Plastic Mini Blinds... in the Garden?

 photo source:  chelsea.c

Remember those plastic mini blinds made popular back in the 1990s?  Everyone had them, some probably still do.  During that time, I had graduated High School and started cleaning apartments to support me during my full-time ministry.  I hated cleaning those blinds, they were the worst things ever!  Especially if there was a smoker living in the apartment, because then the blinds couldn't just be dusted and then cleaned with Windex.  Oh no, I had to remove the blinds from the window, fill the bathtub with water and a bleach and soap solution and submerge the blinds to clean the yellow grime off of them.  Boy, those were the days!

Last year we started our little garden and I needed a way to mark the vegetables we planted.  I didn't want to spend a lot of money (of course!), but remembered something somewhere that showed how to cut those old plastic window blinds into 9-12" lengths and use them for garden markers.  Brilliant!  

I went to Big Lots and picked up a box of blinds for $5.  When I got them home and out of the box, I cut the string that held them in place.  Then I cut them into appropriate lengths, making sure to angle one end so they will be pointy enough to push into the ground easily.  I used a black Sharpie marker to write the name of the vegetables and pushed them into the ground next to the plant or seed.  

I did the same thing this year since I still have tons of those plastic blinds in the garage. 

Here's what they look like:

It's a great way to "reduce, reuse & recycle".  You can reuse the "garden markers" by cleaning off the Sharpie marker with rubbing alcohol and writing a new name. 

This has been linked to:

• DIY Day at A Soft Place to Land
• Homemaker Monday
• Tackle It Tuesday at 5 Minutes for Mom