Excess and Trash - A Review of the Book "7: An Experimental Mutiny on Excess"

A few months ago I picked up a book on a whim.  It was on a special offer for my kindle, and the description of the book intrigued me.

7: An Experimental Mutiny of Excess - By Jen Hatmaker
7 is the true story of how Jen (along with her husband and her children to varying degrees) took seven months, identified seven areas of excess, and made seven simple choices to fight back against the modern-day diseases of greed, materialism, and overindulgence.

So I will admit - this is not my typical book.  I'm more of a chick-lit kind of girl.  My time to sit and read is limited, so I mostly choose light books that let me escape into the carefree lives of the characters.

In any case, the author lured me in within the first few pages.  It is a casually written book  that reminded me of emails my friends and I might exchange.  At times I thought she tried a little too hard to be funny, but then sentences later, she grabbed me with deep thoughts about the values of America, and how it relates to modern religion.

Each month she and her family took on an "excess"  and stripped down to the bare minimum.

• Month one they eat only seven foods
• Month two they only wear seven articles of clothing
• Month three they rethink their possessions 
• Month four is a media fast
• Month five  was a focus on waste (Reduce, Reuse, Recycle)
• Month six focused on spending
• Month seven was a focus on stress and simplifying day to day life

She realized many things along the way;  We are incredibly lucky to live in such a rich place.  But our richness also seems to come with greed waste and misplaced values.

With some help she planted a garden that produced a good amount of vegetables and fruit.  She found that donating unwanted items directly to organizations that could use them (Think homeless shelter - instead of Goodwill), she felt a better connection and fulfillment in her giving.  She realized that today's consumption is undermining the earth's environmental resource base.

Hatmake has quite a following of readers.  I was quite happy to see her rethink disposable water bottles and embrace buying items from local sources.  Her family bought an more environmentally sound vehicle, and are now trying to reduce their waste footprint.

I appreciated that her book called on religious leaders to take care of the earth.   I also liked how she seemed to not be afraid to roll up her sleeves and serve those who were lacking resources and needed help. 

In short - if you are looking for a book that both playfully and thoughtfully looks at how you love more sustainably and less wasteful,  this book might be a good read for you. It was (at least to me) an interesting experiment that showed we can all do just fine with more thought and less waste. 

Green Up Your Halloween

Halloween!  The kids love it, but it can be a seriously "trashy" holiday.  Gazillions of teeny wrappers of plastic, one-time use costumes that people toss after their evening of fun, and "disposable" Halloween Decor translates into a lot of waste.  I'm here to help you green up your Halloween.

First, let's talk costumes.  This is a perfect time of the year to let your inner artist and creative spirit run free... by making your costume.   That's right - make your costume!  You don't need expensive materials. This year my kid wants to be something from MineCraft - the base for his costume?  Cardboard boxes... it doesn't get any easier than that.   Do you need some creative inspiration?  Check our my Pinterest page for Handmade Halloween Ideas - a sneak peek is at the bottom of this blog post.  ReCreate is even offering a Costume Workshop for people who may have the desire, but might want a bit of help putting their costume together.

Next, Let's talk decor.  We make it easy at our house. - we have a bin of nice decoration we pull out each year - and we mix them with the latest handmade decoration.  My kids love to create - so this is always really easy.   Buying and tossing each year is a colossal waste of money and resources.  If you like pumpkins - buy real ones - not plastic ones - because at least they decompose easily.  Remember, every single thing we buy, eat, wear or use was made from a natural resource.    It is not great for the environment to decorate for a couple weeks, and then toss it. 

Finally - candy.  I am not going to try and tell you not to give or collect a treat.  Here is what I'm suggesting:  Go old school for your candy collection bag - use a pillow case like when I was a kid.  No need to go buy a candy container for one day!  If you are handing out candy,   opt for one slightly large candy - instead of 5 little ones.  This translates into fewer little pieces of plastic littering our community or filling up our landfill.    Please only collect an amount that your child will actually consume.  The idea of collecting it, and then tossing it, makes me a little crazy!

Also you can donate your candy wrappers to Terracycle!  Terra Who?  Terracycle.

TerraCycle is on a mission to eliminate the idea of waste. [They] do this by creating waste collection programs (each one is called a “Brigade”) for previously non-recyclable, or difficult-to-recycle, waste. The collected waste is then converted into new products, ranging from recycled park benches to upcycled backpacks.

I hope you have an awesome Halloween.  If you make your costume - please post a link in a comment below!

Before you toss that container of food - Are you sure it's bad?

