Friday 19 November 2010

Hen, dinnae chuck yer wellies in the bin, recycle them!

 
Recycled wellington boots as a pair of handy funky garden shoes.
Ok where I'm from 'Hen' is a word of endearment for a female friend/relative or a chicken hen as well I think. When we think about recycling things its often things like jars, cans, paper and packaging. Anyway  what do you do when your wellies end up with a hole in them - or like me they split up the back. Very infruiating - especially when its one of your favourite pairs which you've gone through! We dinnnae (don't) normally think about recycling our wellies - other than maybe when we've grown out of them and we give them away to a pal or a charity shop. 

Or put them into the garden.............................I know a friend that has rows of wellies full of flowers at her door - what a brilliant idea! (thank you for the photo L!)
 

Anyway - I'm huge a fan of the wellington boot, 'wellies' are I think my favourite footwear - next to naked feet, I think. I've many different types from my bog standard green wellies, my steel toe capped yellow wellies to my very funky silly 'fashion' wellies - all of which I wear at minimum a couple of times a week (each). 
One day they were on the beach...........the next they had a big hole in them - not funny!                                                  
 I'm lucky that I can wear wellies to work, don't mind wearing them when I'm shopping and I've even got a special wellie rack to keep them - how cool is that??? I saved up for that and got my very own one from ebay - only then for my brother to tell me he could have made me one! Typical!! But its well used - and paid for by selling plants on ebay! When asked how much it cost - I have to say - 6 sold packs of my own alpine strawberries............

Wellie boot stand - big enough for all my favourite pairs!

Anway when my trusty funky wellies gave up the ghost, I did weep - buckets of tears, eventaully I had a brain wave and decided to make a pair of wellie shoes out of them (like those posh ones you get in the shops) - and now I wear them every morning when I feed the hens - who really appreciate them! All you need is a decent pair of kitchen scissors and a pair of old wellies - I just thought about the shape they'd need to be if I wanted to just slip them on at the door before going out - and came up with this....................



The next minute, one pair of kitchen scissors later - a pair of very lovely garden shoes - took about 10 minutes - thinking of how to recycle them took much longer!
Its just amazing what you can get in the post - and what you can do with an old pair of wellies! Next time you're thinking of chucking yer wellies in the bin, dinnae (don't) do it - recycle them instead if you can! Now with my new funky shoes I have to say - I'm wearing them even more often but I do miss my old wellies but at least I'll get to wear them as shoes................ 

13 comments:

  1. Hi , thankyou for your comment over at mine :0)
    Lovely to find your blog , the wellie idea is brilliant .
    Where you live looks amazing .
    Jacquie x

    ReplyDelete
  2. You're very welcome - I'm humbled by folk with real talent - and you're very talented! Thank you for popping over the fence! x

    ReplyDelete
  3. What a gorgeous place you call home. To live by the ocean is a dream of mine. Thank you for visiting my blog. I am looking forward to visiting your lovely blog quite often.

    ReplyDelete
  4. I love the wellies. I have very big calves and find it difficult to wear wellies. This year I bought some apres ski boots from decathlon.
    You made me broody this week with your dog photos and guess what I went and brought a puppy home yesterday. I will post the photos later. Have to go out to work now
    Sue

    ReplyDelete
  5. Those are brilliant! And I love your wellie stand...

    ReplyDelete
  6. There has been a ripped pair of wellies sat outside the cottage door for months now waiting for me to recycle them into planters.I've been full of good intentions but still not got araound to it, no excuse for lack of time now though so maybe this week I will get around to it.Thanks for the kick up the bum :)
    Your welly shoes look great and much more practical than my crocs for seeing to chickens in muddy weather :)

    ReplyDelete
  7. Nice to see alot of positive wellie comments, Dreamer I'm sure you'll get to it soon - crocs here - too wet to go out to the hens in - I end up skyting all over the place.

    And, I've big calves too sue - Hunter wellies work well.......

    Pamela - thanks for dropping by. x

    ReplyDelete
  8. That's a nice idea to recycle them. How long have you had these wellies before they split?

    ReplyDelete
  9. Thank you both. Wellies were 3 years old before they split and are now a year or so into their new shoes life :)

    Wellie oot stand is gorgeous and practical!

    ReplyDelete
  10. Saw your comment over at down to earth linking to this post. I love the idea. We live in the Pacific North West (USA) where it is RAINY. My dauaghter's boots from last year are too small to use for boots, but cutting the legs and backs off would be great! And with chickens running around loose and her liking to run around bare footed, I sure hope she'll agree to wearing them...thanks!

    ReplyDelete