Making your household products more green

(WTNH) -- This is Environment Awareness Month and since Sunday is Earth Day here are some creative ways to use products that will make your house a little greener and give you more bang for your buck.

Organizing expert Lisa Lelas gives some suggestions for how to re-purpose some of your household products.

• Turn an old golf bag into a garden caddy in your garage. It's the perfect size and vertical shape to hold long garden tools. The side pockets are great for storing small garden clippers and work gloves.

• Paper lawn bags are great for indoors too because they stand up and make it easy to toss things in. Use them for Spring clutter clean-outs (clothes to Goodwill, toys to toss or donate, and office paperwork, etc.)

• Clothes pins are great organizers. Glue one onto a magnet to serve as a reminder clip on the refrigerator, or use them as electrical cord organizers.

• Lemon juice for cleaning. Add a half cup to the wash cycle of towels, sheets, or shirts to brighten whites.

• Vinegar to fluff sweaters. Add a few capsules of white vinegar to the rinse cycle to fluff up all your summer sweaters.

• Chopsticks in the laundry room. Use them as a lint remover for hard to reach dryer lint traps.

• Dryer sheets to help you sew. Run a threaded needle through a dryer sheet to prevent tangles in the thread when sewing or hand mending.

• A kitchen colander in the sink is not just for pasta anymore. They work well for washing and rinsing fine hand washables, keeping the fabric safe from any chemical cleanser residue on the sink.

• A salad spinner is great as a quick sweater dryer.

• Newspapers tucked into your winter boots stored for the season, to absorb any moisture and odors.

• Flat iron your clothes, not just your hair. These are great for quick iron touch ups for hard to reach wrinkles in-between buttons on shirts, etc.

• Rub salt with a lemon peel to clear stains in coffee mugs and iron bottoms.

• When ironing shirts, sprinkle baby powder on collars and underarm areas to help prevent oil and grime from staining the fabric.

• Aluminum foil under the garment while ironing, smoothes out wrinkles faster.

• Baking soda is not just for cooking. Use it as linen refreshers where you store your sheets and towels. Sprinkle on carpets before vacuuming too.

• Gift wrap tissue for traveling. Wrap clothes in tissue paper when placing them in suitcase to help prevent wrinkles.