Thrifty Thursday • Baby Food Jars

So, I tend to never throw things away.  My hubby calls me a pack rat (not a hoarder).  I usually have to give him permission to just throw things away if it's still boxed up.  I obviously don't need it if I haven't unpacked it in over a year!  As long as I don't see something, I won't even remember I had it, right?

The thing is, I always save things with the thought that I will use it for this or that at some later date.  I've said before that I have lots of little ideas but lacked the time.  The bad thing is I let too much time go by, and things like boy scout popcorn tins, spaghetti sauce jars and empty tuna cans that I had planned to cover in pretty designer papers end up piled up in a garbage bag unused.  My hubby says if I haven't done anything with them in over a year then they need to be tossed or recycled.  I kept the popcorn tins, parted with the tuna cans.

Over the past few months I started saving Stella's baby food jars.  I thought they would be great for storing little things like safety pins and paper clips.  Of course, my hubby didn't know why I would need 20 little jars full of safety pins and paper clips (reasonable concern), so unless I would be giving my jars full of pins and clips to friends, they needed to be recycled.

But then I found a way to keep them without filling them with pins and clips.  They are perfect for storing buttons and sorting them by color!  I had enough buttons in such a variety of colors that I almost didn't have enough baby food jars!

Another way I have been using the smaller baby food jars are to store my ribbon rolls.  When left on the spool, ribbon tends to get loose.  I find it annoying always having to tighten it and either tape or pin it in place.  Plus, little miss someone likes to unravel the ribbon spools, too!

So I just started unraveling the ribbon and wrapping it around my finger, and once I had a tight roll I placed it right into the jar.  It keeps it all in place and pretty easy to pull out as much as I need at an given time and tuck it right back away.  Best fit for 1.5" x 4 yd ribbon spools.

I've also made a jar into a project take along.  I threw in some pieces of ribbon (or fabric), thread, buttons and a needle and had just what I needed to hand sew a Snappee flower on the go!

What other ways have you used or would you use a baby food jar?

Thanks for reading,

Eva

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