Home Recycling

Recycling products is more than plastics, paper and glass.  It is reducing waste and finding dual uses for items.  Recycling is a way of life for many people, and is a growing part of our culture on a daily basis.   I purchased my home in 2002 and have had decent luck with it.  I have been forced, though, to take a hard look at the things I need and the things I have, and to simply just make it work, somehow.  Owning a home is hard work and expensive, but it can be done. No, many of us cannot purchase exactly what we need, much less what we want, but survival is more than buying everything... it takes creativity, imagination, and endurance.  

My current struggle is a project that I just started in my basement.  It is a 1937 unfinished basement with no framing on the walls, but they have been braced.  I live in an area that sometimes has a temperature high of   -5 degrees.  Point blank, it is cold.  I read this last weekend somewhere on the web that about 20% of heat is lost through an uninsulated basement.  How correct this figure is, I am not sure but it is enough to get me moving in desperation.

Why don't I just buy the insulation?  Money.  In order to hang the insulation, a person is supposed to have framed in walls.  I am not handy even though I am a worker- so in addition to lumber costs I would need to hire labor, purchase insulation, and other minor tools on a budget that is sinking already.  I need to do this with little or no money.

I did have an issue with an upstairs ceiling in which the ceiling tiles all came tumbling down- denting themselves, etc- but I kept them because I felt guilty throwing them away.  It came to me one day to reuse those!  It won't look so pretty, but maybe there is something I can do to make them look better when the project is complete.

The ceiling tiles are 1x1, and do not need to hang in a grid; they tuck into each other, and a person can staple them to the ceiling furring strips.  I thought I could hang them in rows on the wall so that I could just secure the top tile to a piece wood that sits on top of the cement wall- that way they are easily removed if something should happen. 

Since I am in the first stage of this project, I have used Liquid Nails on the back of the tiles to glue them together in pairs.  I figured this would be easier to construct the rows instead of having to work with each tile separately.  The Liquid Nails is still drying and I will wait until dry to hang.