Grab one of those charity bags which are always dropping on to your doormat, start upstairs, and room by room, cupboard by cupboard, drawer by drawer, go through each of them. Anything that you haven't used or you've forgotten you had could be one for the charity bag.

There's lots of different ways you can reuse things, rather than throwing them away, especially if you’re crafty (or know someone who is). How about upcycling some old furniture and using it for your garden? An extra chair will always come in handy for outdoor gatherings when the weather is fine.

Some other top tips:

• Tear up any old clothes with holes in them and use them for cloths. Even better, once you’ve used them for cleaning you can throw them in the washer and use them again for next time.
• If you've found any old Christmas cards hanging around you could make them into gift tags to be used on all your gifts this year. Save it for a rainy day and you’ll fill in a quick 30 minute slot until the sun comes back out.
• Any paper that you have only used on one side - and this could apply to your junk mail too - could be added to a scrap paper pile for doing your shopping lists, kids colouring in, or maybe those all-important to-do lists so you can tick them off as you go!

If you're doing so much cleaning that you finish your cleaning products, loads of your household plastic empties can be recycled. You can check the full list on the what goes in my blue-lid bin? page, and if there's something you're not sure about, you can always look on Recycle Now for more advice. Give them a quick rinse and pop them straight into your blue lid recycling bin ready to be picked up on your next bin collection day.