The overwhelming majority of plastic gift cards sold (some 75 million pounds a year) can easily be recycled through a free program called Swipe It. Swipe It lets you collect and send in all of your old and used cards to be recycled into new plastic products. All you have to do is visit swipeit.com, enter the number of gift cards you want to recycle and mail them in. One other idea is to invest in gift cards that can be recharged and reused by the retailer. When the balance is up, you can reload it and give the gift card to someone else as a present.

It's an old-fashioned tip that works: Turn off the lights when you leave a room to save money and electricity. But it's an easy thing to forget, especially for young kids in the house. One idea to get kids' attention is to invest in colorful switch plates that come in vibrant colors like green, purple, pink and blue. They help remind them to turn off the lights when leaving a room. And if you can, invest in dimmer switches for light fixtures that are usually on. Lowering the light level means less energy is used, and the life span of the light bulbs will be longer, too.

With summer around the corner, the Environmental Protection Agency has tips on how to properly fill up your car's gas tank, especially during hot, sunny days. Try to fill up when it's coolest -- like in the morning or night -- since any accidental spillage of gasoline will evaporate right into the atmosphere when it's warmer outside. When gasoline evaporates, it becomes a vapor that contributes to bad ozone and toxic air pollution. And don't top off the tank after the gas pump automatically stops. Your car needs extra room in the tank to allow the gasoline to expand. If you top if off, extra gas will escape into your car's vapor collection system, which wastes both money and fuel.