Everyone has limits

Everyone has their limit for different things. When it comes to green living, what is simple or necessary for one person can be completely overboard for another. I read a LOT of blogs about natural or green living so I'm constantly learning about new things. Just this past week I read about washing your face with oil, "family cloth" and lactofermented vegetables. I find all of these things fascinating, regardless of whether they're something I would ever incorporate into my life.

Another example of this is line drying. I wanted an umbrella clothes line for a while to sun my diapers. When I first expressed my desire for one, Sean said, "That's what I bought a dryer for!" To me, it seemed perfectly logical to hang clothes when we had the time (weather permitting) and save a few pennies. We eventually got one and now I hang clothes out when possible. I love it!

One of the crazy blog posts I read this week was about "family cloth." While I would consider doing this, I shared the idea with a few people who thought it was COMPLETELY overboard. My sister even requested that I please keep toilet paper around for guests. I knew from reading various online forums that some people don't use toilet paper. And I always wondered what they used instead. Bidets?

For me, it wasn't that out there since we already wash diapers daily. So what's the big deal if we wash some big people wipes? I knewfigured this was a bit much for Sean but decided to approach it with him as if I really wanted to do it - just for kicks. Surprisingly, his response wasn't as crazy I as expected, but he definitely wasn't down with it.

I read an interesting forum thread once where someone asked, "What green living things would you absolutely not consider?" Would you stop shaving your legs? Would you stop using deodorant? Would you use mama cloth/diva cup/etc? For now, we'll definitely be using toilet paper around here.

Seriously...

I've been toying around with actually having a focus to my blog. Up until now, it's been part personal, part green living. Yes, I know people make money blogging. But I don't feel like I have that kind of time to devote to my blog. But yet I want to.

And then there's that other issue. The one where I'm torn between wanting people to actually READ my blog and wanting to keep it from people I know for fear of offending someone or opening my thoughts and/or writing up to criticism. Or worse, what if no one cares to read it? I can't even get my husband to read it and I even set Google Reader up on his homepage so it would show him when he had new posts to read. I mean how lame can my blog be if HE doesn't even read it?

But does any of that even matter? I love reading other blogs about green living. Maybe there's someone out there who would like to read mine?

We compost, now what?

One of my big things for this year was that I wanted to compost. I started reading about it last year but with the pregnancy and me practically being incapacitated, it wasn’t feasible for us to start - especially since it was something I wanted to do but Sean would have to do all the work. Early this spring I started thinking about it again and researching options. I know it can be as simple as a “pile” but we live in the city in a neighborhood and I didn’t really want to create a “pile” in our backyard. And the garden is right up against the back of the house where our bedrooms are and I didn’t want to do it there either. Retail composters can be ridiculously expensive so we were left weighing our options.

Fortunately, Sean’s SIL Denise wanted to compost too and his brother decided he wanted to make a tumbling composter. He found instructions on the internet but it required an enormous pickle barrel and the only place he could find those was in Kentucky. Believe it or not, he drove down and bought 2 – one of for us, one for them. I still can’t believe Eric drove to Kentucky just to buy 2 pickle barrels but I’m glad he did.

We scheduled a Saturday for us to go to Eric & Denise’s to make the compost bins and all was well. We got there shortly after lunch and they got started. It didn’t take them long to realize it was going to be more difficult than they thought. Turns out the directions were merely a diagram! Afternoon turned into evening and I was exhausted from trying to juggle the babies away from home. Despite much help from Denise & Adrienne, I just needed to go home. We decided that Sean should just stay as long as he needed to to finish it because we didn’t know when we’d have another weekend for him to do that. Luckily, we had driven separate since there was no way the finished product was fitting in my car.

Sean didn’t get home until almost midnight but our composter is awesome! I’ve thoroughly enjoyed dutifully taking our scraps out and dumping in the stinky bin (it’s behind the garage for optimal sun) and dodging all the bugs. But last night Sean said, “So when do we stop putting stuff in there?” I said, “That’s a good question. I guess I’ll have to look that up.” I was so set on getting started I never researched how long it would take or how full we should make it can still tumble and breakdown, etc. I guess I need to get on that.

Living Simply

My mom was visiting this past week and mentioned an article she’d read about a woman who had 100 belongings. I didn’t really think much about it till someone shared this article on Facebook. I have since read Tammy Strobel’s blog about social change through simple living. And she had a guest blog from the writer of Becoming Minimalist.

