive and label. This can be easily done by pouring a small quantity of cooking oil on the adhesive and rubbing with a paper towel. Remove any foil on the mouth of the jar and wash the jar with hot water. Paint the jars if you want or print colorful labels on adhesive stickers to tell you what each jar contains. It would help the man of the house when he gets into one of those rare moods where he offers to do the cooking for you. You can even gift such a set to your friends as a reminder of the affection you have for them. It would make an unusual and inexpensive gift.
Image Source : Flickr : virginiaricardo : https://www.flickr.com/photos/virginiaricardo/3044757864/
Coffee Jar Craft Projects for Children
Encourage your kids to save by having them build their own piggy banks from coffee jars. Most coffee jars nowadays are made of plastic, but even if they are of glass they will do. Imagine kids being excited by the clink of coins against glass in their own piggy bank. You need to clean the jar and remove the label, adhesive and foil like before. Cut a slit in the top lid and if you feel the need, use adhesive to seal the lid to the jar. Now find some decorative wrapping paper and glue it around the jar. You can use other stickers or even small toy animals to stick to the jar — if you get one with a piggy face, it would be just great.
One of the simplest things to make for a craft project with a coffee can or jar is to make a pencil and pen holder for your child’s work table. You can dispense with the lid here, but if it fits the bottom of the jar you can glue it on for an additional base. You can even put in some sand or metal pieces before you do this as this would give stability to the pencil holder that you make. Decorate the jar with paper and stickers or even some paint. Let your child do this by him or herself and watch the excitement that they get from their own handiwork.
You can also recycle the coffee cans and jars into snowmen or Easter bunnies. Get hold of a Styrofoam ball a little larger than the opening of the jar. This will make the head of the bunny or snowman. Then decorating it so that it has eyes, a nose, and ears is easy with felt. Wrap the jar in white felt and there you have the completed project.
There are many other things you can do to recycle coffee jars or coffee cans. Use them to grow herbs on your kitchen window sill. Tape them all together in a bunch and lay them sideways without their lids. Put in some birdseed and see the way the birds flock to your garden. You can even use them to make ice cream if you put a smaller can with the milk and sugar and flavoring into a bigger can and fill the larger one with ice and salt. Get the kids to roll it around and make some ice cream. There are so many ways to take advantage of and have fun with used coffee containers — who would throw them away?
References
Coffee Jar Projects - https://www.ehow.co.uk/list_6366673_plastic-jar-craft-projects-kids.html
Recycling Coffee Glass jars - https://www.ehow.com/how_4682574_recycle-glass-coffee-jar.html
Recycling ideas - https://www.essortment.com/home/thriftyrecyclin_tsmm.htm
