Chasing a Lost Ornament (Proper Recycling Techniques)

A sweet boy in Zeplin's Pre-School class lives in our neighborhood. Over the months of the school year, we got to know his family some, and they, ours.

Come Christmas, they gifted our sweet boys with fun toys and added a gem to the tag: a beautiful, wooden, nativity scene. (Scene above.)

I loved this ornament and thought it was just lovely and perfect and was so grateful for it.

Christmas day had come and gone and it was time to take out the trash.

Unbeknownst to me, the ornament ended up in one of three trash/recycling bags!

I had NO IDEA, until I realized it was missing and, in a moment of brilliance, had a hunch it was in one of those large bags I had just taken outside.

Oh, the insanity.

After going through the first bag of recyclables and finding nothing, I sat on my driveway and silently thanked the Lord that I had rinsed the plastic bottles before putting them in there. How gross would it be to look through dingy, smelly, sticky trash?

Thankfully, I found the ornament in recycle bag number two and didn't have to face the looming bag of actual trash which was next in line. *whew!*

But this made me wonder, what if we all took a crash course in proper recycling techniques?

What can be recycled?
How we sort.

How we clean.

So I looked up information using the prompts:

recycling in NC

and.

proper ways of recycling

There, I read about the different items which can be recycled, as well as how to handle them.

Ideally, if you can sort your newspapers from other papers, that's a plus.

Likewise, glass has to be sorted by colors.

If you live in an area like I do where we are given one, large, multi-item recycling container, you can just put it all in there together and it will be sorted at the recycling plant.

Another thing I read on almost every site, PLEASE CLEAN THE ITEMS FIRST! Not only does this help detour pests from your living spaces, but it is kind and helpful to those who have to sort.

Do you recycle?

For as long as I can remember -and to the annoyment of both my mother-in-love and my Big Strong Man- I make a production out of it.

My trash can sees very little action in comparison.

And I even have two grocery bags in my van: one for trash, one for recycling.

What can I say? It's part of my DNA.

If you do not already do so, there are so very many benefits and I hope you reconsider.