One Small Change- April

It's Earth Month!  The celebration and communication of our love for the planet is circulating this month!  Which in our household is EVERY month but this month always has an extra focus on the earth, with planting and being outside more.  We have a lot planned this month for our changes that will lessen our carbon footprint.  I can't wait to get to it.  

For those who are new to my blog...I am part of a campaign that challenges people to make a eco-friendly change monthly.  It doesn't have to be big, just something that will lessen your carbon footprint.  Check my first One Small Change blog here or the One Small Change Blog to read more about it. I just learned that the blog who hosts One Small Change has chosen to end One Small Change blog to allow more time for herself and her family.  I am sad to see it go but totally understand where she is coming from, I have felt the need to do this a few times.  I think I will continue my own little version of One Small Change, because it helps me to write and share about my goals and wishes for this planet.  I might call it something different but I will keep you informed with it in May. 

As usual, I am doing more than just one small change.  I just find that there is so much to do that I can't pick just one thing!  Here is my long yet fun list of changes for the month:

• Making my own green, toxic free, all purpose cleaner and bathroom cleaner.  We only buy toxic free and green cleaners in our home but I thought I would try making my own.  It will be less packaging and better for our bodies & the environment.  I am in the middle of researching the best way to do this.  Before April ends, I will post my recipe, pictures, and how it went.   Once I get these done, I will move onto other cleaners and household products.  My goal: removing most or all toxins out of my home! 
• We are doing two tree plantings!  One is in my parents backyard.  The other is at a local park.  My son will be involved with both.  I strongly believe that children should be a part of helping our beautiful earth at an early age.  They are our future!  We have already done one planting in February and he loved it.  
• The city is also putting on a Nature Walk at a local park for 3 and 4 year olds.  My son and I will go check it out! 
• Attending an awesome Earth Day celebration, that City Repair puts on every year.  The event will be full of booths with sustainable living information, music, food, kids activities, community art projects, and community service projects.  We will make this a family day and enjoy the celebration of our earth and all that live on it. 
• For Easter, we will be making our own natural toxic-free color dye to decorate our eggs with.  We will definitely take some pictures and post them.  
• I am also continuing my "green" spring cleaning.  I am actually going to dedicate a whole blog about this, because its a fun subject with a lot to write about.   

Wow....that is a lot!  I like keeping myself busy, as long at it involves my family!  On top, of all of this we are also doing most of our planting for our backyard garden and our co-op farm.  Planting and waiting for the seeds to sprout is my favorite part of gardening....well besides eating the fresh produce that you grow yourself!

What changes are you making this month to lessen your carbon footprint?

Happy Earth Month,
Alyson

"I'm not an environmentalist.  I'm an Earth warrior."  ~Darryl Cherney

Reusable Produce & Bulk Bags and the Beauty of Upcycling

Time is slipping away from me.  Things are happening fast and I am finding it harder to sit and blog.  That means it is time to re-adjust my daily rhythm.  Which makes life fun!

I am finally finding some time to blog about the reusable produce & bulk bags I made last month with my mama.  I was so intimidated by my sewing machine but found it a lot easier than I anticipated and it gave me some much needed practice on my machine.  I am ready to start making some more fun things!

Needed materials:

• Organic Muslin fabric (We used some that my mom already had and we bought a couple yards at a fabric store.  I strongly believe since it will be used for food, that I shouldn't use any dyed fabric.  I don't want any color dyes to get onto my food that I will be consuming.)
• Cording or thick string (We upcycled gift bag handles.  We took off all the handles of any gifts bags that were no longer reusable at my mom's house)
• Sewing Machine
• Hooking tool
• Wood Kebab Skewer

Steps:

I cut the fabric using a cutter and a cutting mat.  I first wanted to make a smaller bag, to make sure I knew what I was doing.  So I fabric measurements that I cut were 26 inches long and 9 inches wide.  The smaller bags are perfect bulk bags for flour, sugar, oats, almonds, any grain, etc.

 

I then took the cut piece of fabric and folded it in half.  I then sewed the sides at an 1/2 inch.  On one of my sides I left about 3/4 inch unsewn at the top.  This is provide an opening for the cording/string to fit in. 

Then I took the top of the fabric and folded about 3/4 inch.

Next was to sew the top fold.  Make sure to leave an 1/2 opening for the cording/string.

 Turn the fabric inside out.  

Take cording/string and push it into the top opening with a wooden skewer.  Once you get the string/cording half way in, put the hooking tool in the other side and pull the cording/string out.

 Tie and enjoy your finished project!

