making a change * update *

here's an update on this post: making a change discussing my goals for making my house less disposable, more green and safe from toxins and chemicals for the people and pup who live here.  its sort of a way for me to look at what we've been able to accomplish and hopefully fuel my energy for the possibility of making changes.....and to remind myself at how easy most of the transitions have been.  but perhaps it'll encourage a few of you to make even one of these changes down the baby steps road to saving money, helping mother earth and protecting yourself and family from the things we don't even realize are in our daily use products.  until i started paying more attention to this stuff, i took it for granted that some government run health fairy agency was sending its employees out there to ensure that nothing harmful was being put into the products we all use and love. surprise.....

going paper towel-less: this is a huge change that is so much easier than expected. i think we've used 2 paper towels in 14 days - for cleanup involving some serious wood working glue. we used to go through at least 2 per meal and additional paper towels for cooking cleanup.  the system of having 3 on-duty kitchen wash rags of different color is working great. there is one for dish washing, one for mess/countertop cleanup and one for wiping up petey after meals. (EASY!-we still have paper towels around if we ever declare a state of emergency in the house and NEED them....but don't plan on buying them in mass quantities ever again.)

de-plasticizing: i inspected the sad condition of my rubbermade storage containers and was amazed just how destroyed they were due to microwaving, cutting and general use. they're now all in the garage waiting to be taken to a local recycling spot that accepts number 5 plastics.  they've been replaced with a wide variety of glass storage containers of varying sizes (large and small mason jars and a plethora of pyrex), a wonderful early mother's day gift from my boys. i love being able to see the contents of those containers in the fridge instead of wondering what is inside that murky-non-see-through plastic we used to use.  reid's using them for toting his lunches too, they are a bit bulkier and heavier than the rubbermade so i am looking for a new lunch satchel to send his goodies in, for now its reusing a kohl's shopping bag for him.  we also purchased some klean kanteen's for toting beverages around and i am IN LOVE with this product and their fun colorful line of stainless steel bottles.  ***i was totally pleased to see that all of their packaging is fully recyclable paper and non-plastic in nature - and the bags the bottles came in are now in my compost. i appreciate these great details***  as for ziplock, we're making great strides. now our on-the-go snacks for petey go in jelly jar sized mason jars (pretzels, grapes, etc) and we've been washing and reusing the remaining snack size and sandwich size bags.  when those run out, we've got another product being shipped as we type from ecolunchgear.com, cloth sandwich and snack bags made by an awesome momma who carefully selects everything that goes into her product, work environment and shipping packaging for sustainability, recycling ability and toxin-free status. hip hip! can't wait to get them and then i'll really be in business for lunch making and snack taking! and for the month of april she's doing lots of great giveaways with each purchase to celebrate earth day. (EASY, a process to procure the plastic substitutes and find a place that accepts #5 plastics that your rubbermade/tupperware is likely made of - or repurposing those old storage containers for things like nails in the garage, puzzle pieces, etc).

doggie dumping: this one gives me huge amounts of satsifaction and grosses me out a little but is worth it.  because i dump all of baxter's doo in the toilet and flush it away each time our outside trash can doesn't knock you over with the stench of feces when you open it. that is a BIG plus. that and knowing that there isn't going to be my pet's petrified poo in landfills inside plastic bags for eons = awesome.  once we run out of the current plastic bags we're using to pick up his business i've got a new stash of a great product from flushdoggy.com - water soluble, flushable doggy bags.  i bought them in bulk to save on price. its the best solution i have for now since the current sans-poo bags are being put in the trash once the doo is flushed.  (easy, a little gross at first but WAY less gross in the long run)

