Recently, my husband and I got ambitious and decided to tackle organizing our cellar. Amongst the stuff that we sorted, was five boxes of kid’s party supplies, including cards, stickers, party favors, cups, napkins, paper plates, gift bags, craft projects and much more. I had been storing this stuff for a few years. My husband’s mother used to stock cards and other items for department stores and when product lines were discontinued, the items would either be thrown away or reused.
My mother-in-law split all of the party items she recycled between our family and my husband’s sister who has a daycare. After a few years of collecting all of these items, I decided I could either open up a party store (not my first choice) or donate the items again.
I connected with the YMCA in Portsmouth through an organization called Freecycle. The Freecycle NetworkTM is made up of 4,638 groups with 6,151,000 members across the globe. It’s a grassroots and entirely nonprofit movement of people who are giving (& getting) stuff for free in their own towns. It’s all about reuse and keeping good stuff out of landfills. Each local group is moderated by a local volunteer. Membership is free.
The YMCA was able to use the party supplies for the kids they take care of. It was great to see that items I did not need were being put to good use and not being thrown in a landfill. Do you have something you no longer need and are considering throwing away? Stop! Check out Freecycle in your town first and donate your unwanted items to someone who can use them.
Filed under: Recycling Tagged: | donations, Freecycle, nh charity, recycle, YMCA
