What to do with Old Business Cards ?

 Things change; we move, change jobs, change our cable provider, email address etc.  So what do we do with old, outdated business cards ? This is a dilemma I am now faced with.

You see, not long ago I ordered a box of 500 business cards for my etsy shop, AlmostPrecious. (The box of cards in the left of photo below)

Then I opened a second shop, DellaMessina handcrafted jewelry, and had to order another box of 500 cards for that endeavor. 

Since I also place my jewelry into local boutiques and galleries I have a box of cards for those establishments that make no reference to my online shops, the owners of shops and galleries prefer it that way  (wouldn't want to have their customers contact me privately about purchasing a piece and skipping over the middleman's 40% commission).

 

As I said; things change.  Not long after I received all these cards we had a change in our cable provider which resulted in a change of email addresses and now I have hundreds of outdated business cards.  Sure I could paste a sticker over the old information but that looks tacky and  unprofessional, therefore I went online to see what ingenious ideas others had come up with to utilize these tiny bits of card-stock and ink.  Truthfully there weren't many novel ideas. 

One could use them to jot down an address or phone number.
Keep them to list what pantry supplies or craft supplies you're running low on. 
Use them to shim up a wobbly restaurant table (we've all experienced one of those teeter-totter tables and had to resort to using paper table napkins, packets of sugar or sugar substitutes to even out the imbalance). 
Some suggested using them to make your own set of playing cards.
Donate them to a local school's art teacher.
Use them for bookmarks.
Wallpaper a room with them. ( Uh - don't think so !)
Clip them to one's bicycle so the card would hit the spokes of the wheel, making a noise. (We're all pretty familiar with that one.)

Okay so there's a lot of . . . well , a lot of suggestions . . . but was there something truly useful that one could do with old business cards? 
If one made handcrafted paper, maybe the cards could be shredded, soaked and transformed into some type of paper . . . can that be done with glossy cards ? 
Someone suggested shredding them to use as packing filler in packaging. 
Also one could make teeny, tiny little paper airplanes.  Not sure that they would fly very far and I doubt that I need a fleet of close to a 1,000 of them !

However I did run across an interesting idea . . .  constructing little boxes with them.

 

 

Though it is a bit novel, I have no inkling at all as to what I would do with a hundred or so of these little boxes.  I'd love to hear your suggestions on how to use old business cards . . . or even what one could do with these little business card cubes. 

To learn how to make your own little business card cubes (if you're so inclined) you may visit : Ned Batchelder

Since I posted the photo of this little fellow I thought I should follow through and give some information about him or her.

It was back in December and my daughter was here enjoying time away from New York city and absorbing some of our warmer weather.  We spotted the little creature meandering across our driveway and naturally (being the annoying paparazzi that we are) we ran to get our cameras.

Little turtle was trying to find it way back to the sanctuary of our neighbor's pond.

 

Of course in the photo above the level of the pond was down because it had been awhile since we had a good, hard rain.  Naturally the water level fluctuates and below is a photo of how the pond looked when Tropical Storm Issac can roaring through.

 

You can tell that the pond's center island has shrunk considerably, what you can not see is that somewhere along the fence line is a shallow gully where Little Turtle can slip in and out of.  Unfortunately Little Turtle often has trouble remembering just where that shallow gully is and that's what happened on this bright and sunny day in December.

Little Turtle had lost its way and was wandering further from the safety of its pond.

We let it roam around a bit, hoping  that eventually it would find the entrance back to our neighbors pond but in the end my daughter took pity on the moss covered little creature, she carried it over to the fence line and directed it to the gully where it could return to its home.  Wish I had taken some photo of Little Turtles rescue but, alas, I did not.

Fe - Fi - Fo - Fum

 

Yeah I admit it, I've been grumpy lately. Grumpy might be putting it mildly, perhaps more like Oscar the Grouch on steroids.

 

Recently I realized it is more than just being grumpy. I find that I don't want to go anywhere, do anything, see anyone or talk with anyone. Nothing seems to make me happy and even things I normally enjoy doing aren't giving me pleasure. If I were a turtle I'd swim to the bottom of the deepest pond, settle down into its soft, muddy bed, tuck my head inside my shell and remain there for as long as possible.

 

Also the fact that my hubby was recently diagnosed with prostate cancer has definitely contributed to my lackluster spirit. So yes, grumpy is now beginning to look a lot like depression. Fortunately my hubby is basically in good health and the cancer is in its first stage. According to the urologist it is a very slow growing cancer, so John is a prime candidate for low dose chemo therapy, which minimizes the side affects and damage to nearby healthy tissue. He will begin treatment in March and will have to have low dose radiation treatments daily for nine weeks.

 

Hopefully my mood will improve soon - if not I guess I'll need to see my doctor or a therapist . . . or both! Until then please do be patient with me and forgive me for my "downer" blog postings. I realize that 99.9% of blog readers want a happy, chirpy post, full of motivation and inspiration and though I must admit I have never been a constantly perky, perpetually cheery individual, I have never been this down for this long.

Wishing you all well and wishing you happiness.