Living the Green Life
Lately I've been making efforts to be more green. I've always been good at recycling and reusing items, but for the past couple months I've been wanting to do more. Here are a few changes I've made:
*using less chemicals--I've been doing this for awhile, using greener cleaning products and natural beauty products...more on this later...
*changing light bulbs to compact flourescents, but I am concerned about the mercury that can be found in these....did you know these are considered household hazardous waste and should not be thrown away in your normal trash?
*eliminating plastic bag use and instead bringing my own reusable shopping bags--I've been really good at this when grocery shopping....it's been a little bit harder to remember when I just run in to Target, Michael's, Staples, etc. I keep these bags in the back of my car and have been trying really hard to remember to bring them in with me. Even though I have several bags, I'm considering ordering these bags as they fold up small enough to fit in your purse.
*bringing my own mug to Starbuck's
*eating organic and local...I order from Boxed Greens about once a month and get a lovely box of organic produce delivered to my door. We got a box this morning containing lettuce, collard greens, squash, parsnips, potatoes, onions, tomatoes, pears, apples, bananas and tangelos.
*reading, listening to and watching information on living green. Purchased this book at Barnes and Noble and thumbed through a couple issues of Edible Phoenix tonight.
My next big hurdle is water bottles. We drink a lot of water in plastic bottles. I know this is a problem both for the environment and for the leeching of chemicals from the plastic. There's a couple of reasons this is a hard habit to break. First of all, I'm on the go and in my car all day long. Grabbing a couple of bottles to take with me when I leave the house is a lot easier than washing and refilling. Until we get our kitchen remodel going, we won't have a water dispenser on the fridge or a water purifier under the sink or attached to the faucet. Plus, Shawn is much more likely to drink water when he can just reach in the fridge and grab a bottle and not have to pour himself a glass from a Brita pitcher. However, I am going to try to reduce my use of bottled water. I purchased this stainless water bottle at Whole Foods this week and will attempt to fill this and take it with me all week next week. Not sure how this will work during the summer though when it's a million degrees in my car....
All in all I think it's about making a series of little changes. Doing things one step at a time so you can break old habits and keep new ones and ultimately make a small difference because of your changes and efforts.
*using less chemicals--I've been doing this for awhile, using greener cleaning products and natural beauty products...more on this later...
*changing light bulbs to compact flourescents, but I am concerned about the mercury that can be found in these....did you know these are considered household hazardous waste and should not be thrown away in your normal trash?
*eliminating plastic bag use and instead bringing my own reusable shopping bags--I've been really good at this when grocery shopping....it's been a little bit harder to remember when I just run in to Target, Michael's, Staples, etc. I keep these bags in the back of my car and have been trying really hard to remember to bring them in with me. Even though I have several bags, I'm considering ordering these bags as they fold up small enough to fit in your purse.
*bringing my own mug to Starbuck's
*eating organic and local...I order from Boxed Greens about once a month and get a lovely box of organic produce delivered to my door. We got a box this morning containing lettuce, collard greens, squash, parsnips, potatoes, onions, tomatoes, pears, apples, bananas and tangelos.
*reading, listening to and watching information on living green. Purchased this book at Barnes and Noble and thumbed through a couple issues of Edible Phoenix tonight.
My next big hurdle is water bottles. We drink a lot of water in plastic bottles. I know this is a problem both for the environment and for the leeching of chemicals from the plastic. There's a couple of reasons this is a hard habit to break. First of all, I'm on the go and in my car all day long. Grabbing a couple of bottles to take with me when I leave the house is a lot easier than washing and refilling. Until we get our kitchen remodel going, we won't have a water dispenser on the fridge or a water purifier under the sink or attached to the faucet. Plus, Shawn is much more likely to drink water when he can just reach in the fridge and grab a bottle and not have to pour himself a glass from a Brita pitcher. However, I am going to try to reduce my use of bottled water. I purchased this stainless water bottle at Whole Foods this week and will attempt to fill this and take it with me all week next week. Not sure how this will work during the summer though when it's a million degrees in my car....
All in all I think it's about making a series of little changes. Doing things one step at a time so you can break old habits and keep new ones and ultimately make a small difference because of your changes and efforts.
4 comments:
This is good Erin!
I love the bags! We don't receive bags for free here. We usualy have to pay €0,10 - 0.25 ct for a bag. That helps bringing your own with you.
To become more green, at work we stopped drinking coffee out of cartons, we bought mugs and a dishwasher...we were very dissapointed to reed that this isn't helping much. Because of all the water and the energie...:-(
i bought grocery bags as well. i've remembered once and forgotten a few too many times, but it's something i can do to help. i'll let you know when it's a regular habit. and good for you! :)
I really like those bags from red envelope...I might have to get them too:)
Yay!! I'm playing your game too. I love even though we are far apart - we seem to do the same types of things in daily life. Miss you...
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