Food Labeling - What does it mean?  "Best By", "Sell By", "Enjoy By" and "Use By"....they sound simple enough, but in truth the timelines are not well understood and are not regulated consistently.  A recent report from Harvard and the Natural Resources Defense Council - Called The Dating Game:  How Confusing Food Date Labels Lead to Food Waste in America, found that some changes to the system could prevent a lot of food from being trashed, and provide food to some who would be going hungry otherwise.  

As our food system changed from a farm system in the 1940's to a highly processed system now, each state has adopted different policies for these confusing little labels.  What is required in California is different, than the regulations in the next state over. 

Because of the lack of regulation, most of the labels indicate how the food will taste in it's prime freshness, but most people think the food is no longer safe to eat after that date.   Think about it from a producer standpoint - they want you to have the best crunch for your chip, or correct chewiness for your cookie.

But the flip side of this, is that edible food is being tossed and or donated... when it is still perfectly safe to eat, because it is no longer at the freshness level the producer has determined is ideal.

In fact food waste is such a problem, that former Trader Joe's President Bill Rauch, is opening a market in Massachusetts,  by taking perfectly edible produce slightly past its sell-by date that ends up in the trash, and repurposing it into deeply discounted meals.  His place is going to be priced to sell meals that would compete with a fast food restaurant.

It is estimated that American's toss about 40% of all food that is produced in our nation.  Some is at the store level, but part of this is because we look at those labels, and say, "oh, darn this is bad."  But is it?  Maybe it just isn't as fresh as the producer wants us to experience.  It might be perfectly edible.
 
Please note - I am NOT suggesting you ingest dairy, seafood or other highly perishable items after their expiration date.  But that box of cookies that is 3 days past their prime, might be just fine.   How you can make less food waste?   Before you toss, think about what the label is on, how it has been stored, and what your common sense tells you.

Here's to less food waste in our One Big Bin!  

Reduce, Reduce, Reduce, Reuse and then Recycle

In my position at reCREATE, we visit thousands of kids and talk to them about waste reduction.  As part of the presentation, we show them a video that explains how our garbage is processed here in Western Placer County at the Material Recovery Facility (MRF).    

Did you know, if we took all the materials recovered for recycling at the Western Placer MRF, and placed it on a football field, for one year, it would go from one end zone to the other, and be about 200 feet high.  (If a building is over 200 feet, it is officially considered a skyscraper.)

No football fields were "trashed" in the making of this image.

While these materials will be used again, it does take resources to convert these materials into new paper, cardboard, plastic, glass, metal or aluminum.  Some materials recycle "better" than others.  For example, glass can be recycled forever, countless times.  Paper and cardboard can be recycled several times, but eventually it is an end product (no longer recyclable).  Aluminum cans can find their way back onto a store shelf in as little as 60 days, quick and easy!  To see how plastic is recycled, here is a video from Recycle Bank. 

It is interesting to note, that recycled products often take fewer resources to make than new products from virgin resources.  I will talk more about this in a future blog post!

That said, I still feel a responsibility to make less waste, recyclable or not.  What about you?  Want to help shrink that skyscraper a bit?  

We encourage the idea of Reduce (make less garbage) first.  
Reuse (use things over and over) second,
And Recycle as the third option. 
Ways everyone can reduce and reuse: 

• Buy snacks in bulk, and pack them in reusable containers
• Invest in a reusable water bottle
• When shopping, look for options with minimal packaging 
• Shop thrift or reuse stores
• Need something short-term?  Borrow or rent it. 
• Take your own shopping bags.
• When you are out eating, do you need a plastic lid and straw or can you forgo them?  

All of these ideas help make a little less trash.  Thanks for stopping by!  I'd love to hear how you reduce your waste. 

Washing... without all that pesky packaging

Since we have revised the way we shop, our garbage has reduced dramatically.  Taking our own containers and bags (almost all the time - we do slip up on occasion), has really made a difference in our trash output.  The one area where we still were bring home a fair amount of packaging was for cleaning supplies.   so we decided to try and make it ourselves.  

First up, laundry detergent:  I love Method laundry detergent.  It is awesome that the company makes their detergent ultra-concentrated.  Four little pumps, and that dirty stinky load of clothes would come out fresh and clean.  My first solution was to buy their refill.  It is enough for 85 loads of laundry... but it still comes in plastic packaging, and we are trying hard to cut down on that.  

I decided to make my own laundry soap.  None of the liquid recipes I found were very concentrated.... so I will attempt to use dry detergent for this first batch and see how it works.   I took the most common recipe I found on the internet,DIY Natural claims to have posted it originally: 

• 1 4-5 oz. bar of soap - I used Dr. Bonner's Castile Soap
• 1 cup of borax
• 1 cup of washing soda (This is different than baking soda)
• Optional:  essential oil 5 to 6 drops of lavender or tea-tree oil.

