There are shades of green, and the point is to not only find the shade that suits your family but the shade you’ll stick with. For example, I don’t think anyone should use disposable grocery bags. There’s plenty of reasons why you shouldn’t that make sense to most people. However, where it gets sticky is when it comes to choosing the bags you’ll be shopping with. Should you choose recycled organic cotton bags from a well known eco company (my choice) or go with reusable heavy plastic bags (reusable but still a plastic, so not perfect) or those bags from the store that don’t last as long (reusable, but not for as long as say, hemp or cotton). One green decision turns into many.

The answer to the above question is going to depend on your family. I won’t use those store made reusable bags because I think it’s lame that they’re not made to last. I do however like them a lot more than totally disposable bags. Some people only use store reusable bags and that’s still a much smarter green choice than disposable.

Another example is the water bottle issue. We all know disposable water bottles are bad news. Plenty of us have reusable water bottles. On the flip side some folks use filters (of which very few are recyclable) or have water delivered which creates energy drains. IF you’ll only use a reusable water bottle if you can fill it with filtered water it’s not as green a choice as tap water, BUT it’s so much better than buying disposable water bottles.

You have to choose a shade of green you’ll actually use. If someone is bugging you because you’re not using the sort of bags they think are the greenest, ignore them. Your shade of green is better than none especially if it works for you.

Small choices your way is a good way to start getting green. To see some small changes you might be interested in making check out:

Baby green steps that any family can do…

The small steps series here at THF

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Post from: Tree Hugging Family

1. Use your shower towel twice to save water, energy, and money; not to mention time doing laundry. Bonus points if you use it all week. You’re clean anyhow after a shower.
2. Ditch your ATM receipt. One little slip of paper is nothing, but if you lined all those ATM receipts up (from everyone in the world) imagine how many that would be. It’d be a long old line of new paper.
3. Put a pitcher of water in the fridge vs. waiting for the water to get cold when you want a drink.
4. Stop idling already. Make a goal to turn off your car if you sit still for 15-20 seconds or more. Like at the school, or waiting for a pal to come out of their house.
5. Clean the long rubber seal on your fridge door. When it gets all crusty and gross, the door doesn’t form a tight seal and energy is wasted. It takes mere seconds to wipe down with a cloth.
6. Buy recycled toothbrushes. Preserve makes inexpensive recycled toothbrush that are sold most places now.
7. On your next walk in the great outdoors pick up one piece of trash and put it in a garbage bin.
8. During daytime hours pull up your blinds. I can’t tell you how many homes I’ve been in where the lights are on, the shades down, and it’s daytime! Crazy – yes, I thought so too.
9. Carry a reusable lunch sack vs. a paper bag.
10. The next time you go grocery shopping, buy two items in bulk vs. two items in over packaged boxes and bags. Bonus points if you take your own reusable bulk bags to put the items in.

What baby steps are you trying at home?

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Post from: Tree Hugging Family

That said, one VERY simple green moving choice you can make is to change your address online.

According to the United States Postal Service, over 46 million Americans move each year. If everyone filled out a paper change of address form, that’s over 46 million forms a year (many households use more than one) and more than 20,000 trees are needed to create all these forms. Not to mention the gas everyone uses to get to the post office to pick up said forms.

USPS offers full service change of address forms online. This is one small and easy green step you can take the next time you move.

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Post from: Tree Hugging Family

If you’re new to Tree Hugging Family or new to green living in general, you should know that no one (or at least me) expects you to rush out and buy a hybrid, attach solar panels, or cut showers down to three minutes flat. Yeah, that’s all fine, but if you’re new to green, even small steps are good. EVEN super tiny baby green steps, such as…

1. Forget the drinking straw at any and all restaurants.
2. Step down one heat setting while washing clothes. Technically, you can wash everything on cold; but if you’re freaking about losing the heat, just use the warm instead of hot water setting.
3. Use both sides of your paper when printing.
4. Unplug your cell phone charger when it’s not charging. Bonus points if you step it up and unplug at least four more household electrical items.
5. Buy a reusable coffee filter.
6. Turn the heat cycle off on your dishwasher – just open the door and allow dishes to air dry.
7. Next time you go out for ice cream, try a cone vs. a throw away cup and spoon.
8. Buy three organic food items the next time you go shopping. Three valuable organic food items to try are organic milk, organic apples, and organic cheese.
9. This week buy less stuff. You know, at the mall you think you need this and that. Well, this week put one item back. Create a smaller footprint for yourself and save some $.
10. Teach your child, best friend, sister, grandpa, or whoever, about one of the green steps above.

