Every little bit....

I followed a few environmental blog links today and found myself commenting on one that had discussed how the parties involved kept their plastic plates at a conference to reuse rather than to just discard. Sounds like something I would do. She asked if it was, so I responded about some of our adventures, here.

Deli and Meat counter success!

Today I was able to get deli cheese and meat for the first time without any extra packaging (well I had to get a sticker with the price on it).

I simply brought my containers, asked for the food to be put in it and they did it.

What was I afraid of?

Fresh from the farm

I forgot to mention that the other day when we were at the surprise party we got talking with some older friends we hadn't seen for a while. It turns out they are living a little out of town on a small hobby farm. And they are raising chickens! Over 60 to be exact. Actually those are just the laying chickens. They just got their meat chickens harvested and will wait to that again until spring. Anyway, I made arrangements to call and then to visit so that I might get some of their "produce". I went out on Wednesday and after a lovely visit, tour of the house and farm, I got 4 chickens and 2 dozen fresh eggs. I was so excited! Marlee got along really well with their daughter at the party and was actually quite upset that she couldn't come with me to the farm but I promised that if this went well that we would all go out some weekend together. After this visit we will be sure to do so.

Thursday night I made a roast chicken and roasted root vegetables. It was so yummy! I did up carrots, parsnips, turnip, sweet potato and potato in maple syrup and balsamic vinegar. They got a little overdone but were still really good. I will be making them again for sure. It is so nice to know what we are eating and how it got there. So much healthier!

The Story of Stuff

I came across this video on my travels yesterday. Woah! Very thought provoking. I KNOW our family has too much stuff and we do try to do a lot of the listed "suggestions" but it really makes you think about what we are doing to our earth.



I'm challenged again to look at my Gotta Do List (which I haven't been thinking about at all!)

Diaper discussion

I met today with a woman who I plan on signing up for a cloth diaper service with. She came to the house to show me her product and tell me about her washing service. I am totally excited! I had been debating about how to go about this whole issue since we found out about the baby. I really felt that cloth would be the way to go this time - especially since we can't recycle or compost the diapers through Small Planet anymore. I read some really good posts about cloth diapering on Simple Mom but have honestly left things till the last minute. I then came across an article in the paper about Munchkin Bums and put it on the back burner - still thinking I'd just do it myself. This week I went around to the used clothing stores and realized that there really aren't a lot of used diapers to get out there. Enter the service again - and when I asked Drew, he was totally on board with using a service and not doing anything ourselves. Works for me!


So anyway, I met with Lisa today, who apparently MAKES all of the diapers herself! They looked to be of great quality and the price is comparable to buying disposables. I am still totally on board with trying to go as diaper free (using elimination communication) as much as possible but I realize that I still have to have something around. I can't wait to see how this works out.

It's all wrapped up - well not really.

Brown paper packages tied up with string… there is a lot of paper involved with my favourite things! Since I already journalled last year about my "wrapping style" I thought I'd reflect on the paper invovled with Christmas. This holiday (along with most everything these days) sure involves a lot of paper. I hope to do a collage with samples of just a bit of the Christmas-y things that come through our doors…

wrapping paper, advent calendars and decorations, lists, shopping bags, receipts, ads, cards, artwork, play bulletin, scrapbooking, muffin liners, tissue paper - I'm sure that's not all!

Happy Earth Day!

Happy Earth Day Everyone!

Everyonewho knows me knows that the environment is a bit of a passion with me. Today on my run I couldn't believe the amount of garbage I saw strewn all around our neighbourhood. We live in a pretty affluent neighbourhood (not that that means anything) - but it surprises me how little we do to control this behaviour. Even the school ground is littered with garbage. Granted we don't have any garbage cans around either (issues of bees I think??? - obviously not right now though!!!) but why is it that we can't take our garbage with us? I have two pastic bags attached to my strollers for garbage and recycling now because it is always around us. Even the kids comment on the pieces and grab them as we go by (yes I also have wipes and gloves). (I've trained them well=))

Soooo, being earth day - we are going to spend a half hour after school picking up garbage on our way home. I love our neighbourhood and I love how it looks and I want to keep it that way!

