The Compact - Month 2

With the end of October comes our two month anniversary of Compacting and I'm struggling to even remember the beginning of the month, let alone what we bought this month. We did some thrift store shopping a few times this month, hoping to find a snow suit and boots for Macy. We didn't find those, but we did buy a bunch of second-hand books and a Halloween costume for Fletcher.

Marc bought a shirt for himself and a matching one for Fletcher from Woot.com (new, not used). I didn't find out until it arrived in the mail.

Yesterday I broke the Compact to buy Macy a snow suit and water proof gloves (new). She still needs snow boots, but I'm going to keep searching ebay for those. You can read more about that experience -- at Walmart nonetheless -- in my post over on the Green Phone Booth today.

Oh and I almost forgot to tell you about my two big scores this month! First, Marc's school was taking all of the Lost & Found items that hadn't been claimed to the Goodwill. He rescued a cute pink snow jacket for Macy, which she totally loves.

Second, I went to drop off some old clothes in one of those big metal donation boxes you find in parking lots. On top of one sat a practically brand new pair of Nike tennis shoes in girls size 13 -- Macy's size! I took it as a sign of good karma and snagged the shoes for her. Hey, I donated more than I stole.

I love a good find!

You know how people say...

You know how people say "I support the climate bill!" or "I support the public option!"? Well it's one thing to feel supportive of the idea and another to actually support. You don't have to go to any rallies or put pen to paper and come up with a letter to send your representative. You don't have to look up their numbers, or worry about what to say to them.

It's much easier than that these days. Today my blog post is short. Take the extra minute you would have spent reading a longer post and use it for action!

Climate Change
All you have to do is click on this link and input your name and address. That's it. With the click of a button, you tell your senator that you want him or her to support a strong climate bill. You can also Tweet your representative using this link. Gotta love technology!

Public Option
Here you can ask your members of Congress to support the President's plan for health reform. You can Tweet your Senator or Representative on this too.

Please put your fingers where your heart is and show your support!

350 follow up...

Climate Action Day was a huge success. Have you seen the photos? If not, visit 350.org to see the slide show. From Times Square to Mexico City to Hong Kong to Botswana, people everywhere showed their support.

Here are two of our three kids (with Fletcher's girlfriend Emma) at the pumpkin patch where we spent Saturday morning.


And the 350 event in our town (we missed the photo opp unfortunately).


What a crazy day it was. Lots of activity and two sick kids. I was happy for Monday so I could get a little bit of a break.

Climate Action Day

Today is Climate Action Day friends. Get out and show your support for a strong global climate treaty. Find out what your eco-heroes are doing in my post at the Green Phone Booth. See what others are doing at 350.org and tcktcktck.org. Here are some of the photos so far:

Afghanistan:

Netherlands:
That's 5000 people!

What will you be doing today?

Stocking Stuffer: Mini notebook

I whipped up a few of these sweet little notepads to use as stocking stuffers at Christmas. The mini comp notebooks were on sale at Walgreen's for $0.19 at back-to-school time. I think they're pretty darn adorable. Tutorial is available over on Make it From Scratch today!

My favorite time of year.

This is my favorite time of year, but it also gets so busy for our family. This weekend alone we are visiting a local pumpkin patch, there's Climate Action Day, the kids Fall Festival at school, and a birthday party to attend.

Over the next few months the opportunity is ripe to over-spend, over-extend ourselves, and go way overboard on parties, gifts, and food. I think we're already experiencing the over-extending ourselves part!

I hope to keep blogging somewhat regularly though, because this is the most important season to remember sustainability in all that we do. You might find some shorter notes from me in the coming months as I try to get tips and thoughts posted as time permits, but I hope that you continue to come by each day and find something helpful or inspiring here.

Public Service Announcement: Halloween Approaching Rapidly

Every year at Halloween I find myself running around at the last minute trying to finish a costume, find one more item I need, or pick up candy at the last minute. Inevitably this takes me out of my green comfort zone and leads me to purchase over-packaged high fructose candy, costumes manufactured overseas, or something else equally unsustainable.

But this year will be different! (Ha, I say that every year, about every holiday.)

This year my procrastinating ways are your friendly reminder to get moving on this whole Halloween thing. Are you ready? I don't mean "Yeah, sure, we have some stuff" ready. I mean "Absolutely have everything we need and I'm sure of it" ready.

Candy

Are you giving out candy this year? Is it to people you know? If so, can you instead give handmade treats to avoid individually packaged candy? If not, is there a local chocolatier or candy shop you can support? We have a cute little taffy shop here in town. Or how about a small gift you can give that isn't packaged?

