Recently I found some awesome deals on nail files, and went a little crazy buying them. For whatever reason I felt I needed them in my stockpile! I purchased a few very large packages of those cute little nail files, and now I have literally hundreds of those things. Of course it’s great, because I keep losing them and then I always have more, which is perfect; I tend to lose things easily. However, what I did figure out is that a nail file has a whole plethora of additional uses, besides just filing your fingernails.
A nail file is essentially just a small piece of sturdy board with a fine grain sand paper attached to it. This leaves the possibilities open and endless.
Scrapbooking
The first thing I tried my nail files out on was my scrapbooking and card making projects. It gives a very light distressed look to the cardstock when you file it gently. Looks great and is very controlled, unlike using a big piece of sand paper.
Need some other ideas? Just read on…
Make Up
Nail files are particularly handy when your powder compact gets hard. This applies to powder of any kind – eye shadow, blush, and face powder. You can gently rub a nail file across the powder to help loosen it a bit, and its all good to go again. You can also use the nail file to help gently sharpen eye liner and lip liner pencils.
Rough Edges
Wooden, plastic, glass and crystal items sometimes have rough edges or get small chips in them. Use a nail file gently to smooth down the rough spots. Works great, and the item won’t cut or snag on anything.
Sharpening
Obviously because of a nail files fine grain sandpaper quality, it can be used to sharpen blades, sewing machine needles, knives and other items that frequently need to be sharpened. Just gently pull it across the item in one direction a few times, and the item will be good as new.
Erasers
As a writer, I must go through erasers like crazy. And every once in awhile I get an eraser that gets dirty fast or gets too smooth and just smears the pencil across the paper. My old trick, which works wonderfully, is to run the pencil eraser across a piece of clothing or carpet to roughen it or clean it up a bit. However, I also found that a nail file can have the same effect without the fear of staining the garment I’m rubbing it on. Try it, and you’ll be surprised.
Remember, that any project that uses sand paper, can also be accomplished with a nail file, because that is essentially what the nail file is made of!
Any other terrific ideas to share using your nail files?
For more terrific articles on using common household items in other ways, you can visit my blog, or the frugal blog here at families.com.
To learn more about stockpiling, please visit the DEALS section right here on families.com!