Get Creative at Home with Cardboard

With an increase in online ordering, there is something we are accumulating in our homes at an alarming rate – cardboard. With all those boxes, you may be left to wonder what to do with them. So, we’ve come up with a list of fun ways to reuse them before you recycle. From creating activities to occupy the kids to sprucing up your home office or redecorating the house, rethink and reuse your cardboard with these life hacks:

Fun and games for kids of all ages

1. Tired of streaming shows? Why not put on your own theatrical production but instead of using bandwidth, use sock puppets. Construct and decorate the perfect puppet theater.
2. Get a little fresh air outdoors but successfully keep your distance from others with a toy that will find its way back to you every time, that’s right, a cardboard boomerang.
3. Playgrounds are closed but playtime does not have to end. Line up those larger shipping boxes and make an indoor cardboard playground complete with tunnel, slide and even hopscotch!
4. Staying indoors means your children can discover their inner artist so give your little Picasso an easel to paint on.
5. There’s always room for one more at home, if that one more is a robot.
6. Let your child discover their inner swashbuckler by getting creative with a couple of gift wrap and paper towel tubes. That’s all you need, though don’t forget their shield.
7. Children can start their own zoo or aquarium and fill them with cardboard creatures of all kinds.
8. Have the children create their own marble maze, from simple to more complex.
9. Up for a game of twister? All you need is a homemade spin board, a sheet or drop cloth and painted paper plates or cardboard circles.
10. Use cardboard to construct a foosball table, air hockey or even a miniature golf course.

Fix up your at home work space

1. Need to cordon off a section of the house to use as an office. Why not try a room divider?
2. Every desk needs its own organizer and this one can easily be made from cereal and cracker boxes.
3. Many workers must convert areas at home into workstations that are less than conventional. If you find yourself cleaning out a closet area to use, why not try these hanging storage baskets.
4. Laptop stands are essential when you have no control over the height of whatever furniture is available. Construct one with heavy duty cardboard.
5. Better yet, construct your own standing desk using cardboard boxes.
6. Cell phone not loud enough? Create an amplifier for your cell phone with a chip can.
7. No filing cabinets at home? No problem. Make file, notebook and magazine holders out of cereal boxes.
8. When working on home furniture, keep them protected with a desk blotter made from cardboard.
9. The same goes for you walls. Protect them from tacking up lists and notes with a cardboard bulletin board.

Design and decorate

1. Get the family together with a project that will have you looking to the stars, cardboard ones. They are a lovely decoration in any home.
2. Get whimsical with a bookshelf shaped like a cloud.
3. Cut a shape in multiple sizes and overlay pieces of cardboard into a stunning piece of wall art.
4. Spruce up the front stoop with a festive wreath made of various cardboard tubes.
5. Have you ever seen those mounted cardboard deer heads? Now you can make you own!
6. Have each family member make a self-portrait of themselves in cardboard and hang the deconstructed family portrait on the wall.
7. Get inspired by cardboard artists and try your hand at sculpting but instead of clay use corrugated cardboard as your medium.
8. Create decorative decoupage trays out of cardboard for storing or displaying.
9. Finally, to keep spirits high, join the movement of putting up your Christmas lights and decorations. And while you’re at it, why not construct a Christmas tree as well?