Costumes

Are your kids costumes ready? Do you have every thing they need down to the shoes or the jacket they'll wear over it if it's cold? If not, where can you go to get something 2nd hand? Can you borrow from a friend? Make it yourself? Be sure to leave yourself time! You might even do a trial run. Put the kids' costumes on and see if anything is missing, itchy, too big, too small, etc.

Pumpkins

Will you be carving a pumpkin? Can you get it from a local pumpkin patch? Plan some free time one afternoon or this weekend to go!

Parties

Going to a Halloween party? Kids having one at school? What will you need to bring? Reserve time in your schedule to make homemade pumpkin muffins instead of store-bought cupcakes.

So far this year we've spent $5 on Halloween. Living in the boondocks has it's benefits, like the fact that we get no trick-or-treaters, thus no candy to buy. Score! Macy is wearing the princess dress up costume that she already has. Felix is wearing Fletcher's hand-me-down skunk costume. Fletcher had his heart set on being Spiderman, so we got his costume at Goodwill for $5.

Remember the days when you made your own costume because the ones they sold at the store were totally lame?

Things you have to see to appreciate

I read about this over at Fake Plastic Fish. The plastic wrapped banana:



Beth says,

According to this article in USA Today... “7-Eleven recognizes that the wrapper could be an environmental issue and has asked supplier Fresh Del Monte to come up with a wrapper that’s biodegradable.” Um… it already has a biodegradable wrapper. It’s thick and yellow and decomposes in about a week, as evidenced by the contents of my compost bin.

So funny because it's true. This ranks right up there with the plastic wrapped potatoes they sell at my grocery store and the banana saver. Head over to Beth's blog post on the matter to find out more - and find out who you can write to to tell them they're an idiot.

On a lighter note is The Uniform Project where one brave woman has committed to wearing the same dress every day for one year as "an exercise in sustainable fashion". The website is addictive. You can scroll through the calendar to see what she's worn for the last 172 days of the project.

Proselytizing Green: October APLS Carnival

Growing up in the bible-belt I was taught that "witnessing" or spreading the word about my religion was part of being a good and faithful servant. These days I attempt to be the best steward of the environment that I can be, but I often wonder if simply changing my own ways is enough. Should I be out spreading the word about climate change and sustainability, striking up conversations on the street, "Have you heard the news?"

Curious as to what other environmental bloggers think about the subject, I decided to make "Proselytizing Green" the topic of the October APLS carnival. Here's what they had to share...

The Farmer's Daughter lets her actions act as a catalyst for conversation. In her post Louder Than Words she addresses some of the things she does that get people talking about sustainability.

Erin at the Green Phone Booth has put together a light hearted, yet seemingly spot on, Cosmo-esque quiz that will tell you exactly what type of green proselytizer you are. This is one you can't miss!

Heather at Heather's Homemaking is happy to get into a lively conversation about anything from food supply to consumerism, but she prefers to live a life that speaks for itself. Read more in her post I'm green, how about you?

Robbie at Going Green Mama lives by the words of St. Francis: "Start by doing what's necessary; then do what's possible; and suddenly you are doing the impossible." Find out how environmentalism and religion go hand in hand in her post Having faith in your actions.

CRSTN85 moves from "silent to all points bulletin" regarding her environmentalism. Learn how she even inspired a coworker to become vegetarian in her post Hello World, I live sustainably.

Green Mom in the Burbs makes an excellent point that sometimes "People only hear the answers to the questions they are asking." Luckily for us, she tells us how she gets people asking the green questions. You can read her post here.

Steph at Greening Families wonders Can Your Friends Make you Green? It's just like mom always said about "the friends you keep". Read more about how Steph believes friends influence each other.

So it seems that I'm not the only one who tries to let her actions speak loudly. Like many of the other contributors, I'm happy to talk about sustainability until I'm, ahem, green in the face but I've always been firmly against berating someone with my beliefs. "You attract more flies with honey..." my mom used to say.

Still, lately I can't seem to forget something that No Impact Man, Colin Beavan, said in an interview with Beth Terry of Fake Plastic Fish. He told her that just making all of these smallish changes in our own lives is not enough. That we must do something bigger in order to spark real change. For Beth, it was getting the Clorox Corporation to start recycling Brita water filters. That's big!

