I also put my old blades in an old pill bottle just for safety. I sharpen my blades with a rotary blade sharpener from Tri-sharp, with limited success. I hear from other quilters that have the electric sharpener that it's not much better. Easypeasy I drilled hole in scrap block of wood to fit my seam ripper in and cut my chained-pieced blocks apart that way, it works really fast and it's cheap.