Egg cartons are ingeniously designed to cradle very fragile cargo.

The standard model is made of molded recycled paper, but you can give that paper yet another life by reusing the cartons in these resourceful ways, many of them courtesy of those folks at "This Old House."

Start seedlings. Cut off the lid, fill each cup with potting soil and plant seeds. Once the seedlings sprout, cut apart and plant in the garden - cup and all.

For the birds. Trim off the lid, thread string through holes in each corner of the tray, fill the cups halfway with birdseed and dangle the whole shebang from a tree limb.

Fire the grill. Fill each cup halfway with sawdust, then melt candle scraps and broken crayons in a double boiler. Carefully ladle the molten wax over the sawdust and let it cool. Cut apart and each cup now can serve as a fire starter - just light the edge.

Cushion ornaments. Egg cartons are ideal for separating small, fragile Christmas ornaments for storage. Leave the lids attached this time.

In the office. An egg carton in a desk drawer is a great place to stow thumb tacks, paper clips, push pins and the like. The sliced-off lid can become a hopper for pencils, pens, markers, books of postage stamps and glue sticks.

Organize fasteners. When making appliance or other household repairs, use a carton as a repository for the screws and bolts that you've removed. Marking the cups helps ensure proper reassembly.

Sort and store. Build a little plywood cabinet into your workbench and use both halves of egg cartons as the drawers to keep small tools and those same screws and bits of hardware permanently organized.

Round up tiny lights. Spare

4-watt nightlights and Christmas bulbs won't last long if they're left rattling around in a drawer. Egg carton cups make for ideal storage. This time, keep the lid.

Manage a farm. Torn-up egg cartons are a great food source in worm farms. If the soil mix is too moist, add dry carton pieces. Too dry? Dunk them in water first.

Cool a drink. I doubt it would work with the paperboard cartons, but the plastic-foam variety double as great makeshift ice cube trays when you're stocking up for guests or planning a family fishing trip.

On another note

Ernie, a HouseWorks loyalist from Vista, Calif., dropped a note about a gadget he made to restore some damaged pipe threads.

Rather than lay out the cash for a tap he'd likely never use again, he bought an appropriately sized nipple, then hacksawed four

1-inch slots through its threads.

"I then took a punch and bent the exposed threads to the right side of the slots toward the center of the nipple," Ernie explained. "This exposed a 'cutting edge' to the left of each slot.

"I started the new tool by hand into the female threads and then simply used a pipe wrench to clean the old, damaged threads. It worked perfectly, permitting me to install a new galvanized nipple at a fraction of the cost of calling a professional plumber."

Handy and frugal, too. Our kinda guy.

Send your questions to: HouseWorks, P.O. Box 81609, Lincoln, NE 68501, or

e-mail: houseworks@journalstar.com