Friday, January 1, 2010

Greenolutions

I have to give credit to Best of Mother Earth who had such a great post that it inspired me. Have you came up with your New Years resolution? How about this year start a greenolution? What is that exactly? Well its some goals you set for yourself this year to get more green. I know at first it seems too hard to do all these green things. I promise once you start, it will be hard to stop. I have been green my whole life but it wasn't until last year that I really started challenging myself. This whole blog started with zip lock sandwich bags. Yep, those nasty plastic things.
I challenge you to make some greenolutions. Here are a few easy and simple things you can do to be greener with little or no effort.
1. Stop buying paper towels and invest in some fabric napkins . Yeah for saving tree's!
2. Stop buying paper plates/cups and use your own. Just wash them. Yeah for saving tree's!
3. No plastic sandwich bags. Use glass bowls with lids or your own bowl and cover with a plate. No more toxic plastic!
4. Make your own laundry soap. Saves on plastic and keeps money in your wallet. (I will blog the recipe soon!)
5. Buy in bulk. No paper packaging means more tree's! Did I mention it saves you some cash?
6. Pick weeds manually instead of toxic chemicals sprayed in your lawn. Remember, your kids play in your yard. You want them exposed to them? no!
7. Start a garden. Saves you money!
8. Line dry your clothes whenever possible. Saves energy!
9. Start recycling everything!
10. Buy Eco friendly products. You can get everything from hair products, cleaners, trash bags, muffin papers, sandwich bags, etc. There are thousands of options now!
11. Buy Eco friendly products as gifts. There are so many options out there now so look for them.

I blog about these options all year round so just keep reading my blog and maybe I can inspire you to live greener. If not for yourself, but for your children. We live our world for their world. Here are my greenolitions for 2010.

1. Make my laundry soap always. I sometimes find great deals on soap but when I think about it, I still save money if I make it myself. Plus I'm not having to recycle those huge plastic jugs. Recipe soon to be blogged.

2. Slowly but surely rid myself of all plastic/Tupperware. I know! Anyone who knows me, knows that I am a huge Tupperware fanatic. I am very sad but I know its for the best. Plastic of any kind is just bad in my opinion. Why do I keep collecting them? They bring back childhood memories and that's it. There is no other reason but that. I cannot heat Tupperware in the microwave due to me not knowing if the new or old Tupperware contain BPA. Most of mine is vintage so who knows. Also I have to hand wash all of it or it will start to warp. Too much work and all will be replaced with glass. One glass comes in and one Tupperware goes out. I am still sad about this but I'm sure I will get over it.

3. Utilize all space in my garden. My garden was built by the previous owner and its more for visual look than practical use. This year I will be planning my whole garden. I know what needs to be planted where, I plan to move some planter beds, and plant things in other places. My husband is not crazy about this last one but likes that I am saving money by growing things. I will keep you posted later when the planning starts.

4. No new buys. I sometimes will just go buy the item because I cannot find it in thrift stores. Bad bad me. Sometimes I have no patience and just go buy it new. This year I plan on sticking to my original plan. I will keep a list of things I need for my house on me at all times. Kitchen gadgets or whatever. Clothing I will go through what we do have and write down what we don't have. Note to self:remember to add sizes. For now I will find most in thrift shops but summer time rolls around and I'm hitting up all the garage and yard sales!

5. Replace all windows in my home. This is gonna be an expensive but much needed item to do. Our 1967 home has very large and odd shape windows. Did I mention a lot of them? Yeah. 9 large windows, 1 slider door which will be replaced by french doors, and maybe our garage windows. My home has original aluminum framed windows that let in a ton of cold air and my home is constantly drafty. Plastic on our windows was our only option ( I looked...literally everywhere) and it has stopped the drafts. I cannot wait for our house to be warm and cozy all year.

6. Remove all ugly wallpaper from my girls rooms. One is 100% covered in wallpaper, one has 2 tacky wall paper borders, and one has half wooden panels. All paper will be removed and rooms will be painted with Eco friendly paint.

7. Hopefully we get to my kitchen. It needs new counters (harvest gold just isn't my color) and new floors. All but the cabinets were redone in the 70's. So its all outta here!Cabinets are in great condition so we will keep them and maybe paint them. I would love a recycled counter that Ive seen on so many do it yourself shows. Would love a pot and pan rack hanging on the ceiling. I need a new to me fridge, put our old one in the garage for extra storage and need a new to me dishwasher. Mine currently only washes stuff on the bottom rack. Ugggg. What a waste of water. Would love to put cork flooring down in there but the hubby is so against it. Still working on that one.

8. Chickens. Yes, I want them! Again the hubby is against them "BUT" my neighbor next to me wants them too and we could go in together and put the coup on the fence we both share and could both take care of them. We use up a ton of eggs and this would be so much healthier and Eco friendly in so many ways.

This was just my list I made today, I'm sure more will be added as the year goes. I hope Ive inspired you and would love to hear any greenolitions you might have! Leave a comment and share with everyone. Who knows, maybe I will get inspired by you!

p.s.
Check out Best of Mother Earth and get inspired just like I do!

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