Those of you who know me well, know that I am a "green" person, or I try to be as best as I can. I think that being eco-conscious is extremely important. We only get 1 world, why not take care of it? So in honor of Earth day I wanted to post a few easy ways for everyone to be a little "greener" everyday.
1. RECYCLE! It's not hard! Once you get in the routine of putting your recycleables in a certain spot and dropping them off, it's easy! You won't even have to think about it anymore. Here are my bins:
Aren't they cute!? I got them from the Container Store online. Click
here to check them out. I love that they stack up and have lids and fit into the smallest of spaces. Even my little "laundry room".
2. Use reuseable bags! I looooove my bags. I have a million of them! Just think of how terrible plastic bags are for the environment. Those things take soo long to decompose. You may think it's 1 bag for a quick trip to Wal-Mart, but that thing is going to be on the Earth for a very long time. I know the reuseable ones cost money. But what's $1 for a bag in the grand scheme of things. I have mine in the back of my car and try to always remember to take them into stores with me. Using bags is also cost efficient. You can actually save money at lots of stores for using them. At Dillon's here in Topeka, I save 5 cents for every bag I bring. I realize that doesn't sound like a lot, but when I'm going to restock our fridge and take 7 or 8 bags, that's 35 cents I could save. Recently my sister gave me a nice bag to take my lunch to work in.
Isn't it cute!? I love it! And it's insulated for cold things. I have to get where she got it from again and I'll post a link to the site so you can get one too!
3. Plant something! There are so many benefits of planting trees and flowers. One, they're pretty, and two, they give us oxygen! Which in my book is a pretty damn good reason to exert some energy and work in my yard.
4. Go organic! Or at least some of the time. For financial reasons I'm not able to be 100% organic all the time, but I do cook with organic products when I can. Whether you agree that organic food is worth it, I just feel better about putting a few less chemicals in my body. My favorite thing in the world to do on a Saturday morning is to grab a coffee and head down to the farmers' market. To be honest, I haven't been able to go since I've lived in Topeka, but in Manhattan I went all the time. I love it! You know where your food is coming from and you're supporting local farmers, which is all around good in my book!
5. UNPLUG! Did you know that your appliances use energy even when they're not on? That's money right down the tubes. So just unplug them. In our apartment we unplug and put away things like the toaster, coffee maker and hair dryer. It's such an easy and small thing to do.
6. Change your bulbs! Switching from regular incandescent light bulbs to the compact flourescent bulbs is the easiest, greenest thing you can do. They may cost more initially but they use 75% less energy and last 10 times longer than normal bulbs. We've tried to just switch out 1 bulb at a time here, so we don't have to spend a lot on switching them all at once.
7. Do full loads! Always wait until your dishwasher or washer and dryer are completely full to start a load. Nothing irritates me more when I open the dryer to find that someone has washed a load that consists of a pair of jeans and a few shirts. Ah! Also, use cold water. Your clothes get just as clean but you don't have to use all the energy to heat the water, which in turn makes your energy bill lower. If you wash two fewer loads of clothes and one fewer load of dishes a week you can save up to 4,500 gallons of water a year. Whoa! I also read somewhere that running those larger appliances in the evenings, uses less energy. I need to do more research on that to find out if it's true, but until I find out it's not, I'm going to start my dishwasher before I go to bed.
Okay I'll get off my soap box now. Environmentalism is just something that I'm very passionate about. If I had a blog like Pioneer Woman, I would most definitely have a "Green" tab to put ways to decrease your carbon footprint on. But I don't, so until then you'll just have to hear me rant on here! If you want to know more about being green, especially for women, read the book "Gorgeously Green" by Sophie Uliano. It completely changed how I see makeup and all of our beauty products. You would not believe the crap they put in all that stuff! So check that book out!
Now I'll leave you with some pretty pictures! Since this is a photo blog!
I have to be honest... Luke took this picture. He's very proud of it, and should be, it's really good!
Now why wouldn't you want to do all you can to save places like that! Remember, we didn't inherit the earth from our ancestors, we're borrowing it from our children. So don't mess it up!