While I don't think I'm quite at that "getting major corporations to change their policy" level yet, there are some bigger things I'd like to start doing. Namely, I'm working with our elementary school to start recycling glue sticks and bottles. I guess that sounds a little goofy when I say it out loud but, considering that each classroom throws out several empty sticks and bottles each day, it really adds up. In addition to saving a little plastic from the landfill, there are also some good lessons and activities involved for the kids. They may not be Clorox, but I'm working my way up!

If you didn't get to participate in the Proselytizing Green discussion, but have something to say, share your comments below!

Blog Action Day

Today is Blog Action Day and my post Climate Change: Life's little convenience charge is up over at the Green Phone Booth. Check it out and visit the Blog Action Day website to read posts on climate change from people all over the world.

Apple Butter & Canning Questions

I couldn't resist this recipe for homemade apple butter on The Farmchicks blog. It was very easy (prep the apples, cook for 45 minutes, can them) which is why I chose it over some delicious sounding, but more labor intensive recipes like this one on PickYourOwn.org where you first make applesauce, then turn that into apple butter by cooking it for 6-12 more hours.

So this was the final product. It tastes divine, but it really is just like a chunky applesauce (which didn't stop me from spreading it on some toast this morning!). It's not runny like applesauce would be though.

So here is Question #1: If you were giving this as a gift, would you still label it as Apple Butter? Or would you just say it's homemade applesauce?


And Question #2: Is it okay that I seem to have some air bubbles trapped inside? (You can see it in this close-up photo.) I thought that I got them out before processing, but obviously I didn't do a great job.


I still have a lot to learn about this whole canning and food preservation thing, but I have to say I'm really enjoying it. I keep thinking to myself, "Dude. You can actually make all that stuff you've bought in cans all these years!" Like it's a completely new invention. And yes, I do call myself dude.

Hot Pumpkin Pancakes

These hot whole wheat pumpkin pancakes (recipe from Pinch My Salt) were the only thing that would due this snowy Saturday morning. I think I might be slightly obsessed with pumpkin right now. I'm just savoring the season...quite literally.

Green the Season is back!

I hate to push Christmas on you already when it's not even Halloween yet but if you're anything like me, you have a lot of gifts to make this year. You seriously need to get started! Oh wait, that's me.

Last week I canned my very first batch of strawberry jam, following the recipe and instructions on Pick Your Own. Thank goodness for canning instructions for dummies! I'm always worried that I'm going to poison someone. This jam will mostly likely be gifts for some of the folks at the school where Mr. Greenhab works. I'm also planning to make some of this apple butter from The Farm Chicks. Drool......

I've been going through some of my favorite blogs gathering ideas and making lists, so I thought I'd share some link love with you here.

By the way, have you joined Crunchy Chicken's Buy Hand for the Holidays Challenge? If not, check it out. She has issued a challenge to make it, buy it handmade, or thrift it. She also has many ideas and links listed for you.

Cozy Homemaking also has an enormous list of gifts to make in her Handmake or Buy Handmade post.

Going Green Mama has a great section from Christmas of 2008 labeled Homemade Holidays where she links to everything from food to hand-sewn gifts to wrapping options.

And you can always click on the Green the Season label below to see some ideas that I posted last year. I'll be sure to share more over the next two months!

Homemade Sandwich Wrap

I just made Macy this cute little sandwich wrap for her school lunches. It was super easy and fast to make. Find the tutorial, and my Friday post, over on Make it From Scratch.

Play Dough Fun

I've been dying to make some home made play dough -- okay maybe "dying" is a bit of an exaggeration -- but I have been wanting to try it. We have so much of the store-bought variety at home (given to the kids as gifts) that we just haven't had the opportunity until now.

Fletcher's preschool uses play dough on a daily basis as part of a learning activity they do, so they've started asking for volunteers to make some on a bi-monthly basis. Last night was our turn, so we got to work... (Note to self: do this BEFORE bath time next time!)

Here's the recipe that the school gave us. They give you one of those big reusable shopping bags with all the ingredients in it and the recipe taped to the outside.

Play Dough~
2 Cups boiling water
2 Cups Flour
1 cup table salt
2 Tbsp oil
2 packages kool-aid (for color)

(I assume you could halve the recipe for home use!)

So quick and easy to do! Next time I'm planning to use Julie's recipe at Terminal Verbosity. I like the idea of using food coloring instead of the Kool-Aid, and adding cinnamon or other things for scent.

Let Fall Begin!

Have I said yet how much I love Fall? It seems like there are a million things to do. Between Fall Festivals, Craft Fairs, Pumpkin Patches, and just enjoying the last warm days of the year, we are go, go, going all the time.