Grate your soap, with a cheese grater, mix in your other ingredients, well, stir for about 5 minutes then you are done!  Store in an airtight container, and keep out of reach of children.  You only need one tablespoon, per load, two tablespoons for a really dirty load.

Borax and washing soda come in boxes that are enough to make many batches of detergent,  so the waste impact of this project is minimal.  One paper wrapper from the soap.  Not bad for 30+ loads of detergent.

Next Up... Counter-top cleaner made from vinegar and orange peel!

Amazing Upcycle - Wine Cork Floor

I came across this this image on Pinterest, and loved it.  What a beautiful way to reuse wine corks.  

The image came from a story originally originally posted on MSN.  

The handiwork is from Phoenix Commotion.  You can see Phoenix Commotion founder, Dan Phillips speaking at a TEDxHouston  here.

Inspired?  We have a huge barrel of corks @ reCREATE, 10 cents each.

Resolve to Make Less Trash

 Welcome to 2013.  Since we are trying to make minimum waste, we have several plans to help us achieve our zero-waste goal.  With the average American making almost 5 lbs of garbage per day, it is EASY to find ways to make less waste.

Here are ways we plan to continue or start making less waste:

Continue to bring our own bags.  Not just to the grocery store, but to the mall or anywhere we need to make a purchase.  The U.S. goes through an estimate 100 billlion shopping bags annually.  A single plastic bag can take up to 1,000 to degrade in a landfill. Only about 3% are recycled.  Yikes, right?!

Continue to use our own reusable water bottles, and coffee cups.  Here too, the statistics are boggling.  I'm happy to say that as I go visit classes with our waste reduction programs, 4 years ago, I would look out and there would be a sea of disposable water bottles on students desks.  Today, I rarely spot more than a couple in a class of students.

Call the companies for the few catalogs that are showing up in our mail, and get off their mailing list.  We can find it all online. If you want to reduce your junk mail,  here is an excellent article on the ways to cut down on the waste.  

Give up paper towels.  This has been a hard one for us.  We have gone about three weeks without paper towels, and I must admit, for certain clean ups, they are nice, but we are going to try.

Fix It.  If something breaks.  We will attempt to fix it before buying something new.

We are making an effort to eat more fruits and vegetables, so along with that goal, we are trying to buy local.  Local foods are higher in nutrients, and it is a great way to teach your children about food and what grows in each season.

Along with our eat more vegetables, we have a goal for less food waste.  It is estimated that about 40% of all food is wasted in the U.S.  It isn't just the food that is waste.  Water, transportation, store resources, refrigerator energy - all down the drain when we toss that food.  Better planning equals less waste.

What are your goals for the year?

Trash Audit - A.K.A. Does this Trash Make My Bin Look Big?

Happy New Year!

We audited our trash last week, to check in to see how we were doing, in our quest to make less trash.  We hosted many people for both Christmas and New Years, and I am happy to report, that even with the present opening, we still have room in our trash can!  (We forgot to put it our between Christmas and New Years.)  Here is what it looked like:

Trash:
8 plastic bags of assorted food packaging (crackers, bread, cheese, ham)
Three plastic tubs (cottage cheese, dip and spread)
12 candy wrappers.  Mostly paper and foil.
 One kitchen trash bag of paper (from a purge of old paperwork.  This all arrives paperless now, but we still had it from the past.)
Christmas Packaging - fit in one 10" x 10" by 8" box.  This was the rigid plastic around a toy each of my kids got.  There was also tissue paper that was beyond reuse, and had already served us well several times!  Santa wrapped his gifts - so there was a small amount of gift wrap  We were pleased that Santa used eco-friendly printed paper.  
One grocery sized bag of assorted tissues, floss, misc.  bathroom trash - collected from all the bathrooms.
Two paper soda cups that came home from eating out - no lids or straws.
Three pieces of fruit that went bad.
A decent handful of junk mail and envelopes from Christmas cards we received.
12 glass bottles of various types.  Did you know that glass can be recycled forever?  It never goes down in quality like other products. 
13 cans of cat food.   Our elderly cats can't eat dry food very well any more.  
4 soup cans.
Cat waste.

