I love to make New Year's Resolutions. Last night we had a
Family Home Evening in honor of the New Year. We focused on New Year's Resolutions: what a resolution is, why it's a good time to set them, and why Heavenly Father wants us to continually better ourselves. Then we set a few as a family.
(Here's a cool FHE link.)
Now most of you know, since most of you are family, that I love to be green. Sometimes I am more green than others- like when it means
being green is being frugal. Of course, you also know I have three in diapers right now. I just cannot fathom the idea of washing 150 diapers a week. So, I've been using disposable diapers lately, adding to the landfill, depleting my bank account. I know, I know. How very irresponsible of me! I'm actually toying with the idea of switching back. And those of you that have been waiting eons for my cloth diapering post, wait no more. Someone else has done the work for me. Her
whole blog is about cloth diapering! Now if only I could convince this total stranger to write the rest of
The Twin Birth Story.
Anyhow, I was blog-hopping this morning and read Gurrbonzo's post about resolutions. Since Gurrbonzo is very funny and I actually know her IN REAL LIFE,
here's her link. She talks about using only reusable grocery bags this year. Since she is a fresh-out-of-law-school-lawyer and knows way more stuff than me, I've decided this is a good idea. Of course, I use those disposable grocery bags to throw away stinky diapers and to line trash cans in our house. So I don't know what to do. I'm befuddled. What would you do? Would you switch to reusable bags and then
buy trash bags? Or do you just empty your trash cans into one large bin and not need trash bags at all? Ideas?
8 comments:
Bahahaha. YOU know WAY more stuff than I do, and, thinking about three in diapers makes my head explode.
My thoughts: plastic grocery bags accumulate fast. I don't know how. It's like they breed. I have probably a billion under my sink. So my goal is to use those for diapers and garbage as so forth until they are gone, then reevaluate. If I need to take one reusable-less trip to the store to re-stock on the plastic bags, so be it.
Although, my local grocery store gives a 5 cent credit for every reusable bag you bring, every time, so if you think like you're PAYING 5 cents for every plastic bag, maybe that will convert your frugal self.
Sometimes it's about balance. You ARE re-using the grocery bags so that is being at least somewhat 'green'. Consider other areas of living where you could be more green. The 3 in diapers thing is temporary. It's not like you'll be living your whole life that way.
Perhaps growing more of your own food and employing organic techniques is a good choice (not sure what you already do). You could also use less detergents, recycle rainwater or any of a number of other things.
I understand the desire to be 'green' (my background is in Landscape Architecture and Environmental Planning) but as a Mom, I also get the need to be able to FUNCTION. Function is often the higher priority.
I'm bad, I guess, in that I have no remorse in using plastic grocery sacks and disposable diapers. Going more "green" is a fantastic New Year's resolution. Our city has a fantastic recycling system that we already use, but I could use a lot more. (they pick up our recyclables in its own recycling bin! Cool!)
I wash most of my clothes with cold water. Our car sports 40 mpg. But there's still so much I could do...So don't feel so hard on yourself, Nikki, you're doing MUCH better than me at the time being!
I use those grocery bags also, lining the smaller garbage cans, lunch bags, etc. Since there are times that I just forget to take the canvas ones into the store, there are always a few around. Some stores have better bags than others, and sometimes I purposely leave the canvas ones out so that I collect those higher quality ones. Now that big store with the initials WM - very cheap bags, much better to use the canvas ones. But the nice thing about the canvas bags is, the food is much easier to bring in from the car. They are stronger and easier to tote. BTW, I used cloth diapers for my four children, (I even hung them out on the line instead of using the dryer) but I never had twins, and the disposables back then were attrocious. You could do a mix of disposable for church and trips and outings to the store, cloth at home.
Gurr- I like the idea of restocking.
Cynthia- Very good point- talking about the balance. Growing a garden is something I want to do now that we're in a place where we could have one year round. I even added a link to my sidebar about food storage seeds.
Lisa- I forget to think about all the other areas that I strive for greeness in. Sadly, my van is a horrible gas hog leaving quite the footprint. But I do have a new fandangled front-loader washer that saves lots of water. And after the whole pinworm fiasco, I'm back to washing in cold water- except towels.
Laurie- Very good point about some bags being cheaper quality than others. The commissary has very nice bags. But those other places don't. I'll consider that when my bag stash gets low.
I also really like the thought of cloth diapering at home and disposables for church and trips and such. I didn't like doing that when I had any of the others in diapers because I wouldn't create a load fast enough. But with three in diapers, that will be NO PROBLEM! :)
I have re-useable bags and find that I forget them when ever I'm not at the grocery store, so I still get a few plastic bags to use around the house. I get a bit irritated when I forget them.
I use the plastic for the same things, and when they are low I do 1 grocery trip to restock. Just remember to wash the canvas ones on a regular basis. Menards, and other retailers in Minot have sales all the time where you get 15% off whatever you fit in a canvas bag(their bag ofcourse). So I have one from each store which does this. It makes all those little things you need with homeownership(lightbulbs, etc) worth while. Occasionally you can get free canvas bags during store grand openings or special sales ect. I look for those opportunities when I can.
Jerusha- That is VERY neat about the discount for using canvas bags. I'll have to check around and see if that applies in our little town near base. And I've never thought about washing them. How do you do that? By hand? or in the washer?
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