Catching up on a few things....

Posted by Jen 9.30.2010 5 comments

Over the last few weeks I have won 2 awards from Life Love Green and Life of this SAHM.  Thanks ladies!

The rules of accepting this award are that I have to post this in my blog and link back to the blog that awarded it to me.

Then I have to name 10 other bloggers that I love and have recently discovered or that I could marry if I could. Then contact them and let them know that I think that they are kickassawesome.

So who am I picking? ::drum roll please::

1. Attack of the Red Neck Mommy
2. Calgary Daddy
3. Green Baby Guide
4. Green and Clean Mom
5. GreenInspiration
6. Look at the Birds
7. Strocel
8. The Foster Family
9. Natural Papa
10. Cheap and Creative

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Green Blog Hop

Posted by Jen 9.29.2010 4 comments

I have been participating in this Green Blog Hop for a few months now and have found some really excellent blogs. Check them out! If you have a Green Blog them add your blog to the list.

The purpose of creating this blog hop was not to create yet another general hop, but to help network bloggers who have taken the initiative to go green for the purpose of education and continuing efforts of saving our planet - one home at a time. We will be monitoring the blogs and will delete those that are not deemed somewhat green.

* PLEASE make sure to put the button on your site and make a quick blog entry - otherwise we will not be reaching the most number of people that would be interested in networking







* Follow the blogs of the ladies in the top three spots :

* Link your green blog to the MckLinky below

* Follow as many other blogs as you want. The more you follow, the more that will follow you back!
 

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Home vs City Compost

Posted by Jen 9.27.2010 3 comments


Last week we received a note on our door saying that in a few weeks we will be receiving our green bin. This excites me greatly. We can compost so much more in the city system vs our home compost system (ie: meat). But if you have a city compost system do you still compost at home?

I can see the benefits in the winter time. No more shoveling a path to get to the composter...no more wet feet as I walk through a foot of snow. I guess I am going to have to figure out how much I need to be putting into our home composter to keep it going and put the rest into the city system.

If you have a city compost system let me know what you like about it and how you balance your home compost system if you have one.

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Toronto + Bixi Bikes = AWESOMESAUCE

Posted by Jen 9.23.2010 1 comments


Toronto is trying to get Bixi bikes for the public to use. Don't know what a Bixi bike is? They have them in Montreal and other major cities. You can use any of their bikes from their stations for a small fee (and you need to be a subscriber so you have an electronic key to unlock the bikes). Ride it around and drop it off at any station you want. It is a cheap and easy way to get around the city. It is a huge success in Montreal and would be perfect for Toronto.  The thing is they need to have 1,000 subscribers in order to get the system to come to Toronto.

Bring Bixi to Toronto! Go here to sign up to be a Bixi user.

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Hmmm maybe I DO compost at work....

Posted by Jen 9.21.2010 6 comments


Today I was looking for a monitor cable for a colleague. I thought for sure I had an extra one somewhere in my desk. When I opened my bottom desk drawer I was surprised to find an apple. Not a nice shiney apple either. It had obviously been there for awhile as it looked like the face of one of those apple dolls I made when I was 10. You know I had wondered what that smell was that I caught a wiff of every once in awhile. I honestly thought that one of my coworkers had some bad farts. Nope....just an apple breaking down in my desk drawer.

Holy crap....I wonder if they have thought I have had smelly farts all this time??? Now does this mean I can blame all future gas on composting fruit?

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Disposable Society?

Posted by Jen 9.15.2010 4 comments


I can't wrap my head around this idea. In a time where the protecting the environment is everywhere you look why are there more and more disposable items available? Have we become a disposable society that places more value on "convience" and "saving time" then the environment? What is going to be the long term impact of this shift? More waste, landfills filling up faster and more imported crap from other countries that no one really needs (I mean I love the Dollar Store and all but seriously do we need half the stuff in there?).

What do we use that is disposable?

Diapers and wipes. Yep we are not on the cloth diaper train. Tried them and they didn't work for our little guy. I sleep a night by spending a small fortune on Nature BabyCare diapers and wipes.

Razor blades. We don't use disposable razors, just the blades. What is the alternative though? Burning hair off with chemicals? Or painful painful waxing? Sure these may work on my legs but Joey's face. Not so much.

Feminine hygiene products. Tampons people...its okay to say it out loud. I just can not get on board with the idea of using the diva cup. It is over my 'green' line.

Ziplock bags and saran wrap. If you aren't using these things how on earth do you freeze your meat and keep it from getting freezer burn? How did you keep your avocado's from going brown? What do you do with partially used veggies? These are the reasons we have not stopped using ziplock bags and saran wrap.

What are we doing to try and limit the amount of things we use that are disposable?

We aren't the type of people that need to have the latest and greatest of everything as soon as it comes out. So we don't get new cellphones every year. We use them until we need new one's. Novel idea isn't it?

My car is paid off (crap I should not have said that out loud) and technically I guess I could get a new one. But why? Yes I want a shiny new hybrid but my car works well so it would be a huge waste to get rid of it to get a new one.

We spend a lot of time figuring out what items we want to buy before we buy them. Some may say we are anal but I prefer to say that we are being smart. This way we don't just hit up the local swedish store and buy something that works RIGHT NOW but in the long run will just piss us off and not be what we really want.

We don't use paper towels. We have made our own out of old shirts.

What do you do to not be part of the disposable society?

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Weekend to End Women's Cancers

Posted by Jen 9.13.2010 2 comments

This weekend changed my life. I walked 60km in the Weekend to End Women's Cancers walk in Toronto. My feet are full of blisters but that did not stop me from signing up again for next year!

There is a lot that the organizers have done to reduce the events impact on the environment. I only ever received 2 packages in the mail. One was my participant confirmation letter and the other was my ID badge. All other communications occurred via email. A lot of the 'decorations', tents etc are reused year after year. Even the mile marker signs were reused multiple times.

What do I hope is different? I hope that they consider recycling and composting at the rest stops. I hope that there will be less useless giveaways (like rolls of toilet paper). I hope that they will consider using computers to allow people to sign up for the walk the following year instead of having papers pre-printed for every participant. I think that any vehicle being used by those working for the walk should be hybrids.

I can't wait for the walk next year. Now lets just hope that I can do it without blisters the size of a small country.

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Disappearing Bag - Week 14

Posted by Jen 9.08.2010 2 comments


I checked in on my Sun Chips bag when it hit 14 weeks. Originally I planned on checking on it every 2 weeks but after the first few times and seeing no progress I decided to just leave it alone and see how it did. I must admit I went into this thinking that it was just another marketing ploy to get people to buy their chips over other chips. So smack my ass and call me Sally was I surprised when I spent a good 10 minutes sifting through the composter looking for my chip bag. It was gone. This is good news! The bag does biodegrade in the 14 weeks promised!

The bad news...most people won't put them in their composter. The average consumer probably doesn't realize that if they put the chip bag in the garbage it most likely will not break down.

I still have to check on the bag I put in the garden. So far the weather is not cooperating for me to be able to do that.

Up next - Compostable cutlery. Will it also break down? I suspect that styrofoam has a better chance of biodegrading than this fork and spoon.

Day 1
Day 14

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Speaking of Camping....

Posted by Jen 9.01.2010 0 comments


I did a guest post on Life On the Roof when we were out in the woods camping. Ahhh sweet technology..oh how I love thee. Anyways, you should go and check it out but I am warning you it will make you hungry.

Also, check out some other green blogs over at the Green Blog Hop. If  you are joining me from there then WELCOME!

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