Diverted:
8 cans from soda.  They are being diverted to make soda can art, like this 
4 wine bottles.  Diverted to make these centerpieces.
Loads of gift bags and tissue.  We refold and put these back away for another year.  
Compostable plates from New Year's Eve.  They will go into the worm bin.
5 plastic cups - that were washed out and will be used again.
5 cardboard boxes that will be used for art at reCREATE.
Eco -Packing peanuts - which can be used for to make fun art sculptures, like this.


Not Among Our Trash:
Wasted Food from Christmas Eve.  We carefully calculated how much food was appropriate for our guests.  We replenished food as needed.  Result - virtually no wasted food after hosting 11 people.
Excess Packaging:  Among the adults - almost all gifts were either handmade or "experience" gifts.  I'm thrilled that we will be getting together with other family members to see theater performances, and attending some lovely fundraisers together.  Not only are we helping causes, we now have some dates that we know we will be having fun together.  My sister and her husband are taking our kids to see a show and keeping them overnight.  They can't wait!
Disposable Plates & Cutlery - We did bring out some paper plates for New Year's Eve- but we will compost them.  We used all real plates and cutlery for the rest of the time, and just cleaned up afterwards. 
Shopping Bags - We bring our own when we shop - so we don't have a drawer exploding with one use plastic shopping bags.  
Christmas Decor - I heard a story about a local family that put their Christmas Tree out for the scouts to pick up.  It still had on the lights and ornaments.  I can't imagine that!  Each year as we pull out our ornaments, we revisit memories of Christmas Past.    The result is that we reuse them every year.  We did buy a tree this year... but I know it will be mulched and made into compost. 
Much of the food we bought was placed in our glass containers, significantly reducing the amount of waste we generated.  

We are still learning, but are quite proud of our low waste holidays!  How did you do?

 

Being Creative in Making Less Waste

I can't believe it is just a few days until Christmas. My last several weeks have been busy, but calm.  No frantic trips to the mall.

Last weekend I helped 80 girl scouts (along with a small army of helpers) make 400 gifts.  Each made a waterless snow globe, an ornament, a winter scene art piece, a button & wire sculpture and a key chain.  The amazing thing is that the only thing we purchased to make it through this afternoon was the rings for the keychains, and a small amount of glue.  EVERYTHING else was from reCREATE.  We essentially made 400 gifts from other peoples waste!

If you are looking for gifts kids can make, from items around the house, you might want to check out my Pinterest board:  Green Gifts Kids Can Make.

For my kid's teachers, I made these cookies in a jar, from the Whole Foods Market Blog.  The jars were not purchased, but rather empty jelly jars we re-purposed.  We spruced up the jar, with a bit of fabric and ribbon around the top.  There is even a tag you can print out for the gift, here.  

If you are inspired to make something, I have been pinning upcycled projects for over a year at Pinterest.  Upcycled is a term for taking waste or used materials, and transforming it into something of better or higher quality.  Check out this board.

I mentioned that I was part of an Ornament Exchange this December.  In our group of four, two ornaments were upcycled!  This beauty was made by the creative Cindy Ann who runs the ornament exchange.  You might also want to check out the adorable egg carton angels made by Michele, from Michele Made Me.

We plan to audit our trash for the next week, so we can tell you exactly how much trash we made over the holiday.  We are hosting the family, so we might have more garbage than usual, but I am optimistic to share that we were able to have a few days filled with special moments without having an overflowing garbage bin.

I hope you have a lovely holiday. 



 

Does This Trash Make My Bin Look Big?!

An Inventory of our Garbage

In order to see how we are progressing with our Zero Waste Journey - We need to know how we are doing right now.   We wrote down everything we tossed for the week, and then inventoried it.

According to the EPA, each person in the US makes about 4.4 pounds of waste each day.  That means the average family would make 123 lbs. of waste per week.  Of course some of it is recyclable, but wow- that is a lot of trash. 

Here is the inventory of our trash for this week:

Paper:  

• Election Guide
• Mailed newspaper circulars, Saturday and Sunday newspapers
• 43 election flyers
• 18 pieces of assorted junk mail, brochures, envelopes, etc.
• 36 pieces of completed homework sent home after being graded  
• One old magazine that was torn up for the collage I made from magazine pieces
• Several tissues - as we had the sniffles this week
• One empty paper bag from See's Candy
• Four Paper towels - the end of the roll - we are going to attempt to not buy any more

Plastic:  We were overdue to clean out our refrigerator, so we took a hit here:  