Saturday was Fire Safety Day at the Evergreen Fire Department and boy did they put on a nice event. There were bucket rides on the big aerial ladder truck, the kids got to test out a fire hose, they met firemen and women and the county sheriff.

Isn't this cool? How often do you get to do something like this!?

The view from the top... The building on the left is Fletcher & Macy's school, so it's right next to the fire department.


We ate and played and the kids did a short bike safety lesson, after which they got to enter for the chance to win a bike. And win indeed! Both Fletcher and Felix won bikes.


The little girl who won the girl's bike offered Macy her old bike, so we are pretty much the luckiest family ever! These are the first bikes for all three, so they're all just learning how to ride them.

Sunday we went to the zoo. It was a beautiful day and no one was there, so we had run of the whole zoo. Felix especially loved it. This tiger kept jumping up on the glass. Felix would scream and run, then go right back.


And last night I made my first batch of strawberry jam, which will be little Christmas gifts for some of the folks at Marc's school.

I wish October would never end! If you're looking for ways to celebrate Fall, check out my post from last year: What I did today... which gives you 31 ways to savor the season.

Busy weekend...

I had planned a post for today, but this weekend has been busy (and lots of fun) so far. Be sure to check out my post from yesterday on the Green Phone Booth~ I am woman, hear me...sew?

September Compacting Update

We have successfully completed Month 1 of our Compact! This month was pretty easy -- no birthdays or holidays to buy for -- and I guess anyone can go one month without buying anything. Our two purchases included:

CFL bulbs: We had a few burnt out bulbs and CFLs aren't exactly something you can buy second-hand.

Underwear: For the 2 year old. We decided to potty train him because we thought he was ready. It didn't work out. Let's not talk about it.

I did do some thrift store shopping where I bought winter gloves and scarves for Macy, some cloth napkins for the kids' lunch boxes, and a grip of books. If I had to cut out thrift store shopping, I might have some serious withdrawal!

The things I'm struggling with right now are some winter items that I need (want?) for Macy: tights, snow boots, winter shoes, and socks.

*Edited because I forgot to add the most important part:

Compared to our average credit card bill from the past 5 months, we saved about $1000 this month.

Holy cow! I can't even imagine what we've been spending an extra $1000 on. I'm truly shocked by this. We don't do shopping sprees. We don't really even shop. We do eat out, but not anywhere expensive. I guess it really does add up! It will be interesting to see what our CC bill is like for the next three months in comparison.

World Vegetarian Day

Friends, Today is World Vegetarian Day! According to VegNews Daily~

Today is World Vegetarian Day, so let your veg flag fly. Founded in 1977 by the North American Vegetarian Society (NAVS), World Veg Day kicks off Vegetarian Awareness Month, an educational campaign designed to spread the word about the ethical, environmental, and health benefits of a veg lifestyle. October 1 marks the beginning of a 30-day celebration, full of lectures, parties, potlucks, and festivals in North America and around the globe.

Here at the Greenhab household we are not vegetarian by any means. We like our meat. Some of us (ahem Mr.Greenhab) *love* meat. Like in an unhealthy, artery-clogging, why-don't-you-marry-it kind of way.

While I don't necessarily aspire to ever be completely vegetarian, I would like it if we ate a lot less meat. I cringe at knowing how most animals raised for food are treated, what they're fed, how they live, how they're butchered, etc. Financially, it just isn't feasible for us as a family of 6 to purchase organic, humanely raised meat for every meal. And diet-wise, eating less meat and more veggies, legumes, whole grains, fruits, etc. is just plain better for you.

When I first met Mr. Greenhab, our meals were meat and a side dish. The focus of every meal was the type of meat we were having that night. Very bizarre now that I look back on it. But, Mr. Greenhab was always the chef in the family since my cooking skills left something to be desired, so I went with it. We might have one or two meatless meals each week (and by "meal" I'm really thinking "dinner"since we weren't breakfast eaters and lunch was eaten at work).

Nowadays we have meatless dinners at least 3 times each week, often 4 times, plus my breakfast and lunches are usually meatless as well. I'm not sure if Mr. Greenhab has realized this yet but, since I work at home and do most of the cooking now, I get to make whatever I want to for dinner and he's usually pretty happy about it...usually. We'll see how far I can push him to the veggie side before he notices. Mwahahahahaha! (That's my evil laugh)

I'm running a mini-challenge today over at iVillage for World Vegetarian Day. Be sure to come by and join us!