June 13, 2007

How is your green challenge going?

I am no where close to some others but at least I am trying. Let's see how I am doing.

Electric bill - I have not bought any special light bulbs yet, I am waiting for some light bulbs to burn out. I would hate to waste a perfectly good light bulb. But maybe this weekend I will buy a couple and replace a few. I am also turning the lights off a lot more than I use to. The clothes line is working great, I have only been running the dryer for maybe 2 hours the whole weekend instead of all day Saturday and all day Sunday. Now if I could get Joe to hang the clothes out when he does laundry in the middle of the week - that would be accomplishment. (Not gonna happen!!) I tried to wash all of our clothes on cold and was not happy. I know the clothes will get much cleaner if I use warm.

Gas for the car - Joe and I are pretty much using my car only. I ride my bike to work as much as possible and he takes my car the rest of the time so instead of paying for gas for 2 cars we are only paying gas for one car. But it seems as if we are filling it up more, trips to Lake City for my 10K run (over 120 miles round trip), trip to Crested Butte to go for a hike (60 miles round trip). I estimated that we spend about 70 gallons total on gas per month - I am keeping track of how often we fill up and how many gallons so I will see at the end of the month.

Plastic Grocery Bags - I have two canvas bags that I take to the store every time and I try to remember to bring left over plastic bags. Hey mom - if you any extra, spare canvas bags laying around I would love it if you would mail them to me!! I should have about 10 canvas bags, that way when I do a full load at the grocery store I am set - no more plastic bags. I have also been using a reusable bag for Mikayla. I am on the look out for a cute lunch bag for me and a different one for her.

Garbage/Compost/ Recycle - I recycle everything that I can and it is not much - plastic 1 and 2, clear, green and brown glass, tin cans and aluminium cans. I do wonder how much actually gets recycled in a small town. The clear and green glass just go to help cover the landfill! I need to reuse more glass containers and plastic containers as well - especially the ones that I cannot recycle. I needed more TP so I bought recycled TP and I plan on keeping this up. My grocery store does not offer recycled paper towels - otherwise I would buy these as well. I have invested in a lot of towels so I am using cloth towels for cleaning the kitchen, napkins, cleaning the house and anything I would have used paper towel for in the past I am using cloth towels. I need with the compost pile. If you have any advice please let me know. I am looking for something small (garbage can), dogs cannot get into, does not smell, and if a potential home buyer (our house if for sale) would not know what it is. That brings me to my next question - if I start composting now (I would use it for kitchen scraps) is it worth the while if we sell our house in the next couple of months and we move across the country? I would not transport compost material.

That is it for now.

4 comments:

Unknown said...

I would definitely start a compost pile. You could simple purchase a metal garbage bin and drill a few holes for air circulation. We put veggie and fruit scraps,egg shells, coffe grounds, and grass clippings in ours. I turn it ever few days to help the matter break down.

Ours came with the house when we bought it five years ago, and I love it!

Alexis said...

Hi Tiffany. I wasn't sure where to post this. LOL Thanks for your comment regarding sex ed for our boys. We do what we can... the problem is I sometimes think the schools think that the kids need to know things before we think they do. Luckily the kind of relationship we have with out kids, we let the conversations buck and boy... you should hear some of our supper conversations ( esp thurs after sex ed)LOL. WE are very lucky with the school that our kids attend. I think that makes all the difference! Thanks again for your comment and concern, I do agree with you, we need to be teaching our kids these things, not the schools. HUGSSSS

Terri@SteelMagnolia said...

We've had a compost bin for years now ... one at home and one in Beaver...

We also recycle everything...
I think I have more recycling than regular garbage...I don't understand the people that don't recycle!

I don't buy those weird light bulbs b/c of the mercury... so,
I'll stick with the ones that I have now.

It's 110 degrees today.. so I don't leave my house in the summer!! If I did, I wouldn't be riding my bike, not here in L.V. anyway.... it's too HOTTTTT!!
I don't drive around very much... so, I don't waste gas.

We do what we can.

I'm just afraid the government is trying to start taxing us on this carbon footprint deal... I don't trust em.

Unknown said...

Great progress on your green efforts...makes a lot of sense. I too have been riding my bike more, walking and decline a bag when offered at the store to help out my flow of garbage. Every little bit helps out for sure.

Also, things on the farm are going great from a back to basics perspective and if I could only buy more and afford more, I would be protecting more of the environment through private ownership to drive a green way of life.