grow your own/buy local: the garden is in the works. by the weekend i'm hoping to have some plants in the soil and thus begins my biggest experiment yet.  in the meantime, i've been buying 90% of my produce from the poway farmers' market and have been blown away by the absolute difference in taste that these organically grown, probably picked the day before produce i get there.  hands down, i've never had carrots that taste so good!  its totally worth it.  i've also found hilliker's eggs that are laid in lakeside (14 miles from our house) and fed a carefully calculated vegetarian (and non-corn) diet. they are caged for a special technique they use to control their waste but after watching food, inc. and seeing how the so-called 'free range' chickens live that the bigger companies tout (thousands of them smashed together in a big, dark coop with "access" to an outdoor garden that they choose not to visit because the food is inside), i'm ok with that.  they've been in business since 1942 and are true to their animal husbandry ways.  still working on local meat sources, i'm considering joining a chicken csa but 'local' takes on  a different meaning when getting meat where i live - its call coming from pretty far away (although still relatively close sources when you consider how far our meat current comes from).  (EASY living in southern san diego where we have a year round growing season and lots of local farmers, it'll require more effort where you live - check here to see if there is a CSA in your area that can provide you locally grown, in-season produceif you aren't lucky enough to live in a place where there are farmers markets year round, every day of the week, somewhere nearby).

make your own/buy products with real ingredients you can identify: i've been going to buy as little processed (or as lightly processed) food as possible. i'm opting to make my own whenever possible (like my homemade spaghetti sauce) and buying products with identifiable ingredients when i do buy pre-made stuff at the store (the fewer ingredients the better and i want to be able to identify all the ingredients on the list....if it looks like a recipe, its ok with me!).  its sad that buying real food comes at a cost but its worth it - and i think that the other areas we're saving money makes up for the often small extra expense of buying a jar of smashed peanuts for a pbj instead of a car of hydrogenized oils and chemicals and sugars.  and so far, all the new products we've tried have been great - vegenaise and laura scudder's peanut butter, for example, are great.  

composting: after my awesome hubby made my compost bin i've been collecting all of our fruit and veggie/compostable kitchen waste and have been quite amazed by just how much of that stuff we used to throw in the trash.  the only challenge i've faced with this is finding a source of yard waste to offset the kitchen waste in the compost recipe. we've got a steady but small supply of leaves and some other yard waste from some work we did cutting out some dead bushes but nothing steady (since we have fake grass in the back and rock in the front due to bigtime watering restrictions and heavy heat in our community) but a few of our neighbors still mow their yards on a regular basis and i've gotten permission to steal their clippings on fridays when they put them out for the yard waste removal guys (i figured they wouldn't care but didn't want them wondering what the crazy pregnant lady was doing stealing their grass clippings at 10 pm at night).  so far no smell or bug problem which was hubby's main concern.....looking forward to seeing the fruits of our labors months from now with some rich humus for my winter garden, perhaps!

cable-free:  again, this has been such an effortless transition which was quite unexpected.  we shut our cable down almost 3 months ago, beginning february 1.  and honestly, we didn't watch much daytime tv anyway. it was usually evenings and weekends when reid and i had time to share together and petey was asleep.  and this is sort of a hoax because while we've been saving $100 a month, we still have internet and still watch all the shows we actually care about for  FREE at hulu.com or at the networks websites with less commercials, would you believe, than what you see on cable tv.  and we don't spend time watching other shows that we don't care about, the mindless watching of tv just because its there.  i'm thrilled about this change in our lives and our monthly budget!  hubby has even been able to watch live baseball games on espn.com or espn2.com....actually more coverage of games he wanted to see than what we could see on tv when we did have cable!

cloth diapering: still determined to go this route but not quite ready to purchase yet. i found a website with 45 day money back guarantee on the product i want to use so i want to want and buy them when the baby arrives so i have those full 45 days to decide if i love the product.  and i'm still using up the disposable diapers we have for petey.  so this is a coming attraction. admitably this is the most terrifying change of all to me for some reason, but i am committed to doing it and will be sure to report how it goes after i've gotten into the swing of things.

and the list will continue to develop.....lots more to come as i run out of personal care products and create my own (looking forward to trying the oil cleansing method when my facial cleanser runs out and trying the shampoo free method of hair washing hen my shampoo is gone).  what is in your favorite personal care product?  check it out - you can search by product name here -  i've been amazed at the contents of some of my favorites - is it really possible that its legal to sell us this stuff to rub all over our bodies?