I wonder if there is an efficient organizer who could give me some good suggestions on organizing recycling items in the kitchen. We have our bins set up in the basement and right now I just bag all the recylables by the sink and take downstairs once every few days (I'm lazy). Would appreciate any helpful (easy) tips! thank you

May I ask why you keep it in the basement? Just seems so inconvenient... take down and then take back up to dispose of.

Need to know how much separation you need or care to do. Some areas demand everthing be separated, some everything can be lumped together. When you take it out how much do yoju have, on average? Enough to fill a paper grocery bag? Half that, twice that?

We keep the bins in the basement, then we can just take them outside through the garage door for recycling. Not enough room in the kitchen to have the containers. Daily, enough to fill a grocery bag. The recycling depot takes: styrofoam, take-out coffee cups, foil coffee & food bags, plastic bags,batteries and then we have tins, soft plastic & paper for regular recycling.

We have minimum recycling in our area. Only plastics that held liquids. Paper and cardboard. Food cans and aluminum. That's it. But at least we've got that!

No styrofoam, glass, butter/cottage cheese/sour cream/etc. containers.

I barely take one plastic grocery bag full to the bin. I have a plastic bucket under the sink. Everything gets rinsed and smashed. Paper is stuffed in a box. It's all dumped once a week, generally.

As of July 1 our whole area has curbside recycle pickup. However, they don't take plastic bags of any kind or styrofoam. Otherwise, we just put all of it in the dumpster container and its picked up. They've also instituted yard waste pickup once a month and heavy items on call. Prior to then, our particular waste hauler did a curbside pickup, but was the only one who did.

I'd think some kind of rigid side container might work better (and look better) than the trash bag. Especially something with a lid.

I do two grocery bags under the sink too. Glass and plastics go in one, and cans (aluminum & tin) in the other. Papers and cardboard flattened and placed along side or if a lot, by the stairs, and go out when I go down to the garage too.
My only suggestion, make it easy to carry and sort items into bins in the garage?
Any food waste or smelly trash goes into a separate sack inside the cabinet door, and goes out daily. We double bag those items (keep the bears from sniffing) and take the trash to the transfer station & recycle much every week.
I was glad to get rid of the last load, DGD's weeks worth of disposable diapers!

So your really need a space in or near your kitchen for 2 large kitchen trash cans. Does that sound about right to hold a few days worth?

Assume everything is clean (of course) is there room for a piece of furniture near the kitchen (maybe dining room or foyer) that they could sit under and be hidden from sight? Say like a console table with a cloth skirt. Or a book case with doors that you can take the shelves out of.

Seems like you have to look outside the kitchen proper if there is no space in the kitchen.

And you have made me thankful today that my attached garage is just a few steps away.

Here's some ideas:
http://www.amazon.com/s?ie=UTF...g%20organizer&page=1

Hi .. thanks for all the great tips! Space wise, I'll copy the tip for paper bags (2) beneath the sink .. I like that idea of one for plastic & glass & one for tins & paper folded. We have 3 cats and that equals 3 - 4 tins a week. I've just started keeping a blue recycle bag in my study for paper. And thanks for the link to the recycling containers. Some great products there!

I am looking for Organizer/designers who specialize on organizing and designing exactly like it was featured on the "mission Organization show in the Boston area. Can anyone help?

I like to keep things really simple. I have one trash bin that fits under my sink. I take out the trash every evening. I just set the recyclable items to one side inside the trash bin, then when I take out the trash I just pull out the recyclable items and put them in the recycle bin the city provides.

Mona M, this site lets you find professionals by area.
http://www.napo.net/default.as...etectCookieSupport=1

Rubbermaid makes a 14 gallon stackable recycling bin that's not unattractive. I have 3 stacked in the corner of my kitchen to separate the items into paper, cans and plastic. I haul it myself to the recycling center. I go more often now so could easily get by with just 1 bin and sort it there. Here's a link to the item.

http://www.rubbermaid.com/Cate...ash&Prod_ID=RP091449

Larger kitchen.
Husband made a flip-top rectangular container approx. size of a kitchen garbage can. I did x-stitch and we put one on three sides and in the top (glass covers them). That's where plastic and cans go. Our waste people have given us all a large container and they take almost all plastics, steel cans, compressed and corrugated cardboard, newspapers, magazines, phone books, catalogs, etc. All paper items have to be tied or bagged separately.
We used to have a flip-top garbage can but people used that for garbage. So---the nice wooden container by the cellar door. Periodically the bag inside is removed and taken into the basement and sorted: steel, aluminum, plastic. Aluminum we take to a different recycle center.
Under sink: one side garbage; other side bag for paper: towels, napkins, etc.
What you can use and where to put it depends upon the size of your kitchen. Our system works well for us. Not a problem to take to basement, sort, bag, and bring up for pick up twice monthly. Large items we take outside and place in the recycle wheeled container--it's large! 50 gallon size if not more.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: M-ma,

quote:

Originally posted by Jane E:
We keep the bins in the basement, then we can just take them outside through the garage door for recycling. Not enough room in the kitchen to have the containers. Daily, enough to fill a grocery bag. The recycling depot takes: styrofoam, take-out coffee cups, foil coffee & food bags, plastic bags,batteries and then we have tins, soft plastic & paper for regular recycling.

Simply best suggestion even we do in somewhat same manner. We don't have recycling center nearby so me and my neighbors collect recyclable waste separating them by basis form of waste such as paper, plastic, glass, metal and some other biodegradable substances and send it to recycle center twice a month!! So by anyhow trying to make our earth go green...

waste management

I have (3) of the rubbermaid 14 gallon stacking recycling bins in the corner of my kitchen- I used it for cans, plastics and bottles. Now that we no longer have to haul our own to the recycling center I could get by with only 1 or 2 since it doesn't have to be separated. They're black with a green swinging door.
http://www.usfreeads.com/1580931-cls.html

Our recycling containers are in our basement, too. All items are washed ( except paper/cardboard) and taken to the basement as soon as they are cleaned. I do not like those things to be in the kitchen. It takes me less than 60 seconds to take them to the basement.

It seems much easier than having multiple containers in multiple places.

quote:

Originally posted by Jane E:
We keep the bins in the basement, then we can just take them outside through the garage door for recycling......

My house is set-up like that, too. The garage, family room, and laundry are in the basement, everything else is upstairs. I almost always leave the house through the garage.

There's always something at the wrong end of the stairs. So every time I go up or down I carry something. Often the thing going downstairs is recycle. So I may take recycle out 3 times in one day.

For cans I have a small dish drainer in the sink. I rinse the can, then let it dry in the sink until the next time I head downstairs. Newspaper and junk mail accumulates in a box that contained soft drinks until its nearly full, then gets hauled down. (I get a lot of wind. Paper left loose in the bin will be all over the neighborhood by the time it gets picked up.) Cerial boxes and the like are flattened and go in with the paper or are left intact and used to accumulate the labels from cat food cans and other small bits of paper.


BTW - here's another good reason to keep a dish drainer in the sink, above the garbage disposer.
http://www.snopes.com/critters/disposal/catchday.asp

This message has been edited. Last edited by: JoW,

Any food waste or smelly trash goes into a separate sack inside the cabinet door, and goes out daily. We double bag those items (keep the bears from sniffing) and take the trash to the transfer station & recycle much every week.

We tend to freeze food related waste that can't go down the disposal.. (like corn cobs)- wrap it in an old plastic shopping bag- then put it out on trash day. We have bears too.