Green Living Challenge-January! come join us! - Page 5

[snozzberry]

Originally Posted by greenmansions

Hmmm or maybe I should just accept plastic bags at the store when we are running low, and use canvas the rest of the time.

That would work. Somehow, it would feel better to me to not accept new bags but to reuse bags that someone else was already going to use anyway. That way I wouldn't be supporting new bag production in any way. But I don't know if that's logical that's just my gut feeling!

[Nitenites]

Hey girls - what is your best source for CF bulbs? Anyone have any luck finding some that give a "softer" light?

[greenmansions]

Originally Posted by snozzberry

That would work. Somehow, it would feel better to me to not accept new bags but to reuse bags that someone else was already going to use anyway. That way I wouldn't be supporting new bag production in any way. But I don't know if that's logical that's just my gut feeling!

That's a very good point. We grab a bag from the drawer sometimes tho to wrap vegies or whatever in, so I wonder how clean the ones in the bins are. Have you found them to be pretty clean generally?

[mugglemom]

I did pretty well for January:

- Bought some canvas bags at the thrift store and remembered to use them at the grocery store every time.

- Drove 50 miles less than my monthly average for next year.

Off to think about February!

[MrsMike]

Here's a re-cap of my January goals and what I accomplished:

Get cloth napkins and stop using so many paper napkins and towels. - We didn't get cloth napkins, yet. However, I did buy some handi-wipes (I'm cheap) and have been using them for cleaning in place of paper towels.

CD ds more frequently. - Yep! We've been CD'ing him more. Even my dh (Snappi's make him cry ) is starting to get the hang of it.

Find a much better alternative to the special diet my cat needs to be on. - We're getting there. I haven't had a ton of time to do thorough research. I've talked with a veterinarian that I work with about starting accupuncture. Also, I'm starting him (and my other cats) on Cosequin, which helps maintain bladder health, in addition to joint health.

Get mama cloths. - I haven't done this, yet, but we haven't had a ton of money to spare.

Declutter and give things to St. Vincent De Paul/other charities. - yup. We got rid of a few bags of clothes. We're still working on this and will for the next few months.

Off to the February challenge!

[whitedoyle]

Does any one know about these?

Originally Posted by greenmansions

So what do you all use to line your garbage cans with? We typically use plastic grocery bags, but with a switch to canvas I don't know what we'll do then... DH does the trash around here and he wants some sort of bag. I do not want to rock the boat to the point where garbage becomes my job!

This reminds me--

When we moved in to our old house(11 years ago) there was a trash can there that used plastic shopping bags. It attached to the cabinet door under the sink. It was sort of a rectangular wire hoop that had spots to hook the bag handles on and there was a lid. We had gotten rid of it because it was too small and we were "too busy" to recycle. When we moved into our new house we got a larger can and right now I find it goes 3-4 days before getting changed and we have to buy larger bags to use in it. To make a long story short--I would love to locate something similar to the plastic bag can.

Any ideas?

[whitedoyle]

If you shop there

Originally Posted by Nitenites

Hey girls - what is your best source for CF bulbs? Anyone have any luck finding some that give a "softer" light?

Home Depot has CF's sometimes at 5/$10 or so. I have gotten 3-way there and have seen dimmables there.

[melissa17s]

Originally Posted by whitedoyle

This reminds me--

When we moved in to our old house(11 years ago) there was a trash can there that used plastic shopping bags. It attached to the cabinet door under the sink. It was sort of a rectangular wire hoop that had spots to hook the bag handles on and there was a lid. We had gotten rid of it because it was too small and we were "too busy" to recycle. When we moved into our new house we got a larger can and right now I find it goes 3-4 days before getting changed and we have to buy larger bags to use in it. To make a long story short--I would love to locate something similar to the plastic bag can.

Any ideas?

My inlaws had these at their home in Singapore... We tried to get one, but we just did not have enough time to find the little store they bought it at... the store was called Howards. My fil thought Ikea had something similar. I will let you know if I find any online, and if you do, please share your source.

[kimberlychapman]

Originally Posted by melissa17s

My inlaws had these at their home in Singapore... We tried to get one, but we just did not have enough time to find the little store they bought it at... the store was called Howards. My fil thought Ikea had something similar. I will let you know if I find any online, and if you do, please share your source.

I have one, although it's currently not in use because our cupboard doors in this house are too thin to support the hardware needed for mounting.

I bought mine in Canada, either at Zellers (Target analogue) or K-Mart. Probably Zellers. It was in the late 1990s when I got it, and it wasn't the first one I had (I left the old one with my ex). They weren't hard to find up there.

Being unable to use it here sucks. I tried double-sided-taping it to the inside of the undersink door but it kept falling off. So instead, right now we use a small plastic bin like you can find at any Target-like store, and we put used grocery bags in that. I have never purchased kitchen garbage bags in my entire life.

In re-using grocery bags, check the bottoms for holes, especially at the seams. You don't have to discard ones with holes, though...you can use them as doublers inside of ones that don't look like they have holes, because sometimes you'll find they actually do and leaks are a pain.

Wild Oats has the best bags in our area. We alternate between paper and plastic, so we can re-use the plastic for garbage (and it's what they need to wrap meat in anyway) and we re-use the paper to hold recycling, or to wrap postal packages when re-using Amazon and other corporate boxes for mailing. Trader Joe paper bags are also good for this, but their plastic bags aren't very good and almost always have holes, so we always get paper from them.

And Vons of course doesn't even have a paper option. So we re-use their bags in garbage bins that don't hold much wet stuff, such as bathrooms where it's mostly tissues and hairballs (we're long-haired hippie freaks and make good use of a hair trap over the shower drain!). Or we triple them up in the kitchen if needed.