PS - why is this a passion of mine? Genesis 1:28 says "God blessed them and said to them, "Be fruitful and increase in number; fill hte earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and over every living creature that moves on the ground". The Life Application version discusses that "to rule over" something is to have absolute authority and control over it. We are given the responsibilty from God to take care of the environment and the other creatures that share our planet. We shouldn't be careless and wasteful with all that we have been given. God wasn't careless is how he created the earth and we shouldn't be careless in how we take care of it.

10pm - it was raining when I picked the kids up (not when I left of course so no umbrella) so needless to say they wanted to go straight home. We'll see what we can do tomorrow!

Boomerang Waste, Skiing and Owwies

People that know me know that I care about the environment and in many ways I take it quite seriously. Obviously there is only so much that we can do but I try to do what I can. (Reduce, reuse, recycle, compost, worms, green bin etc etc - I do it). The kids school has recently initiated a concept called "Boomerang Waste" which involves taking a ziplock bag in your lunchbag and bringing home any waste that is a result of your lunch. They are trying it one day a week to start, then adding another and so on. This should significantly reduce the waste that the school generates. Great idea. I'm all for this. I guess I am struggling with why I find this an issue.

First of all, the school's recycling program is quite poor. I don't understand why their recycling varies so drastically from the local residential recycling. For quite a while they weren't getting their milk containers picked up and were considering scrapping the whole program after parents didn't like getting the empty container back in the kids lunch bags (we get get milk on Pizza Fridays a few times a month). Our local recycling takes construction paper - the school's does not. My child's classroom throws out plastic straws and other objects that go in our blue box at home. The amount of food waste that goes out, as well as paper towel and kleenex which we put in our green bin is astounding and sad.

We as a 5-person family generally put out 1 plastic grocery bag full of garbage a week. Everything else is either recycled or green binned or composted.

But back to the boomerang waste. We as a family don't really need it. We use plastic containers that get filled up daily and washed if necessary (definitely weekly). They were cheap (Dollar store) and are colour-coded for each family member. For us it works. I try to avoid the use of plastic bags after seeing the devastation they do to the environment. We even re-use all of our ziplock bags (not usually for food but for projects, toys etc). [TIP - I actually put them in the washing machine inside-out and then hang them to dry. No work!] This method sometimes takes more time - but usually not - I just have an assembly line method, and is actually cheaper - and no waste. We use a cloth lunch bag which gets thrown in the wash weekly and for some reason we don't find leaking to be an issue. We have a refillable water bottle for each child. Friends laugh at my bin of mini containers but the kids know which snacks are for which kid, it's good portion sizes and it's cheap. And I find it easy.

A typical lunch includes the following:

• water bottle
• sandwich (not for Marlee)
• dried snack x2 (teddy grahams/ fishy crackers/ ritz bits/ animal crackers/ muffin/ loaf/ bear paw - no wrapper)
• "wet" snack x2 (cut apple/ grapes/ clementine/ melon)
• yogurt in container
• Veggies (carrots/ celery/ cucumber with dip)

So conclusion? A great idea, although the use of the plastic bag concerns me - and bottom line - I hope that the idea behind it will catch on and that families will be more creative with their packing. It can be done!

Skiing and Owwies

Seeing Marlee today reminded me of her weekend. We were all able to go skiing on Sunday - and the weather was so nice that we stayed for another hour after the lessons. Marlee went down the family hill 3 times! It was really nice to actually ski as a family - it was our first time!

It wasn't without incident though! Halfway down her second time she got a little tired so Drew tucked her between his legs to guide her down. I guess he caught an edge and in trying to avoid damage actually landed on top of her. From behind it was quite the sight! She was a trooper and only has a bump on her lip and her eye to show for it. She was up and ready to go again. Drew was a little worse for wear (just his fatherly pride) but the next run was her best yet. And now she has another photo to add to her Owwie book.