Over the past few years I have been trying to educate myself on how to make my footprint on this planet a little lighter. The more I educate myself the more I feel empowered and invested to make changes for myself and for our home. I am starting with changes in our kitchen and wanted to share the changes I have implemented so far.
This isn’t meant to make anyone feel guilty – I simply want to share the tips that I have found that have worked in our home! I am far from perfect in my “green” efforts, but I think every little change can make a difference to reduce waste.
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1 – REUSABLE PRODUCE SACKS
We started using these reusable produce sacks and haven’t looked back. They are easy to use and easy to clean – just pop them in the washer! I much better about using these than the numerous plastics sacks we would use for produce each time we went to the store.
2 – CLOTH NAPKINS
I am a big napkin user, probably because I tend to be a messy eater and usually spill something. We’ve had cloth napkins for a while, but I still always found myself reaching for the paper napkins. One day when our paper napkins ran out instead of buying a new pack I put a basket of cloth napkins on the counter and I haven’t bought paper napkins since. Keeping them on the counter has been key so they are visible and easy to reach.
3 – REUSABLE SNACK BAGS
I bring my lunch to work almost every day of the week. I also love to bring lots of snacks to work, I like having options. I found myself using and throwing away so many plastic snack bags. I found these reusable snack bags last year and haven’t purchase a box of plastic snack bags since. The ones I bought can be put in the dishwasher, but we usually just wash them by hand.
4 – CLOTH CLEANING TOWELS
Another item we would go through like crazy was paper towels. We used them for everything. Cleaning up spills, wiping the counters down, and everything in between. A few years ago we made the switch from paper towels to cloth cleaning towels and have drastically cut down on the number of paper towels we throw away. We still have a roll of paper towels on hand for just in case times, but we rarely use them. I think we have had the same roll since January and it’s only halfway gone. We have trained ourselves to always reach for the cloth rags instead. I keep a basket of clean rags on the shelf in the laundry room (which is right next to the kitchen) and keep a basket for dirty rags on the floor right below it. I wash everything in the dirty basket once a week to make sure we always have a fresh supply. Having the rags in a convenient location was important so we would actually use them.
5 – BEE’S WRAP
This is a new item to me. We recently started using bee’s wrap in place of plastic wrap. The pack we have comes with 3 different sizes that fit most of our bowls and plates. You simply place the wrap over the dish you want to cover and use the warmth of your hands to seal it. You can wash it with cool water and a mild soap and reuse it. They are supposed to have a life of up to a year, but we haven’t had ours that long yet, so I can’t attest to that. So far so good though. We are not 100% using bee’s wrap right now since we are sort of still adjusting to it, but I think with time we will switch to only usingbee’s wrap.
I hope you found these tips helpful. You’ll have to let me know if you already use any of them or if you plan to!
