7 Clever Rubber Band Tricks For Everyday Use
Everyone has rubber bands at home, but these useful little stretchy loops are usually stowed away in a drawer or Mason jar where they're quickly forgotten about. But most people don't realize just how practical rubber bands actually are, and they can even solve many everyday problems!
1. Fasten Pants
Have you eaten too much and can no longer do up the button on your pants? Don't worry, a rubber band provides the perfect solution. First, guide half of the band through the button hole on your pants. Now pull one end of the rubber band through the other so that you have a loop as in the image below. Guide the loop over the button and secure it in place. This should help keep your pants up. Just make sure you're wearing a long enough sweater to cover up your handiwork!
2. Smartphone Holder
You're trying to watch a video on your smartphone, but don't have any hands free to hold it. How frustrating! If you have a bottle to hand, you're in luck though. Simply hook two rubber bands into each other as in the image and stretch one side over the left or right end of your smartphone.
Hold the smartphone up against the bottle and stretch the other side of the rubber band around the bottle to the other side of the phone. Fix the phone in place using the rubber bands. Look, you've made your own little TV tower!
3. Excess Paint Remover
When you're using a wide paintbrush, it can be very annoying to remove any excess paint on the edge of the paint bucket. You just always seem to end up with spots of paint on your clothes, too. To prevent this from happening, simply stretch a durable rubber band over the center of the bucket and scrape off excess paint there.
Now isn't that better?
4. Spoon Holder
You're trying to lean a spoon on the edge of the pot, but it keeps sliding in. Irritating! However, there is a simple solution. Wrap a rubber band around the top end of the spoon and lean it against the edge of the pot without any problems.
5. Anti-Slide Support
There are some clothes hangers that simply don't do their job. To prevent your clothes from sliding off, wrap a rubber band around each side of the hanger. This should keep all your clothes in place.
6. Screw Top Opener
The trick for all screw tops is wonderfully simple. If you're finding it hard to open the top, wrap a rubber band around it and try again. It should now come off much easier.
7. Makeshift Eraser
If you've made a mistake when drawing a picture of making some notes, there's no need to scramble around for an eraser. Simply wrap a rubber band around your finger to erase anything you've drawn or written in pencil.
As you can see, rubber bands have a lot of potential and can be used for all manner of things. Maybe you have some other ideas for using them around the house that you'd like to share with us?