• Seven plastic tubs - yogurt, sour cream, cottage cheese, bean dip, hummus - all almost gone but past expiration date.  We emptied, rinsed and put in to the garbage.  (These were purchased before we started this, but I still feel guilty!)
• Plastic wrap from around the Olive Oil we purchased 2 bottles.
• Plastic lunch meat container (sizeable from Costco.)
• Plastic wrap from cheeses we finished and the chicken breasts we cooked for dinner.  
• Plastic from some Smoked Salmon
• Three plastic bread bags - We pulled out the bread maker - and my husband has already made 3 great loaves of bread!
• Bags the newspapers came wrapped in
• Two shampoo bottles (we are planning on refilling bottles in the future - but these were excess bottles)
• Plastic bags from frozen veggies, fruit, and sausage
• Plastic Method hand soap refill pouch - refilled several containers, but is empty.
• Lid from egg nog
• Empty peanut butter jar - we will be using our own glass containers in the bulk area in the future. 
• Halloween candy wrappers - 10 total.... I know  - yuck, but sometimes I need to pick my battles with the family.
• Empty kids toothpaste  

Cardboard:

• 4 boxes from food
• Egg nog carton
• empty cardboard container from left over food at a restaurant.   I was mad at myself for forgetting to bring my take out container for my leftovers, but need to give a nod to Dos Coyotes for their Eco-friendly to-go container
• One empty soda cup from lunch at a restaurant. (At least I didn't opt for a lid or straw)

Glass:

• BBQ sauce bottle
• One broken drinking glass
• One wine bottle
• 2 beer bottles 
• empty mayonnaise jar 

Foil / Metal:

• Empty Peets coffee bean bag - 2 lb size means less packaging. 
• Foil from wrapped leftovers
• Foil pouch from Costco sized yeast bought for making out own bread
• 7 cans from cat food (our cats are quite elderly and just can't eat the dry food anymore like they used to
• Two cans from crushed tomatoes used for dinners

Misc.:

• Waste from our cats' litter box.  Not sure how we can get around this.
• Dirty newspaper that lined the parakeets cage.   

TOTAL Waste weight for the week: 31 pounds.  

10.5 pounds were cat litter waste, so we generated   20.5 pounds of waste total for the week, or about .75 lbs. of waste per person per day.  While that is not a lot according to the EPA, 20 pounds of garbage is still too much.  We can do better!


Some of our day to day behaviors we should celebrate, because they make no waste:

• Packing the kids lunch in a tin container, with a cloth napkin, and reusable fork.  
• We all use reusable water bottles and reusable coffee cups.  
• If I want to splurge and go out for a coffee, I bring my own cup, or I don't get one
• We bring our own bags to the store when we shop.
• We have a worm bin for some of our food waste. 
  

Celebrations this week on our Zero Waste Journey:

We made our own bread a few times.  I made a batch of tortillas from scratch, and we said no to purchases we had made in the past, and found better alternatives.


I stopped in the new Fresh Market in Roseville.  Immediately I eyed the bulk bins - they seemed to have loads of great stuff to buy in bulk.   

First stop was the deli counter.  The girl was very nice, and happy to put my deli purchases directly into my container.  
Then she said, "Oh, I don't want to put this label on your container, so I'll just put it on this bag you can take to checkout.
Me, "No!  Please put the label on my container, I asked you to put everything in the container to avoid using plastic."
Her, "Oh, ok. Here you go."

They were more than happy to let me use my own containers for bulk, and weighed my other containers for me.  After a closer look - it looked mostly like snack foods, and we didn't need that, so I got just one snack mix.  I wish they had more organic choices.

When I went to check out, I explained to the Checker that the weight of the containers was on the bottom and needed to be subtracted from the container.  
She asked, "So that if how much the bulk weighs, written on the bottom? 
Me, "No, that is the weight of the container.  You need to subtract if from the total weight."
She fumbled with her computer for a few minutes, then looked at me and said,"  Today for you, it is free.  Can you use the bags in the future?  Our system isn't set up for this."
Me, "Thank you, but no - I can't use the bags, I'm trying to keep excess plastic out of the landfill."
Her,"That is good of you,  I will try and figure out how to do this, so we know in the future."
Me, "I hope so, I'd like to be able to shop here again." 

Costco shopping was not very successful - excess packaging made us say no to some of our usual purchases.  Big containers of individually wrapped items are no longer on our "to buy list". 

All in all, some good mixed with challenges.   I realized how much Whole Foods does to encourage people to bring their own containers.


Failings This Week:

My husband and I went out to grab a quick lunch on Friday.  We planned to go to try a new cafe, but it was too busy, so we landed at L&L Barbeque.  We were planning on eating there, so it never occurred to me to think about packaging.  Both of our meals were served in styrofoam.  We ate it all there, so it didn't hit our garbage inventory, but why do restaurants still use this stuff?  Not going back without my own plate!