I really love the whole concept and plan to start working on this right away (what’s one more thing in my life?). The author of Becoming Minimalist started simplifying his life by cleaning out his car. I’m starting with my iPod. I’m a bit of a hoarder when it comes to music. Ideally, I like to listen to a CD before I put it on my iPod so I know if I really like it but this rarely happens. Instead, I have an iPod full of music – some I don’t like and some I’ve never even heard! I often listen to my iPod on shuffle and it’s annoying when I have to keep hitting Next because I don’t like a song. Whenever I eventually need a new iPod I’ll definitely be more selective about what I put on it.

I have 26GB of music on my iPod so I guess this isn’t really starting small – that’s 823 albums by 584 artists. It’s going to take me a while to go through everything and decide if I want to keep it. It’d probably be easier to start in the kitchen!

Reuseable Bags

We’ve been using reusable bags at the grocery for over a year. We have 2 Kroger bags and 2 Trader Joe's bags. Four bags is USUALLY enough for us. We’ve gotten into the habit and remember to take them 99% of the time. We even have 2 reusable produce bags (we lost one but I want to buy more anyway). I hate when I make an unplanned trip to the grocery and don’t have any bags. While I could just store the ones we use in the car, the ones we have aren’t very compact and definitely won’t be lasting indefinitely.

I’ve been contemplating the purchase of some new reusable bags for MONTHS. I want some that are sturdy yet compact when folded and I want them to be durable. At first, I thought I wanted a set of Envirosax, preferably this style. But when I finally decided to buy them, they were out of stock. In the meantime, I kept looking at the ones on reuseit.com. I want some that will work at Kroger and Walmart so the cashier doesn’t huff and puff when I pass them over so I’ve also considered something like this. But I also like these and these.I think this is a case for Nancy!

I'd love to hear what you use as well as suggestions about what I should buy!

Get it together!

I have sensed that some people are under the impression that I have it together. I do not. I hate to ruin the façade but it is true. I only have it partly together. Some of the time. Yes, we use cloth diapers while both working full time. Yes, we make our baby food. But have you seen my refrigerator? Trust me, you don’t want to. Another case in point, my emotional state.

We started a new sitter this week. Our old sitter is in the family way and is hopefully by now relaxing and preparing for her family’s newest addition. When we started with Caitlin (sitter #1) when the babies were about five months old, they were too young to care that she wasn’t me. This, in addition to several other factors, made it much easier to leave my awesome babies with her every day and head off to work. Now, the babies are nine months old and painfully aware when I leave them with this new stranger.

We took them over there for a little bit before the first day and they did fine. But this past Monday was a different story. It doesn’t help that by the time I drop them off, it’s about time for their first nap. And while each day has gotten better for Regina (new sitter), each morning has gotten harder for me. If this is going to be the trend for this week, I’m dreading tomorrow and Friday. I had to fight back tears as I drove away. And it got me thinking about how on earth I can be a stay-at-home-mom, again. What could we get rid of so I could be with my babies? Even if we cancelled the cable/internet, that wouldn’t be enough. My car will be paid off next year but even that wouldn’t be enough for me to quit working. Renting wouldn't be any cheaper than our house payment so that wouldn’t work either. Do you think my lender would care if I stopped paying my student loan? Sadly, even that wouldn’t help either. Maybe we need to play the lottery.

Flashback to December 2007

It's funny to read this now. While I still agree with the album choices, there are definitely some I'd add... but maybe later.


Sometimes thoughts flow into my mind and I am overcome with an urgent need to get them down, to share them. I am in the process of making a special CD for a special friend who is going through a big life change right now. I had asked for input of a few select people and k8 suggested The Heart of Life from John Mayer's Continuum.
I can't always associate the name of a song with the actual song so I pulled it up in my iTunes and was instantly hit with this need to express how much I love this entire CD. For me, this CD is one of those rare CD's where you can put it on, listen to the ENTIRE thing and just go to a happy place. The minute I played this song I was reminded how much I love this CD (sometimes I have to put a CD into early retirement so that I won't get sick of it from listening to it too much).
My next thought was being at home all comfy on the couch, sipping tea during late afternoon…listening to John serenade me to sleep. There are many other CD's that I like to listen to beginning to end.
Here are a few of them…in no particular order.
The Black Parade – My Chemical Romance
Alright Still – Lily Allen
American Idiot – Greenday
Descended Like Vultures – Rogue Wave
Echoes, Silence, Patience & Grace – Foo Fighters
Love.Angel.Music.Baby – Gwen Stefani
Songs About Jane – Maroon 5
Third Eye Blind – Third Eye Blind
Let Go & Under My Skin – Avril Lavigne