Green Resolutions

It is mid January?  How have those new years resolutions been going? This year my family made Green New Years Resolutions in addition to the standard kind.  Daniel declared that he would give mostly "LOVE" gifts instead of "stuff" gifts.  This went over so great during the holiday season, especially with our 5-year-old daughter Ayla.  Each gift she received was written on one link of a long paper chain that had an experiential "date with daddy" on it.  She racked it in with a day of ice skating and sledding, a lunch date, and an art project; go out and take pictures, built a snowman and many other great experiences that will go down in her memory and not in the land fill. In return, she started giving "Love" gifts to us: she put us to bed by singing a song, made our bed one day, and gave a back rub.  We all found that these presents were not only green, but satisfied us much more than a material product.

Ayla's green resolution was to not eat any food that was wrapped in plastic or packaging. We thought that was a great idea she came up with on her own, but quickly realized that, for our picky eater, this was not going to fly, as most everything you buy comes in plastic in some form: even our brown rice, cereal, healthy bars, bags of nuts etc. It was a little daunting when you started looking at all of the food that way.  So, in order to not limit her food intake even more we settled on: no plastic bags at the store. I have had this Green Resolution before and made it through the whole year w accepting only 3 new plastic bags into my life during the whole year.   My daughter experienced this with me as there would be many times we would want to pop into the store to get a few things for dinner, and if I didn't have a reusable bag with me, we would just skip the shopping and make do. A great tip for no-bag shopping is to go to the produce and ask for an empty box.  They have great sturdy big boxes there.  Pack all your food in the box instead of 8 bags.  It is easy to carry up to your house in one load, and then you can reuse or recycled the box. 

And for me, I am perfecting our winter compost practices and tending our food scraps through the frozen winter in order for them to make the most potent soil amendment for our garden in the summer. And I am also living by the saying, "If it ain't broken, don't fix it" meaning, I am staying away from getting a new "one" until the existing one that I have is no longer functional instead of just replacing something when I think it is time or I want it.

Remember, habits form if you do something 21 times in a row. Then, your resolution will not be something you have to practice; it just becomes a part of life.