When cleaning out your pantry for your local food bank, you might think canned food past its expiration date can't be donated. But the reality is that you can donate these items. The expiration date is actually a best-if-used-by date, meaning the manufacturer only guarantees freshness up to that date. It does not mean the food is expired or bad. Food banks encourage you to still donate canned food as long as the can isn't dented, bulging or rusted.

Buying vintage clothes, bags and shoes is a great way to create personal style and reuse something at the same time. But sometimes vintage clothes can smell like, well, vintage clothes. To get rid of musky odors for items that are hard to wash, reach for your cat's must-have item: kitty litter. The same activated charcoal in kitty litter that absorbs odor can eliminate smells from your vintage finds, too. For bags and luggage, just dump a few cups inside, close it up and let it sit for a week or so. For clothes, just fill a garbage bag with clothes and sprinkle kitty litter inside. Seal it up for a week to give everything a fresh smell.

When shopping for a new car, there are lots of options to consider when finding the most fuel-efficient vehicle. One of those choices is the exterior color of your car. A study by the Berkeley Lab's Environmental Energy Technologies Division looked at two identical cars in different colors. One was a lighter silver shade, and the other one was black. When sitting in the hot sun, the lighter car used 13 percent less energy to cool down in comparison to the black vehicle. Overall, a lighter color car -- silver or white -- saves on average about 2 percent in gas and helps extend the life of your battery, too.