Sooo, Earth Day?

I've been pretty stoked about Earth Day this year. What would we do, I wondered. Last year I took the day off and the littlest man and I went to the Arboretum. Maybe we could do something more giving this year, clean up litter maybe?

But, alas, work had to take over the day this year. Too much to do and too many other days taken off; plus, I had to go to the Dr about a weird rash on my back - boo. Adding to that, I really was beginning to feel very blah about the whole thing. Taking just one day to do something green? We're pretty Green all year-round.

A list of green stuff we do everyday of the year:

• No paper towels - ever.
• 100% recycled toilet paper; except once when we had people over, it was late at night and we were about to run out - bad combo
• We haven't bought plastic baggies in a year and a half
• Only using natural cleaners, mostly baking soda and vinegar
• Making our own homemade laundry detergent
• Making our own hand soap - verdict is still out on that one so no post, yet
• Buying almost all organic food
• Line dry clothes year round, we've used the dryer only a handful of times since we started a year ago
• Composting everything we can
• Recycling everything we can

This list isn't exhaustive and also isn't meant to be a 'nanana-booboo' either. Perhaps I'm trying to assuage my guilt over not doing anything today to celebrate.

So, what did you do for Earth Day? Or what do you do everyday that makes you feel better for not doing anything today?

Things I can't stand...

So, a few weeks ago on a bulletin board the question went around "what can't you stand". I didn't think about it again until tonight while watching TV.

I've noticed that I have a problem watching all those ads that are trying to sell us things we don't need and are horrible for the us and/or the environment. (This includes a stupid ad on Facebookfor Tide that won't go away) What set me off tonight was the new Soft Scrub scrubby pads.

They are pre-loaded with Soft Scrub and you get them wet, then scrub away on your appliance. In the commercial, the woman is scrubbing away while the stove makes suggestive sexual comments. But that's not what bothers me. No, what bothers me is that once she is done molesting :) the stove she just THROWS AWAY the scrubby. And that's what the website says to do, "just throw away when the job is finished" GRRR!

Beyond the fact that I don't think you really need to use the cleaning chemical, can't you just buy the bottle and use a scrubby pad that you don't just THROW AWAY?

I've included some other things that really annoy me.

• Trash day and having to drive by all the houses with literally dozens of trash bags full of stuff that could probably be composted, recycled or freecycled
• Plastic packaging that can't be recycled - just make it recyclable people, it can't be that much different!
• Every time my MIL talks about how we don't have paper towels - I KNOW she didn't have them growing up, why are they necessary NOW?
• Having the cashier search for the UPC on my reusable bag that I just pulled out of my purse, and then asking if I know what this is and how much it costs

Clothesline Challenge Update

We've done really well with the clothesline. Back when we first started, I thought we had left some clothes at my mother-in-laws or perhaps just a random location. Where were they? I found them in the dryer about 2 months later.

We've only had to use the dryer once since we started using the line. It was raining EVERY FREAKING DAY and the littlst man had NO clothes. So, into the dryer they went - don't judge.

I am worried about this winter. We don't get crazy cold winters here, but to me it's still very cold. I also don't know how long they will take to dry. I guess we'll cross that bridge when we get to it.

Laundry Detergent Update

I had a comment from Joy asking if you can use the laundry detergent in the new HE machines. That what Shinerman and I have and it works just fine, not had any problems. One piece of advise: Keep the door to the place where you put the detergent in open. You'll probably need to smush (very technical scientific term, yes?) the detergent when the water starts flowing. My first load had about a third of the detergent caked in the cup after the wash was done. The clothes came out fine and we didn't rewash them.

Another thing I did was buy one of those Downy balls. I'm not sure our machine really understands that I want to use the fabric softener cup, and we haven't been able to figure out how to make it work since we bought the machine. I put some lemon essential oil in my white vinegar bottle and use the vinegar as fabric softener.

I put the lemon in there because, apparently, I don't enjoy the smell of the outdoors. When I get the clothes off the line, all I smell is "little outdoor boy" smell - not pleasant. But I'm please to say that not only are my line-dried clothes softer, but they also smell like lemon - yummy.

Full disclosure - the towels are still crunchy. Not as crunchy, but still crunchy nonetheless. We've learned to deal with it, so can you!


Happy laundry day to you!!

Homemade Laundry Detergent

I've been using vinegar as a general purpose cleaner for a while and have even tried making my own dishwashing detergent. Not so successful with that last one. The stuff doesn't seem to want to rinse off of my dishes.

But, I can claim success with making my own laundry detergent! Woohoo! I've had the ingredients for a while, but was pretty intimidated and worried that it wouldn't work – although that shouldn't have made me not do it; the worst that could really happen is that I'd have to rinse the washer out a few times and rewash the clothes.

Anyway, I stumbled upon this site, where she (I'm assuming) had 10 different recipes for laundry detergent. I've seen several, but the powdered ones all call for using Fels Naptha laundry soap. If you look at the ingredients it's essentially oil in bar form, it's made up of mostly petroleum products – not what I would call 'green'. So, I bought Dr. Bronner's Castile soap and then proceeded to not make the detergent. However, on this site, it gave the recipe for powdered detergent calling for Fels Naptha, but THEN said you could try whatever soap you wanted! The heavens parted.

So yesterday I made some laundry detergent, my recipe is below. It didn't take very long at all, about 20 mins, including time to take these pictures. I spent the most time grating the soap using my micro planer, but if you have a decent food processor you could use that. I then mixed up the rest of the ingredients and - tada - Laundry Detergent.

My Laundry Detergent recipe:

1 bar pure castile soap, finely grated
1 cup borax
1 cup washing soda
½ cup powdered oxygen bleach – chlorine-free
20-30 drops lemon essential oil

I'll let you know how it goes...

How does your house get clean?

I'm finally catching up on work and personal email after my trip to Mexico (no I didn't buy carbon offsets - I know I suck) and visited BabyCenter - it went green! Just kidding, it was just a couple of posts. But, I saw in the comments of this blog post that people are just in LOVE with bleach. I have memories growing up of a sink full of a bleach/water mixture 'cleaning' our white enamel sink. I hated having to put my hand down in that to pull the stopper - it hurt! - and I did occasionally ask my dad to do it for me. I've never liked the smell of bleach; so I've never used it in my house as a general cleaner, just in the laundry. I did, however, use a plethora of chemicals to clean our three bedroom two bath home. Scrubbing bubbles, toilet cleaner, formula ### - you name it. But several years ago - the dot com bust actually - we went through some not so fun times and one of the things I did was make my own cleaning products. So I've really been using vinegar for a while, but I have recently discovered baking soda. I now use it when I clean the bathroom; the tub, toilet and sink, and the kitchen as well. My friends joke about how we should have a soap-making party (they joke, not so much me) and I recently read about a group doing Green Cleaning parties. It's like a Tupperware or Avon party - only not earth-killing. But I'm not sure if I could justify the cost of paying for that when I could just do it myself, we'll see.

Anyway, so how do YOU clean your house? Any ideas on a decent do-it-yourself dishwasher detergent?