You can of course, change the measurements for the size of bag you want or personalize it however you want.  You can also upcycle in fabric or cording from you house to make these bag.  What better way to make an green impact on this earth but to upcycle for a reusable bag.  Get away from those nasty plastic bags!  Put your creative hat on and have fun with it!

I really enjoyed this project and plan to keep making bags, all different sizes and for all different uses!  It has motivated me to keep on creating, especially items that promote an ecofriendly environment.  My sister gave me a book called "Rubbish!  Reuse Your Refuse!"  by Kate Shoup.  This book shows you how to give everyday household items a new life.  With more than 30 creative projects upcycling and reducing trash, I will be one happy "green" mama!  Keep a look out for some fun eco-friendly upcycling projects posted on here.

Happy Creating,
Alyson

"Every day is Earth Day." ~Author Unknown

One Small Change- March

My February One Small Change(s) went amazing, as usual.  It has felt so good, to be doing all of these changes for our planet and for us.  People ask me if it is too much work but it is mostly pretty simple.  Simplicity is the solution to most of these changes.  We did have two hiccups this past month when trying to achieve a couple of our goals.  The first one was having to reschedule our SOLV's neighborhood clean-up.  Life happens and sometimes we can't do everything we hope to do!  We rescheduled to do the neighborhood clean-up in the beginning of April.  I will make sure to tell you all about it.  Our other hiccup (and the saddest) was our point and shoot memory card was lost with all of our pictures of our tree planting on it.  Major sad face!  I hope it shows up soon so I am able to share the pictures of the awesome time we had planting.

During the month of February, I had a great time with my mama making our produce and bulk bags.  I will share how I made them on a separate blog this week!  The tree/bush planting was so much fun.  My son had a great time and I am so glad he was able to experience this at a young age.  The weather was quite bizarre this past month with some rain, sun, snow, and ice.  Every chance we could, we got outside.  I will continue being outside more this coming month.

Here are a couple "teaser" shots of when we made our own produce bags.  By the end of the week I will post a blog all about how I made them.  

My March One Small Change Plan: 

• We are joining SOLV with their Spring Beach Cleanup.  I have done this in the past with family and enjoy my memories from it.  We usually pick the Manzanita, Oregon area since it my absolute favorite beach from growing up there.  If you are in Oregon, please check out SOLV's website and join the clean-up.  Help keep our beautiful beaches and ocean clean!  
• My son's birthday is this week.  We are having a small party with some of his little friends and our family.  I am choosing to do eco-friendly party favors in place of a plastic or a sugar coated favor.  Since Spring is around the corner, we are going to be giving out little growing pots with a packet of seeds.  Pictures will be up of this! 
• I am starting my spring cleaning the "green" way.  I am only going to do the first three steps of my spring cleaning this month and will be at it full force next month in preparation of our new little one arriving in the summer.  My first step of spring cleaning this month is reducing our stuff.  I will be carefully going through every corner of my house and making a pile of stuff we don't need anymore.  My next step is reusing!  I won't be throwing away this pile of stuff we don't use anymore.  My goal is too keep most of it away from our landfills.  I will go through it and make sure there is not another use for it either at our house or our farm.  My last step for the month is donating.  All the stuff that I know we can't reuse will be donated.  I have a few plans of where I want to donate this stuff to and let you all know.  I will share the rest of my green spring cleaning steps (there are 10) next month.  

I will share how this went with pictures at the end of March.  Check out my first One Small Change to see why I am doing this challenge or if you are new to my blog.  Also, check out the One Small Change blog for more ideas about environmentally friendly changes you can make. 

What changes are you making to lessen your carbon footprint on this planet?

Happy March,

Alyson

"Unless someone like you cares a whole awful lot, nothing is going to get better. It's not." -Dr. Seuss, The Lorax

One Small Change- February

I never win things.  Never!  But yesterday I won!  I entered my January's One Small Change at the One Small Change blog giveaway and they choose ME!  Little 'ol me!  I won a homemade eco-friendly coozie from Peaceful Peacock.  I am so excited.  Thank you Suzy from One Small Change and Julie from Peaceful Peacock!

My plan for February's One Small Change is, as usual, going to be a few small changes.  There is just always so much to do to help this planet and the people on it, that every month I usually come up with more than just one change. 

