And you can quote me on that, as long as you give credit where credit is due.

I come from a long line of string-savers and pack-rats.  My paternal grandfather grew up in the depression and can somehow find a good use for the littlest pieces of trash, like hanging picture frames with coke tabs.  I took that principle and updated it by using the plastic rings from oj cartons, tacked into the wall, to hold fabric refresher and wrinkle releaser spray bottles in my closet.  My maternal grandfather saved every tiny soap and shampoo bottle he ever got from every hotel where he ever stayed – enough to fill up two 5-ream copy paper boxes and then some.  Useless, you say?  Not so; when we cleaned out his closet after his funeral, those two boxes went to a women’s shelter that was very grateful to have them – they make up little “survival” kits for women who come into their shelter with nothing but their children and the clothes on their backs.  Used dryer sheets?  They keep the clothes in my drawers smelling just-washed.  Empty pickle jars?  Just as good as expensive Tupperware and less likely to leak if turned upside-down.  I do have to keep my string-saving and trash-to-treasure do-it-myself-ing in check, because saved string can easily become useless clutter.  But let me tell you, being the one on my dorm room hall who could polish the guys’ shoes and cut their hair, get lipstick off a girl’s favorite blouse, nurse a good friend’s cold with a few home remedies – you can’t beat that useful feeling.  My family teased me during this vacation about being the Michelin Man in my giant ski coat with pockets full of stuff, but when my Dad’s nose started to bleed a bit, who handed him a hankercheif?  When I wanted to capture the beauty of the mountains, who had a camera?  Well, I did have to borrow Alyssa’s when my film ran out, but who had extra batteries when her camera went dead?  Who had the trail map when Mom and Viv and I weren’t sure if we were on the right trail?  And I had food and drink, too – I’m telling you, if I’d gotten stranded, I was at least marginally prepared.  I guess it’s not just being a string saver, it’s being resourceful, too.   

Good example:  my bedroom.  Just about everything in it is a “found restoration”.  Rags to riches, trash to treasure.  Much to the annoyance of a former boyfriend, I have a habit of dragging home things that other people don’t want.  My dresser, found outside a neighbor's house one day (that Denise helped me pull home on an old discarded office chair) is a lovely veneered piece that, as it turns out, matches an entire bedroom suite that belonged to my great-grandmother.  Some of the veneer is cracked, sure, but that’s nothing the daughter and granddaughter of woodworkers can’t someday refinish, right?  Just as I had posted a bookshelf on my wishlist, one turned up in front of the house next door, in just the right size.  Same with the other shelf unit in my room, originally designed to go over a toilet, that happens to fit over a table that houses my laptop; and the silver and glass nightstand by my bed that I repaired with a candle.  All the frames on my wall someone didn’t want.  Two other shelves upstairs in our living room and three other chairs were discarded.  At a time when privacy was really becoming an issue in our basement, I found two large tri-fold screens and paper on sale with which I will someday recover them. And does everything in my house match perfectly?  No.  But does it look like something found in the trash?  No.  Everything has been cleaned and polished and repaired, redone with a little elbow grease and hardly any money.  I take pride in these projects, really. 

So laugh at my yogurt cup of push pins.  Ridicule the way I roll up plastic bags and horde twist-ties.  Recoil in horror when I drag something home that someone else put out.  But you let me know when you can’t get those frames to hang on the wall, and I’ll come tack ‘em up with a few coke tabs.