POSSUM’S PENNY PINCHING PROJECT POINTERS

I think I will start with my cheapest garden tool, the lowly clothes pin. I am one of those people who loves to improvise, and hates to spend money on something really quite unnecessary when something closer at hand (and a lot less expensive) will do as well – or even better. I use clothes pins to hold fencing together when in use, or when wrapped up to be stored for next year. Clothes pins hold netting in place. Here I have used clothes pins to train vines up a support in my attempt at vertical gardening. After this little section has attached itself, the same clothes pin can easily be moved to the next tendril.

This is a great way to keep potting soil and other such supplies closed and dry. I usually use the oldest clothes pins for garden stuff… I am lazy and leave them on the line, you see, year round, as I am one of those old fashioned folks who LOVES to hang clothes outside when the weather permits. The GOOD clothes pins are in a clothes pin bag thingie, but the gardening ones are in an old strawberry box that hangs up with an old hanger from a now deceased birdfeeder (read squirrel damaged). Now ya can’t get much cheaper than that! And, it is a great example of recycling!

I also use clothes pins to hold birdfeeders in place – again, the squirrel thing, but also we have some serious wind here – and they keep bags of bird seed closed and waterproof… they hold covers on picnic tables, canvas covers on lawn furniture, and so many other things, I can’t think of them all right now. Maybe another post! Send me your ideas!