February's Plan:

• I will be sewing and making my own produce and bulk reusable bags with my mama.  We always use our own reusable grocery bags but find that I am still using the plastic produce and bulk bags. I did reuse the plastic bags but they eventually get torn or yucky, so I end up throwing them away.  UGH....it kills me every time I throw away those bags. So I ordered some reusable produce bags from reuseit.com and those will work perfectly.  BUT I wanted to make my own bags, so that I can make them more personal-able and practice my sewing skills since I have sewing plans in my future.   My mama and I will be using muslin fabric because it will hold my bulk purchases as well as any produce.  
• I signed up for one of my city's tree plantings in a local wetland.  My husband and son will be joining me on this one. I believe it is important to always involve your kids in activities like this, to teach them about "being the change."  If you are interested in tree plantings in your area, check out your city's website and volunteer information. 
• I also signed up for SOLV's neighborhood cleanup.  We will be going to Portland's NW industrial neighborhood to help clean up garbage and litter.  I am excited to bring my camera and take pictures in this area too.  SOLV is a wonderful organization that focuses on cleaning up Oregon's land....beach, rivers, parks, and streets.   I have worked with them before on the beach clean-ups and plan on doing it again this year in March to help clean-up, Manzanita Beach, my favorite beach and the one I grew up on! 
• I will also be focusing on my family and I being outdoors more this month.  Why work so hard to save this planet and not go out and enjoy it?  Of course, we love being outside and we do lots of outdoor activities but with the weather being cold and wet the past two months, it has been hard!  So I will be refocusing on outdoor activities.  With the seasons changing soon and our farm getting ready for Spring, we have lots planned to be outside and to enjoy our beautiful mother nature. 

I will be sharing how all this went at the end of February with lots of pictures.  Check out my first One Small Change to see why I am doing this challenge or check out the One Small Change blog for more ideas about environmentally friendly changes you can make.

What changes are you making?


Happy February,

Alyson

"He that plants trees loves others besides himself." -English Proverb

January's One Small Change Wrap-Up

My December One Small Change, of getting rid of junk mail is starting to show that it is working.  You should see how slim our pile of mail is everyday.  It is amazing!  We still have random junk mail coming, and I will immediately call or email that company to get us off their mailing list.  It feels good!  I urge everyone to do the same.

My January One Small Change was supposed to be three small changes but I found out a little fact that shocked me, so it went down to two.  I focused my small changes on recycling this month.  I wanted to take steps to recycle everyday household items that we tend to throw away.  So I researched how to recycle light bulbs and batteries.  I hate throwing these things away and knew if I did some research I could find out how to recycle them.   While doing my research I found that you can not recycle household incandescent light bulbs any where in Oregon, other than the florescent kind.  I hate throwing away all these light bulbs!  Maybe I need to think of a crafty way to reuse them!  Any ideas? 

We use a lot of batteries in our home between cameras, flashes, toys, and electronics.  Every type of battery we use has chemicals inside of it.  The worst chemicals you can find in some batteries are lead, cadmium, and mercury.  I know that sending any type of battery to the land fill will lead to these chemicals getting into our soil, air, groundwater, and surface water.  So my goal is to make sure these batteries stop going into the landfills.  So this month, I grabbed a glass jar and set it on our desk and this is where all of our dead batteries go.  Come to find out, my husband had been keeping a stash of old batteries in a drawer, knowing that they can be recycled.  I love that we share the same goals and how in sync we are with our thoughts!   I did some research on where I can take household batteries to recycle.  I started at the Portland Metro website (awesome organization & website!),  they have a tool that tells you where you can recycle all different types of household items.  This tool will definitely be put to use by my family.  It then directed me to Pride Recycling Depot, which will take up to 1 quart of batteries for free.  SOLD!  This Monday I will be taking my batteries there and I will continue to do this every time that glass jar fills up.  And what a fun learning field trip for my son and I!  I am curious to know where the batteries go after Pride takes them, so I am going to ask them when I drop it off and report back to you all! 

For those of you that are local to the Portland area and looking to recycle household items that they don't pick up curbside, go to Metro's website.  For everyone else who isn't local, Earth911.com is a great resource and can lead you to your local recycling centers. 

My other small change was signing the Oregon Ban the Bag petition.  In Oregon we are urging our state legislature to pass the Senate Bill 536 that promotes the use of reusable bags and bans the use of plastic check out bags.  These petroleum made, plastic check out bags are one of the greatest environmental horrors that we face today.  It contributes to the large amount of plastic that is found in our oceans and garbage around our streets, hurting our wildlife.  It also requires 12 million barrels of oil a year to make these bags.  YUK!  Please sign this petition! 

Thanks for reading my really long One Small Change blog.  I had a lot to say this month, I guess!  Next month I kind of have a big project that ties in with my One Small Change. I also signed up for a local tree planting and a SOLV street clean-up for the month of February.  I will write all about my February changes this weekend.  If you would like to read why I joined the One Small Change, click here or to join the campaign click here. 

