Wednesday, April 22, 2009

Autumn Asks: How Earth Friendly Are You?


So its Earth Day. I notice in our town there are several places that are giving away free reusable shopping bags. One store has the newer type light bulbs on sale for a killer price (yet they are full of mercury so how earth friendly are they really???). The retailers are really jumping on this bandwagon this year.

And its a good thing.

I think the whole economy mess and most people living on less has made this a little more important in the eyes of the masses. Not that we didn't care before...but when you start to simplify more you become more aware of the damages you are doing...to more than just your credit.

Earth Day has never been a huge deal to us. Okay...and it still isn't. It is important, but I get turned off pretty easy by the people screaming about how we are killing mother earth. You know, the ones having a naked protest down by the courthouse?
I do believe we are suposed to be good stewards of our planet. I think more of us are becoming aware of the fact that we can ignore the radicals that tell you all the things we need to do. Like live in mud huts...or caves.
Eat only sprouts and beans.
Use hay for toilet paper.
Because if we aren't doing all of these things...well, we are just the devil.

I hope we are becoming more aware that we can make one change. And that is good. We aren't terrible if we only made ONE change. The mother earth police might come after us and tell us how bad we are....but hey, we made ONE change.

And one normally leads to another.

Then, before you know it, you are doing all kinds of little things that are adding up. And this is GOOD. Even if we still use airplanes.

And eat meat.
And don't have a brick in our toilet tank.

And wear leather and fur.

And own a SUV.

So, for this year, I decided to take a look at our family and see what kinds of changes we have made to be better stewards of our planet. I'm sure they are not extra extensive. And I'm not interested in the mother earth police critisim on all that I'm not doing. Because I am doing SOMETHING. Next year, I will be something else also.

But just to be clear. I DO NOT hug trees. Not even during hide-and-seek.

Our changes:

1. Making our laundry soap. Leaving the chemical overload behind. Much cheaper. To date I am happy with the cleaning power....but I reserve the right to change my mind on that in 6 months. Less pollution of water sources.

2. The expensive light bulbs. But I read they have mercury so I'm really not sure if this is better. My light bill is better...but where are we supposed to dispose of the burn-outs???

3. Plant a few veggies or other food. Cuts down on our grocery bill AND we aren't adding to the burning of fossil fuels that transport food. I never though of this before reading Animal, Vegetable, Miracle.

4.
Reusable grocery bags. Wait - big fail on this one. I have them. I forget to put them in the car. Or, if I carry them in the car I forget to take them into the store. And I'm telling you, in this town I get dirty looks for throwing them up there for the baggers. Why is that?

5. We use cloth napkins instead of paper.


It's not much. But it is something.

How about you? Have you made changes due to the economy that have in turn benefited our planet?


6 comments:

  1. today we went without lights during the day...
    I am in agreement with you. I like little changes... every little bit counts.
    I think in our family I am just trying to be "less wasteful" which I think helps too!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Buy clothes and furniture and anything practical second hand.
    Start a garden.
    Composte.
    Walk to work. It's less than a mile.
    Eat at home.
    Play a game,read a book, or do a craft instead of watch TV.

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  3. I'm not conciously earth-friendly. I may never be. But we are big on turning off electricity anywhere we're not using it, but that's mostly for our own good - a lower bill. We use the mercury light bulbs, and still don't know where to dispose of them when they burn out. We did buy a couple of those green reusable bags, but I, like you, never remember to actually use them!

    ReplyDelete
  4. My neighbor, who is an environmental engineer, told me that those light bulbs are supposed to be wrapped completely in duct tape and sent off to some kind of disposal place. He never did email me the info and I'm too lazy to look it up yet(our bulbs still have a few years left-aren't they supposed to last about 5 years?). I plan to find out because the mercury does worry me.

    We do lots of things mentioned already, buying clothing and more second hand in most cases, eating at home, using cloth towels(although my husband refuses to give up paper towels!!!), we also try to buy many of our soaps and lotions, jewelry and other things from local artists and craftspeople. It is nice to buy off of etsy and such but there is still the shipping cost. I've got a friend who sells things at a flea market once a month so I buy from her. I make gifts for Christmas, anything from quilts to scarves to homemade bath salts. That's fun as well as eco and pocketbook friendly.