Do you do any of these already? OR will you commit to trying one or two? Let me know in the comments.

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Post from: Tree Hugging Family

I’m not saying microwave meals are green, but if you choose one for handiness, don’t forget to recycle.

• Toss the outer packaging into paperboard recycling.

• Rinse the dish and put it in plastic recycling. Those dishes are often #1 plastic! Check to see.

If you consume microwave meals, do you recycle the packaging?

Image via flickr.

Click here to learn about all the current contests, themes and everything else going on at Tree Hugging Family in October 2008.

Post from: Tree Hugging Family

I tried to fix it. I tried to will the thing with my mind to work. Nothing. It was dead. I managed to get dressed sans coffee, and headed out to buy a new coffee maker. At the store, I was going to buy the same old coffee maker. Mine was nice, and had automtic brew, which is really nice when I have to be up and going early. However, the downside of an auto brew pot, is that you have to leave it plugged in. I unplug most everything when it’s not in use, but not my coffee pot.

At the store, I started thinking, do I really need auto brew? This may seem like a small question, but I sat there on the coffee maker isle for a good long while.  I don’t really need it. If I don’t have it, I can unplug the coffee maker for most of the day. That saves energy. I’m nice and green in other ways though, do I really need to cut out the auto coffee?

In the end, I bought a non-auto pot; just a basic, brews your coffee deal.  I figure what, it’ll cost me a few minutes on early mornings, but no big. Over time, I’ll save more resources. That’s the little luxury I gave up this week. Maybe you can give something up too. Some ideas:

• One magazine subscription
• Your home phone – if everyone in the family has a cell, do you really need a home phone?
• Packaged cookies – save packaging, make your own
• The newspaper M-Sat, try cutting down to Sunday only
• Part of your lawn – have a deck instead
• Use the same towel more than once – perfectly clean linens are overrated
• Buy one less pair of shoes this year

Find something that can save a little energy, or some resources; something that makes your life a wee bit better, but that you can live without, and give it up.

Click here to learn about all the current contests, themes and everything else going on at Tree Hugging Family in October 2008 – that includes Blogtoberfest, (we’re giving away over $7,000 in prizes)!

Post from: Tree Hugging Family

If you’ve been keeping up with news stories on the trayless movement on campuses across the country, you might know that leaving the trays behind has several great benefits.

It saves LOTS of water. And dish detergent. Don’t forget about the energy saved as well. Plus, there’s less food waste.

According to a recent article, the University of Maine at Farmington has reported a 65,000-pound reduction in food waste since implementing a tray-free dining area in 2007. They also saved 288,288 gallons of water! (The War on College Cafeteria Trays, TIME, Aug ‘08)

In addition to the environmental benefits of eating without a tray, there’s a health benefit as well. Students and others who don’t use trays often pick up less food to eat. When there’s no big tray to fill, carrying food becomes somewhat of a balancing act, but it also provides the incentive to think twice about food choices.

Even if your campus or place of work hasn’t banned the cafeteria tray, you can simply choose to not pick one up.

Choosing to be tray-free is one small part of greening college campuses, but it’s catching on. Help make it happen at your campus.

Image via flickr.

Click here to learn about all the current contests, themes, and green challenges going on at Tree Hugging Family in September 2008

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Sure, this idea may encounter some resistance. No every household has a computer, and schools must be sensitive to that. However, parents may be given the option to have an online newsletter printed out and sent to them.

Advantages of online school newsletters:

• Saves paper and money

• Faster than printing

• Effortless distribution once email addresses are collected

• Makes sharing of information easier. (Parents may simply forward a relevant newsletter to family and friends.)

• Teaches children a lesson in reducing waste

One resource worth exploring for online school newsletters is School-newsletter.com.

How does your school handle its newsletter?

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Click here to learn about all the current contests, themes, and green challenges going on at Tree Hugging Family in August 2008

Post from: Tree Hugging Family

If you choose cotton swabs with a paperboard handle instead of plastic, you’ll save petroleum. There’s too much plastic waste in the world, even little swabs will add up.

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Click here to learn about all the current contests, themes, and green challenges going on at Tree Hugging Family in July 2008

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If your recycling center is like mine, they allow you to leave the labels on steel and aluminum cans for recycling.

But… those labels are recyclable paper. And they’re usually easy to remove unless wet or soiled.

Try adding to your paper recycling by removing clean food labels from cans when possible.

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Click here to learn about all the current contests, themes, and green challenges going on at Tree Hugging Family in July 2008

Post from: Tree Hugging Family