Washing Tinfoil, Using Margarine Tubs as "Tupperware," and Sewing Pretty Cardboard

I still do many of the make-do type of things my grandmother did. If "tinfoil," which I guess we now know as aluminum foil, is not very soiled after use -- for example, if it was just used to shield some baked squash from getting too brown -- I wash it and put it into the warm oven to finish drying. 

If you peek in my fridge, you'll think I eat an awful lot of margarine and am afraid of running out. There are little tubs of "I Can't Believe It's Not Butter" sitting on every shelf. The real tub of margarine is always kept in the little butter area on the door! Everything else is holding bacon grease, leftover black olives, baby carrots floating in chicken broth (for the plump doggies to snack on) and so on. 

Maybe this was common in the 1960s only where I grew up, but we had wallets, coasters, collapsing coin holders, and recipe-holders sewn from pretty cardboard. Many department stores placed blouses, shirts, and so forth in lightweight cardboard boxes, usually printed with the store name or initials. Others had fancier boxes with all-over patterns, and the five-and-dime had stationery boxes that were just divine. I remember some gorgeous shoe-boxes as well, back when all shoes were expensive. 

My grandmother would desconstruct the printed cardboard boxes and cut out pieces for useful items, then sew them. Many times, she would sew through a double-thickness of cardboard, with two different patterns, so that the item was "lined." But for some items, it was just a single thickness with the pretty side of the cardboard "out." Sometimes she'd rub beeswax onto the cardboard to "seal" it and make it more durable. Sometimes she used crochet to connect the pieces. Until it fell to dust, I had a sweet basket she had crocheted from the fronts of Christmas cards.

In keeping with that tradition, I have been making both flat and stuffed hearts to make into a garland for the wall. I used part of a lovely old cardboard gift bag that a friend from India gave me years ago. Coral and blue aren't the usual Valentine colors, but they go very well with my Southwest home, and in my stash of collage materials I had paper flowers in all the right hues. Most of all, I just love make-do's. My mind is so happy and engaged, full of memories of my grandmother, when I'm doing the same handiwork she did so long ago. 

I wonder if anyone else has unusual and extremely thrifty little ways that were handed down to them or that they discovered?