Some Up-cycling Ideas and New Ways to Re-use Old Mouse Pads

While cleaning out the office today I just came within 2 inches of throwing out an old mouse pad.
"No!", I said to myself. If we are going to stay on track towards homesteading then we have two mantras to keep in mind to save money. 
1. Don't just buy new stuff.. try to make something rather than buy it.
2. Don't waste old stuff. Everything should have a new purpose. (here's what we did with our old twin bed frame, we made a kitchen island!)

So what can you do with an old mouse pad? Here are some ideas that I found.

The most popular thing out there seems to be using it for a trivet if the top or bottom doesn't have plastic coating. This is a great idea. See it here on RealSimple.com.

From RealSimple.com

InspirationsForMoms.com has 5 other cool ideas. She writes:

 1) Quiet your cabinets. Cut your mouse pad into nickle-sized circles and glue them to the corner of cabinets doors. Say goodbye to those loud bangs!  

3) Catch the condensation. Cut up some mouse pads to use them as drink coasters.
4) Open jars with ease. Use the rubber underside of a mouse pad to loosen the stubborn lids of jars or bottles.

From InspirationsForMoms.com

5) Line your dish cabinets. Yes, cabinet liners are pretty cheap. But if you have old mouse pads just lying around, they are FREE. Place them in you kitchen cabinets to protect your dishes.
6) Protect your floors. To prevent table legs and chairs from scuffing your floors, cut your mouse pad into small pieces and glue each piece to the bottom of a leg.
You can visit her blog here.

We also have a post on recycling bath puffy scrubby things here.These are some really valid and great ideas and I will be a few of them.
If you have any other ideas, please let us know so we can add them and share them.

Homemade upcycled kitchen island - countertop - bar - extention - project thing

If hubby and I were to do a home improvement show on TV, the show would not make it on air due to the amount of time that the beeping coverup sound would be occurring to cover my husband's potty-mouth. Mind you he does not always talk like a drunken, ship-wrecked pirate. Yet during home improvement he does. He gets crazy and swears and throws things and has the patience of a flea. Yet he is also strong and determined and thankfully has the same taste as I do.
I remember my mother asking how I was going to get something pulled off of something else and I said to her, "I just wait and let BD get mad and he will get it done". And he did. He does every time. I love him.
So any-hoo... we had a twin trundle bed that was doing nothing in our junk middle room. It was a lovely bed in brand new condition but we didn't need it. AND because we had it, BD felt that it was his clothes placing surface where he placed dumped much of his clothing for no real reason.
The bed is very similar to this:

Close enough. So I took the entire bed apart. Every screw and staple and piece removed and was determined to make something cool from it. We needed an island/bar/extention to the island in our kitchen so we figured out how to re-purpose this bed into a cool countertop/island/bar thing.

There are tons of slats holding the top and bottom mattresses. Each was stapled to a white connecting string. We took each staple out and make a pile of the wood. Then we took out every nail and screw and connector to the rest of the frame. We haven't ended up needing the headboard or footboard yet. Oh yeah, this project was going to be one of those times where you turn a bed frame into a bench. But we just didn't need the bench. 

So island is it. We used the side board running along the trundle for the front edge of the table. We used other more narrow frame boards and attached it to the wall and back of the cupboards to make the frame.

We used the headboard legs to make the front two legs of the table. 

We used the existing 1x1 edge pieces that held the lats for the mattresses and ran them vertically to make a butcher block style table top.

I wish I had taken pics along the way to show you, I know I should have, but BD was on a roll that day and electronics were better off not in the room. 

Here are some pics of the finished product that I think do it justice. Please let us know if you have questions.  It wasn't that complicated. I could not be happier that it is repurposed. We are deciding on a finish. 

And next are the countertops. And the floor. Don't look at our floor : o

we are so in love with this look. we sprinkled in a few pallet pieces to give it a cool look

this is a corner that tied directly onto the back of the counters on the island part.

we used the long side pieces of the bed frame to make the square frame for the countertop. we used the little 1x1  peices that hold the edge of the lats to rest the lats just below the top of the long frame pieces so they would be level with the edges.

corner piece, still no looking at our floor, please. we will be using cork to fill in the holes. (on the countertop, not the floors)