    Molly

    ReplyDelete
  5. Hi Autumn, I know i haven't looked this up in a while, but here is what we are doing.
    #1, I will not use the fluorescent lights. IF they break in your house, it becomes a toxic waste site. You have to clean it up, DO NOT VACUUM!. There is a protocol for cleaning up, the first thing is to open the window to air it out. I just can't deal with that. We have no fluorescent lights at our house. There are some with less mercury than others. What I don't understand is why they are promoting those (which I have read will be the only light you will be able to buy in a couple of years) when the LED lights use LESS energy, last longer, and are not toxic. They do cost a lot more.
    #2 I have had reusable bags since dh and I got married. They used to cost $10/each. You would think by now I could remember to take the darn things in with me to the store. I don't know why people give dirty looks. I can fit way more into these bags then those plastic ones.
    #3 We use soap nuts which are totally natural and work great! You can find them online. How do you make your detergent? I can never find the washing soda to make it.
    #4 I clean only with vinegar and borax. Vinegar keeps the bugs away.
    #5 I only use natural bug killers or deterrents. There are lots of websites with the information for different bugs. Diatomascus (sp?) earth will kill anything with an exoskeleton. Pyrethium (sp again) has killed some of my fire ants. I'll try it again, but I hope I don't have to use anything else. Equal was working well for a while. DE around the ant hill at the same time seemed to kill the colonies that died. Cinnamon keeps ants away, as well as borax.
    #6 I have started grow boxes and they are working great. I would prefer a regular garden, but haven't had time or money to get it set up yet in FL. Nothing but sand here, and I thought the clay was bad.
    #7 I try to fertilize with natural ingredients. Vinegar to kill weeds (can kill grass too), though we have some pretty tough ones in our yard now, and I think we may need to resort to the regular stuff. It's killing me. Yuck!
    #8 We have a good coop here, we we are eating more organic. I'm not sure how much this helps since some of it is shipped from far away. Another reason to try to get my garden going.
    We do need to get the tv, cable box, etc set up so we can completely turn it off when we are not watching it instead of being on standby. I heard this is a pretty big part of the electric bills.
    Well, I think I used up my space!
    Mary

    ReplyDelete
  6. Hi Autumn, I know i haven't looked this up in a while, but here is what we are doing.
    #1, I will not use the fluorescent lights. IF they break in your house, it becomes a toxic waste site. You have to clean it up, DO NOT VACUUM!. There is a protocol for cleaning up, the first thing is to open the window to air it out. I just can't deal with that. We have no fluorescent lights at our house. There are some with less mercury than others. What I don't understand is why they are promoting those (which I have read will be the only light you will be able to buy in a couple of years) when the LED lights use LESS energy, last longer, and are not toxic. They do cost a lot more.
    #2 I have had reusable bags since dh and I got married. They used to cost $10/each. You would think by now I could remember to take the darn things in with me to the store. I don't know why people give dirty looks. I can fit way more into these bags then those plastic ones.
    #3 We use soap nuts which are totally natural and work great! You can find them online. How do you make your detergent? I can never find the washing soda to make it.
    #4 I clean only with vinegar and borax. Vinegar keeps the bugs away.
    #5 I only use natural bug killers or deterrents. There are lots of websites with the information for different bugs. Diatomascus (sp?) earth will kill anything with an exoskeleton. Pyrethium (sp again) has killed some of my fire ants. I'll try it again, but I hope I don't have to use anything else. Equal was working well for a while. DE around the ant hill at the same time seemed to kill the colonies that died. Cinnamon keeps ants away, as well as borax.
    #6 I have started grow boxes and they are working great. I would prefer a regular garden, but haven't had time or money to get it set up yet in FL. Nothing but sand here, and I thought the clay was bad.
    #7 I try to fertilize with natural ingredients. Vinegar to kill weeds (can kill grass too), though we have some pretty tough ones in our yard now, and I think we may need to resort to the regular stuff. It's killing me. Yuck!
    #8 We have a good coop here, we we are eating more organic. I'm not sure how much this helps since some of it is shipped from far away. Another reason to try to get my garden going.
    We do need to get the tv, cable box, etc set up so we can completely turn it off when we are not watching it instead of being on standby. I heard this is a pretty big part of the electric bills.
    Well, I think I used up my space!
    Mary

    ReplyDelete