BLULOW (All About Living Green)

I was in the middle of preparing dinner and realized that I needed more mayo for the meal. I asked my daughter to get me a jar from the pantry. She pulled out three jars of mayonnaise, which were all attached by a three-ringed hard plastic holder that was inserted around the necks of the jars. Similar to the 6 pack holder, but made of a stronger material.

After pulling out the jar of mayo that I needed I put the other two jars back and discarded the plastic three-ring holder. I later came back to find my daughter with a pair of shears attempting to cut the three ringed plastic holder.

A little puzzled I asked her what she was doing? Her reply was, “I’m saving the ducks.”

Being a little dumbfounded and perplexed I didn’t understand where she was coming from so I asked her how was she saving the ducks? Apparently she had just watched the Disney movie Happy Feet. In one of the scenes one of the penguins had a beer container caught around its neck.

That scene, more than any preaching that I could have done, stuck in her mind. As a result, we make it a practice to cut anything that has the plastic harness to protect the ducks (and penguins for that matter).

Out of the mouths of babes.

To anyone who thinks that the recycling efforts are a bit overwhelming and is contemplating quitting the living green lifestyle, my suggestion is to take a walk around your neighborhood on trash day. Take a look at the contents in your neighborhood’s recycle bin (Just a look. Don’t go poking around in your neighborhood’s trash).

If I don’t walk the other 6 days of the week, I make sure to take a walk around the neighborhood on trash day to reinforce the need to think and live green.

If your neighborhood is anything like mine (and I’m guessing it is), the two major items you’ll find in your neighborhood recycle bins are:

1. Water bottles. Lots and lots of disposable water bottles. The good thing is that we are getting healthier by drinking our share of water, but the bad thing is we’re throwing away countless numbers of plastic water bottles.
2. Liquid laundry detergent containers and liquid laundry softener containers. Our clothes are cleaner, whiter, brighter, softer and smell great, but our landfills are getting fuller and fuller with the plastic from the detergent and softener bottles. I read that only 9.5% of the plastic we used is recycled. Here’s some info that bursts a few of the plastic recycling myths.

When I finish my walk I always wonder if my neighborhood is any different from all of the other neighborhoods around the country…probably not.

If we set our minds on buying reusable water bottles and making our own laundry detergent, we can make an impact on our non-reusable waste.

Buying reusable water containers is pretty easy to do. If you don’t have a water treatment filter on your home, or in your apartment, there are portable ones like the Brita filter where you can use tap water rather than store bought water.

As far as the laundry detergent goes, it’s really easy and economical to make your own (see my earlier posts on homemade laundry detergent) and I’ve found that adding about 2/3 cups of baking soda to my wash helps my clothes to come out softer.

I haven’t quite given up totally on softener, but I do dilute it 2/3 part water to 1/3 part softener. I admit, I’m hooked on the way softener makes my clothes smell.

Take a walk around your neighborhood on trash day to motivate yourself to continue your greening efforts.

I was about to throw the egg carton away and I looked in the recycle bin and wondered, “What else can I do with an egg carton?” After all, I’m trying to live the BLULOW life, I can’t go around throwing away all of the egg cartons.

So, I decided to get on the internet to see if I could find practical uses for egg cartons. I found plenty of information and ideas on what to do with them. Below are my favorites:

Desk organizer:

A recycled egg carton is great for holding paper clips, staples, safety pins and other small items that accumulate in the drawer. Every kitchen has a “junk” drawer. Why not organize the small stuff with an old egg carton.

Christmas Decoration Storage:

Recycled egg cartons are great for the small delicate items. Line the carton with cotton or tissue paper and place the breakables in there for storage.

Paint Palatte.

This only works for the Styrofoam egg cartons. Rip the top off and use the egg carton to hold and mix paint. This is especially handy for kids. It works better than buying small paper cups.

Storage for Barbie Accessories:

Anyone who lives in a house with a Barbie doll and her accessories knows that Barbie is not a neat freak. Her shoes, hair dryer, makeup, etc tends to be left all over the house. A recycled egg carton is a perfect storage receptacle for Barbie’s accessories.

