Baby food jars are a favorite for spices and for taking salad dressings to work for our lunches! They’re such perfect little containers. And like you, our friends are more than happy to set them aside for us.

I frequent the bulk bins at my coop and like to use the brown bottles from vitamins. I also use jars from olives, peanut butter and the like. If you’ve got extra lids for the baby food jars an old garage tip for storing screws and the like involves nailing the baby food jar lids to the underside of cabinets and simply twisting the glass on and off (this doesn’t help with the “keeping them out of light” part)

I love reusing baby food jars for spices, too!! I like the little 2.5oz meat jars for some of my less used spices so that I don’t buy too much of spices I won’t use fast enough (I like to buy my spices bulk so I can get more of what I use more of and less of what I use less of… and no packaging, since I already have sturdy containers).

Here’s a nice way to make them personal and nifty:

http://lifehacker.com/5188977/make-your-own-etched-glass-storage-jars

I used bottles that herbal capsules had come in for spices. Assorted other jars are holding my (extensive, gluten free) flours and such, old coat hangers do for a DIY hatrack, and a giant cottage cheese container is currently holding made-from-scratch veggie stock in the freezer.

I love and adore re-purposing!

I like the etching cream concept from CK above. I’ve been thinking about chalkboard paint for metal tins (oatmeal, tea) so I can erase and rewrite the contents as they change. But I wonder if I could get the paint in a small enough size so as not to be wasteful.

…although I could always pass on the magnetic paint to friends who would like to use it too.

I saw a cool project where someone had painted the tops of the lids with chalkboard paint or a square on the side of the jar so you could write the contents on there.

For the record, the spices don’t degrade THAT quickly in light-if you’re using them within 6 months. Whole spices will do even better. I store bulk spices away in the dark, but keep smaller amounts out in the open where I can get at them.

Another easy way to deal with this problem: use opaque jars! If you are concerned that you won’t be able to see how much is left in the jar, you could try amber-colored jars as well.