Be well, friends,

Alyson

“Don’t blow it - good planets are hard to find.”  -Quoted in Time Magazine

December's One Small Change- Stopping Junk Mail

I am bringing One Small Change back into my blog world.  We have taken steps throughout the year to lessen our carbon footprint but I haven't written about it.  Now every month, I will be writing about the changes we will make each month to make a positive green impact for ourselves and this beautiful earth we live on.  Please check out my blog from last Feb about why I am doing One Small Change or the actual One Small Change Challenge Blog. 

Oh the grand annoyance of junk mail.  How many times do you open your mailbox and it is full of unsolicited junk mail?  Sometimes you get a bill or an actual letter from someone.  I am sure that everyone would agree that receiving this huge amount of junk mail in our mailbox daily is a nuisance.  On average, an American adult receives 41 pounds of junk mail per year, most of it unwanted.  According to the EPA, over 50% of this unsolicited junk mail ends up in landfill annually.

Here are some pretty shocking statistics:

• More than 100 million trees are destroyed a year to produce junk mail.
• The junk mail industry uses 10-24 BILLION gallons of water each year.
• Creating and shipping junk mail produces more greenhouse gas emissions than 9 million cars.
• You waste about 7-8 months of your life dealing with junk mail.  What a waste of time!  

So with the New Year approaching, our family took steps to get rid of this nuisance, not only to help in saving our planet but also to save time and to stay organized.  Here are the steps we took in the month of December to get rid of this grand annoyance!  Please use these steps to get rid of your junk mail as well! 

1.  I started with the DMA and this is the first step before anything else! Visiting DMAChoice will help you remove your name to more than 3,600 companies.  They want to help you choose what mailings you receive by customizing your mail preferences.  

2.  Pre-Approved credit card offers by far bombard my mailbox more than any other kind of junk mail.  Yuk!  I went to OptOutPrescreen.com to remove my name from the 3 major credit report companies.

3.  We don't receive magazines at our house but we do receive lots of catalogs. Everything you see in a catalog, you can see online at the companies website and save tons of paper and trees that way.  I contacted the catalog companies personally to stop from receiving their catalog and also went to Catalog Choice.  (This site is similar to DMAChoice.org but each cover some different areas.)  Catalog Choice helps you find and choose the catalogs you don't want to receive and a BIG bonus....it helps you with getting rid of phone books!  Phone books being left on my door steps in big plastic bags is seriously one of my biggest pet peeves!

4.  With any other unwanted mail, I have started personally contacting those companies that send me junk mail.  We get lots of unsolicited mail from local insurance companies and they come for both my husband and I.  It creates a lot of junk!  So I personally have started calling each company and eventually I will get to each company!

Well until all these steps start working for me, what can I do with all this junk mail??  Here are a few things I have done in the past and plan to do until the junk mail all goes away:

• Recycle it!
• Compost it!  Most paper you can compost.  Avoid the glossy paper and any paper that has any kind of plastic on it.  Put it in the shredder and it is easier to break down in the compost bin.
• Package it!  If you mail a package or need to store breakables in a box.  Crumble it or shred it for sustainable package material.
• Craft it!  My son and I can do lot of crafts with unwanted mail and paper!

I am excited that we have done this as a family and welcome everyone else to try this as well.  It will be such a relief to get rid of a huge annoyance and take a step towards a greener planet.

What is your small change? 

Peace, Love, & Happiness,

Alyson

"Only when the last tree has died and the last river been poisoned and the last fish been caught will we realize we cannot eat money." - Cree Indian Proverb

Menus and One Small Change

At the beginning of this year I joined a campaign that is designed to motivate people to reduce their carbon footprint on this planet.  If you know me, you know how passionate I have always been on this topic.  Honestly, I was born that way.  My mother has always been "green", even before it was popular.  In fact, in elementary school I was made fun of for recycling and not having Oreo's in my lunch.  I am sure the same people who made fun of me, have now joined the "green" bandwagon.  Which is good...the more people who do more green things, the less impact we will have on the planet.  I would like to thank my mom for teaching me such a big lesson at such a young age.  I am glad that I can continue my love for this planet and saving the planet into my adulthood and into my children lives.

The One Small Challenge is designed for everyone who joins to make one environmentally friendly change each month.  The change can be big or small.  The point is to take these small steps, which in turn will make big steps.  When I started this challenge at the beginning of this year, we had already been doing some pretty major things to reduce our carbon footprint but there is always more we can do and room for improvement.  Even though I only blogged about my One Small Change once, we continued to make changes throughout this year.  Now that I am moving my blog in a faster direction, I will be blogging about our changes every month.  My December One Small Change will be posted this evening.