Fire Starter:

Here’s one that I’m particularly fond of. Use the cardboard egg container to house fire starter. My neighbor introduced me to this idea a few years ago. She placed pieces of wood chips into each pocket of the egg container and then filled it with melted wax. She let it cool and broke off a pocket or two to help start the fire in the fireplace.

There are various recipes for the fire starter option. Some people use dryer lint, while others use charcoal as the base for the fire starter. NO matter what base they use, they all pour wax over the coal/lint and use it either for camping, starting the indoor fireplace or grilling.

I particularly like reusing the egg cartons for fire starter because there is more of a need for fire starter. You can save your egg cartons and make a large batch of fire starter at one time, or make them as you acquire the materials.

Children’s Crafts:

Using recycled egg cartons for kid’s crafts is especially useful for pre-school and school aged kids. Not only does it keep them busy, but can potentially recycle a large number of cartons.

This one is a tricky one, however. Being a mother, I know what its like when your little one brings home an egg carton craft. You display it for a few years, and then you store it. You don’t want to get rid of it because it’s so precious. Depending on how many children you have, you may have a menagerie of egg carton animals and crafts. Hmmm, you see the problem? Although the carton was recycled, it will forever live with you.

Packaging:

You can shred the egg carton and use it when mailing delicate items.

Compost:

You can always shred the cardboard egg cartons and put them in your compost pile/bin.

There are more uses for recycled egg cartons around the net. Here are a few sites with ideas.

• Make Stuff
• Green Planet
• Egg Carton Heart (Craft) This one is really pretty cool!
• Enchanted Learning

Part of the challenge with living green is to continually find ways to re-use our unwanted items. Using an egg carton to organize a junk drawer is great, but how many junk drawers does one household have? Even if there are 10 junk drawers, what will you do with the rest of the egg cartons?

That’s why I like the fire starter option because it is not a ‘one hit wonder,’ so when I go to the grocery store, I already know what I’m going to use the egg carton for. I can buy eggs without having to worry about how to discard the carton.

Whew, one product down, so many more to go… (This BLULOW thing isn’t always easy)

It’s been quite a few years since my kids were in diapers, but I came across this site that I’d like to share with you. It caught my eye because they offer flushable diapers.

If you can’t flush, you can put them in your compost pile because they purportedly break down in 50 to 150 days. That’s a far cry from the 500 years it takes to break down ordinary diapers.

Visit their website www.gdiapers.com and be sure to click on the video that gives instructions on how to flush the diaper.

I’ll have to store this one away and pull it out when I become a grandmother (hopefully I’ll remember where I stored it).

Rather cryptic title, but knowing that this blog is all about making green choices, you’ve gotta guess where I’m going with this entry. Yep, it’s all about water conservation and turning off the faucet in the morning when you brush your teeth and/or shave.

I’m not going to spout statistics of how many gallons of water you waste if you leave the faucet running while you brush and shave. No rant or tirade about water conservation. I’d like for you to see for yourself how much water you’re using and then you decide what to do.

Here’s a two-day experiment:

Day 1: Put a large bowl in your sink to catch all of the running water you normally use when you brush your teeth and shave. Don’t scrimp. Follow your usual water consumption pattern.

When you’re done, measure how much water you used. If you’re having a difficult time determining how much water you’ve used, pour the accumulated water into an old gallon sized milk container or some other container that will give you a true idea of how much water you use.

Day 2: Using the same large bowl you used on day one (after you’ve cleaned it out of course), brush your pearly whites and shave, but this time, only use the water when necessary. Don’t keep the water running while you’re doing your usual morning face check (you know the one where you check for wrinkles, moles and test out your latest top fashion model moves).

Just like on day 1, measure the amount of water you used.

The fun part

Ready for a little fun? Take the water measurement from day 1 and multiply it by 365. Do the same thing for day 2’s water measurement (in case you didn’t guess, 365 is for your morning water consumption each day of a non-leap year).

Subtract day 2’s water usage total from day 1’s total usage. The resulting number will give you the amount of water you will conserve each year by shutting off the water when you brush and shave. See, water conservation isn’t so difficult. All you have to do is continue to brush and shave as you did on day 2 of the experiment.

A phrase that I’ve come to love and hate is: “When you know better, you do better.”