You Know You're a TreeHugger If...
- You become giddy with joy when you realize that a recycling center has opened 2 miles down the road and they take ALL the recyclables which you've previously been hauling to the recycling center 20 miles away. (For those of you who've asked: we do have curbside recycling but I personally think it's ridiculous to have to pay for it.)
- You get a big grin on your face when you walk into your local natural grocer and see the "We Are A Bagless Store" sign on the door. (They really won't give you a bag, but they will encourage you to buy one of theirs or they'll offer you a box).
- You cringe when you buy pre-packaged snacks and juice for your Brownie troop after you've worked so hard to teach them to reduce, reuse, recycle. (We mix our own juice for them and we pour their snack into containers/cups that we reuse/wash every week but we bought "portable" snacks for our end of the year party/field trip yesterday).
- You pull recyclables out of other people's trash or bring stuff home from church, school, and Brownies to put in your own recycling bin. (I know ya'll think I'm crazy, but I can't stand to see it get thrown away.)(I'm going on a field trip with Sarah's class today and threw an extra plastic bag in my backpack for recyclables).
- You tell your husband that you want a composting system (this one) for your birthday. And you look away when you see him start to roll his eyes.
Yeah, I'm an eco-friendly girl. Have been for awhile now. And I'm proud of it. C'mon people, I live in Colorado--who wouldn't want to protect all this natural beauty?
22 comments:
I feel completely vindicated! We have to pay a fairly high price for curbside recycling too. I have to drive it about 9 miles (not quite as far as you do but still...) and am glad to do it to support recycling but I think the people who participate in recycling should get free trash pickup (just pay for recycling) and the people who DON'T participate should have to pay for their trash pickup. Whew, how's that for a run-on sentence?
It's the water bottle overuseage that kills me. Water bottles and plastic grocery bags. It is so easy to refill a reusable water bottle at home.
Unfortunately I have one enviro-holdout. My sweet husband who is environmentally cognizant but doesn't mind wasting water bottles, styrofoam cups, etc. Some day he will come around!
Well, I'm not as crunchy as you, but I try, as well. And prepackaged snacks bug me. So do waterbottles. Alas, I've caved to both on many occasion, but always try to avoid them if I can.
I'm one of those women who runs out to her car mid shopping or worse, after standing in line to grab the eleventy million reusable bags from the back of my car. You know, because I'm never distracted and such.
I live in a fairly eco-sensitive environment. We moved from an area that, for the majority, barely seemed to notice we lived in an environment. It was not automatic for me, but once I started doing a few earth-friendly things, pretty soon it became automatic. If we do move back to where we were, and where they don't offer curbside recycling or bag alternatives, etc., if I'll stick to my new habits.
I'm exactly the same way! I pull things out of the trash all the time so I can recycle them. And I feel sick when I'm at other people's houses and they don't recycle at all. I do restrain myself from their trash, though!
I wrote about wanting to start composting. Any tips?
We live in an area where no one cares about the environment at all. We have friends who use stirofoam for their everyday cups. It's all they use! Drives me nuts.
Ok, love this post because I've been thinking about this lately.
I've been lazy since moving to OK about recycling, but in CA they pick it up curbside and it's included in your trash cost. I need to get back on this!
Right now we're in an apartment so composting isn't very handy, but we're moving soon to the country so I've been considering it.
Last thing, I hate the plastic bag thing too, but how do you avoid it... I know you can use reusable bags, but how do you know how many to take in with you for every trip?
I am definitely trying to be earth-concious..working on even making other adjustments as we learn about them or read something and think "hey, we can do that too"...
I love it when my kids get on board and are excited about it too!!
I support you, Mrs. Treehugger!
I just spent a few minutes catching up on your posts and...
-I too am a VB gal! I think I have four bags total and I love them :)!
-While I did not have to write my papers on a typewrite, I do remember library cards in a box/drawer. I spent my childhood in the 80's, which in my opinion, totally ROCKED!
-I hope one day to be as eco-friendly as you. My friends often call me names like "wannabehippie :)"
You.crack.me.up!
Please don't check the Smith's trash. We are dreadful at recycling. In fact, we may just be off-setting all the good you are doing.
A shame, I know.
Have a wonderful day with the kids! I hope Noah is a blessing!
I get more tree-hugger-ish every year.
To answer Emily's question about how to not use plastic bags: I don't have a problem using plastic bags on my big shopping days (when I have at last 20 bags or more); I just make sure I recycle them. It's the same with plastic water bottles. Using a reusable bottle is best, but if you need to have something disposable, just make sure it's recycled. Throwing them away is the true crime.
Good for you! I should learn from your example...another of the things on my "to do" list should be... "Be more green!"
I'm so glad I'm grandfathered in on friend status since I'm not a recycler. But I don't buy water bottles. And I have recyclable grocery bags which I sometimes remember to use.
Yet I am inspired to be better, and I'm sure if I lived next door to you, I'd give you my stuff to take to the center.
I just got some new shopping bags, and we do recycle our newspapers.
Recycling is just now starting to be popular here, but for now it's still pretty limited to paper.
I do love our new store - Natural Grocers - it has lots of great Colorado products. I think of you every time I shop there.
Oh, goodness. I so admire you for being such a "tree-hugger". I have to admit that we are not very good about any of that in our household - although, since I have been blogging this past year and half, I have become so much more aware of this, and now I feel guilty when I toss something I shouldn't.
Good for you, Meredith! I try to be a tree-hugger, but I've still got a way to go to catch up to you!
I would be giddy, too, if our area started recycling more. We can only recycle plastics 1-4 locally--what a difference it would make if we could do 1-7!
I don't recycle. I'm not very good at reducing. But I do reuse...sometimes.
Don't fire me as your friend, please. But, I buy prepackaged snacks. Have never stepped foot in a natural foods store. And I don't dig through trash...mine or anyone else's.
Oh gosh...I'm fired, aren't I?!
Good for you, Meredith! We are making steps toward living greener. I just got the Worm Factory yesterday (for a really big Mother's Day splurge thanks to my husband) so we're just waiting on the worms to get it started. Our 6-year-old gets a Ranger Rick subscription so he has become the eco-police in our household. I do use our own grocery bags whenever I can, partly because now I can't stand carrying in loads of groceries in flimsy bags. I usually let Target supply me with some, though, since theirs are thicker and we do use them for trash cans.
Good for you! We haul our recycling to Hot Springs. I can't throw it away either!
I love your tree huggin self!
This so completely descibes me and then I moved to the Arctic and there is NO recycling here........
I'm worried about the polar bears :)
We just started recycling when we moved to Texas. It is actually part of our regular trash pick up. I am thrilled with that. We used to have a full can every week. This week when I put ours out I was able to put 2 bags from the neighbors inside it. (We have to pay extra if there is more trash than will fit in the can.) So I helped them out. We have about 3 bins of recycling every 2 weeks. The only thing that frustrates me is that they don't recycle all plastics.
I am also trying to use my own bags when I go to the store.
There are other areas that I need to do better on but I feel like it is a process. And I would so love the worm compost bin. It would make a great school project for the boys.
The Mister is the tree-hugger in this family. So after him, you are the cutest tree hugger I know. And I think THE MOST devoted!
I've never been great at the tree huggery, but I'm making efforts. Reusable bags, recycling regularly, etc. I'm finding it easier as the kids get older to cut down on the convenience packaged-foods, too.
You're inspiring me, gurl.
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