As in Ryland's case, I also use the backside of random pieces of paper for shopping lists, notes, diagrams when doing a small renovation. Here in Warsaw, for the last few years wrapping gifts has become less and less popular. People prefer to use paper bags. Of course, not the kind you find in US supermarkets, but nice decorative thick walled bags with string handles. A lot of people use them because it's easier to put something in a bag than to wrap it in paper, we use them because after taking the present out they're like new. We use them for any occasion: X-mas, birthday, nameday, party gifts, etc., and always put the namecard on the handle, so it can be torn off and the bag reused. I hate it when someone writes on the bag with a marker!
Looking around the house yesterday I saw that we use an old plastic container instead of a scoop for the dogfood. We use a 5yo 1.5 liter bottle for watering plants. We have a 15cm cube of styrofoam under the washer to keep it lifted when we need access. I'm using disposable chop-sticks for three years now. We have a whole bowl of rubberbands and twist ties from packaging. We have at least three chipped mugs which are now pen holders. We buy a lot of food at the farmer's market, where there is less packaging, plus we bring our own bags and egg boxes, further reducing trash. Tin boxes from cookies and candies are now the homes of sewing needles and thread, safety pins, screws, nails, etc. After remodelling the kitchen we had a lot of cabinets to dispose of, the sides of which are now shelves in the basement.
Since I often have to eat lunch in town, and I don't always have time to sit down at a restaurant with real utensiles, so I carry a fork in my backpack. A few months ago I didn't have that fork with me and had to use a plastic one. It hurt. Real bad. But then I noticed that I can lick it just as clean as the steel one, so now the plastic fork lives in my other backpack. Thanks to both of them I've saved about 30-40 plastic forks from the landfill. Similar situation when I go to donate blood: they used to give water in 0.33 liter bottles, but thankfully recently switched to reusable 20 liter jugs. Unfortunately, you drink from it with disposable cups, some people using 2 cups at a time (one before, one after donating). I bring my own cup (with a vampire on it - the nurses just love it
).
But there is only a certain amount of trash you can reuse - you only need 2-3 penholders for years at a time, but you produce trash continuosly. And today there is more and more packaging, so reducing is becoming harder (unless you start organicly growing your own food and stop buying your children presents). Reusing is better than recycling, and there is a company which collects packaging and reuses it without going through the whole recycling process. The company is
TerraCycle.