Here are just a few of the changes we have made before this year and during this year:

• Composting ( I grew up doing this and continue with my growing family)
• Doing our best to eat locally, organically, and seasonally
• Growing our own food
• Preserve and freeze the food we grow for the winter months
• Use our own reusable grocery bags...no more plastic grocery bags.  (This we have been doing for a long time now)
• No longer buy or use zip-lock plastic bags.
• No longer use paper towels/napkins.  We only use reusable fabric napkins. 
• We try to carpool or limit our driving.  (This is a HUGE challenge, but we are working on it.)
• We reduce buying & bringing in plastic into our home.  (This is also a HUGE challenge.  It is so hard to avoid plastic.)
• When purchasing something, we choose the purchase with less packaging.  
• We recycle EVERYTHING we can.  I am pretty sure our recycling bin is always fuller than our garbage can.  
• Hang dry our clothes.    
• Many many more changes in our home.

I am excited to continue this challenge and hopefully motivate others to do the same.  Check back later this evening for our December change.

Now...on to our menu for this week:

MON: Roasted Cod w/ Warm Tomato-Olive-Caper Tapernade served over angel hair pasta and steamed broccoli

TUES:  Homemade Tomato Soup with Grilled Cheese Sandwiches

WED:  Homemade Veggie Pizza and a fresh salad

THURS:  My husband's company holiday party

FRI:  Garlic-Dill Salmon, Rosemary Roasted Potatoes, and Crunchy Pear and Celery Salad

SAT:  Potluck Party with some friends.  I am bringing my famous Artichoke Spinach Dip.  (I promise I will post it this week.)

SUN:  Vegetable Dumpling Soup.   (My grandma made me this before.  It was delicious.  This is not her recipe but I am going to try it.  I can bet you my grandma's is better!) 

Extra Cooking & Baking: (Most of these are for gifts)

Puppy Chow
Spiced Almonds (My wonderful friend, Jess, gave me this recipe.  It will be posted this week.)
Cranberry-Almond Granola
Homemade fudge
Christmas Sugar Cookies (My aunt's delicious recipe.  We are having a big cookie making day with my aunt and Ayden)

It is a busy week!  :)

Happy Cooking and Baking,

Alyson

We do not inherit the earth from our ancestors, we borrow it from our children.  ~Native American Proverb

One Small Change

I have decided to join the Hip Mountain Mama's One Small Change project.  The challenge is to make one small environmentally friendly change each month leading up to Earth Day.  It can be something small or something big, just something that we do as a family to make a positive green impact for ourselves and this beautiful earth we live on. 

We do a pretty good job practicing ways to be more environmentally friendly but there is always more steps to be taken.  We decided to do two small changes this month.  Our first One Small Change is to build and start our compost.  We had a great compost going when we lived in Bend but we moved and we haven't gotten back into it.  Just in time for spring we are starting it!  The compost will help with our little organic garden and it will reduce the amount of garbage that ends up in the landfill.  My father is a garden genius and any questions I have will be sent directly to him but there is tons of information online about creating a compost.  I would love to build our own compost bin but we are in a rental home and I don't want to make anything permanent.  I will be purchasing this compost bin instead, The Earth Machine.  We will also put something in the kitchen to hold scraps until they go into the compost bin.  I found this compost pail at Crate and Barrel and I have a gift card for there that I think I will use.  I am very excited to get going on this project of ours!

The other One Small Change is to get rid of our vinyl shower curtain liner.  These liners are more toxic for ourselves and the environment then we really know.  That "new shower curtain smell" is caused by very toxic chemicals called volatile organic compounds or VOC's.  These poisonous chemicals that off-gas into the air, can persist for the first 28 days while the curtain hangs in your home. There are many non-toxic options out there.  We have found a shower curtain made from PEVA, which is a PVC-free, non chlorinated, biodegradable lightweight plastic that does not emit off-gases.  Ikea has them for no more that $9.99.  YES!!!!  There are also tons of natural fiber options: organic cotton, hemp, bamboo, or linen that you can find on different online shops.  We are going to try out the Ikea shower curtain and see how we like it.

What small change can your family make?  If you are interested join Hip Mountain Mama's One Small Change Challenge.  Check back on March 1st for an update on how our changes are going and what new changes we will make in March.

Be well, friends
-Alyson

"You must be the change you wish to see in the world." -Mahatma Gandhi