STYROFOAM

MAKE YOUR OWN SHIPPING PELLETS • You’d like to use foam to ship some fragile things, but all you’ve got is sheets or blocks of foam, not pellets. No problem. Just break up what you have into pieces small enough to fit in a blender and pulse it on and off to shred the foam into perfect packing material.

KEEP NAIL POLISH LOOKING GOOD • When applying nail polish, a foam pellet or a small chunk cut from a block of foam packaging placed between each finger or toe will help spread them apart and keep the polish unblemished until it can dry.

HOLD TREATS FOR FUTURE EATING • To prepare a quantity of snow cones or ice-cream cones in advance, cut a foam block to size so it will fit flat in your freezer. Cut holes just large enough and close enough to hold cones so they won’t touch, fall over, or poke through the bottom. Fill the cones and slip them into the waiting holes. Then pop the whole thing into the freezer, ready for serving at a moment’s notice.

MAKE A KICKBOARD

A sharp kitchen knife is all you need to cut a scrap of Styrofoam insulation into an instant kickboard for your swimming pool.

MAKE A BUOYANT TRAY FOR THE POOL • Styrofoam is nearly unsinkable. You can use the scraps from a construction project to make a drink holder or a tray that will float in your pool (but remember only use plastic cups, never glass):

To make a soda can holder, cut two pieces to the size you want the finished holder to be, then cut holes the same size as a soda can in one piece. Glue the piece with holes on top of the other piece, using a hot-glue gun.

To make a tray with a rim, just glue small strips of foam that are at least 1-inch (2.5-cm) high around the edge of a larger, tray-sized section of the material.

DID YOU KNOW?

Ask anyone what kind of material those coffee cups, packing material, cheap coolers, and other white foam products are made from and they’ll reply Styrofoam. But strictly speaking, Styrofoam, a trademark of the Dow Chemical Company, refers only to durable extruded polystyrene, like that used in the blue insulation boards familiar to anyone who’s been around a construction site. Those other more commonplace white foam items that you can easily tear or crumble are made of cheaper expanded polystyrene and are better referred to as foam plastic or styrene foam.

Recycling foam pellets

Even with lots of creative reuse, sometimes Styrofoam packing pellets keep arriving in box loads faster than they get packed out again.

If you’ve got more than you can handle, remember that packing and shipping businesses often accept clean pellets for reuse. Just call first, to confirm with them before you start delivering.

HELP SHRUBS WITHSTAND WINTER • Sometimes shrubs need a little help to survive winter’s ravages. Leftover sheets of extruded tongue-and-groove Styrofoam insulation are perfect for the job. They’re rigid, waterproof, and block wind. Here are two ways to use the material:

To give moderate protection, cut two Styrofoam sheets and lash them together to form a pup tent over the plant. To hold the pieces in place, drive bamboo garden stakes through the bottom of each piece into the ground.

For something more substantial, fit pieces together to box in your less hardy garden plants on four sides. Put a stake inside each corner and join the pieces with duct or packing tape.

Plants in containers that overwinter outdoors are more likely to survive with Styrofoam protection, too.