Green Options

We are doing our best to recycle or donate anything that is not coming with us on moving day. There is one thing we’ve been holding onto that not even our animal shelter will take: old pillows.

I am not a pillow expert. All I knew about pillows before today is that you’re supposed to change them regularly because of dust mites. (Yuck I saw that Oprah show.) During my research on how to recycle old pillows (make dog beds) I discovered that there are many eco-friendly pillows to choose from. The cool thing about eco-friendly pillows is that they are made from renewable resources and last much longer than cotton, polyester, and down filled ones (the kind I’m sending to the dump because there seems no alternative-sewing machine is packed). The uncool thing is the price. The investment for a full family will be substantial. Even the kiddy pillows are pricey. This brings me to the question of the day:

Is your child ready for an eco-friendly pillow?

I was inspired by Jessica’s banana. The most eco-friendly choices are so simple, aren’t they? Though a picture says a thousand words, Jamie said it best this week in her post on fun activities for young children: ”The first step in becoming more Earth Friendly is to consume less.”

This is why I love Jackie Silberg’s book 500 Five Minute Games. Quick and Easy Activities For 3-6 Year Olds. Silberg’s book is great for preschool teachers, but also for moms and dads who tire easily of young children’s games and toys. Before getting this book I often felt tempted to pick up the phone or put on a movie when my preschooler’s games got repetitive. There’s only so many times in a day you can sincerely answer yes to ”Wanna play hippos?”.

The eco-friendly aspect of Silberg’s book is simple; the activities in it require almost no stuff. Apart from a few experiments that call for simple household items like a bowl or a flashlight, the majority of games and activities in the book require only the world’s most precious resource: children. (Some games require a few kids, but I have been able to adapt most of them to 2 player by either becoming a participant or inviting a stuffed hippo or pony into the circle.) You can also scan each page in a matter of seconds and get the game going before any attention is lost. My daughter’s favourite game from Silberg’s book is called “An Interesting Story” and is from the Language Game section. It goes like this: 

My second (and last) child is no longer a baby. I know this not because he just turned two, but because he actually needs a bath most days. Though we consider ourselves cautious parents in terms of water safety (our water heater was set to 120F before we brought our first one home) I sat by and unknowingly let both of my babies chew bath toys that contained PVC and mold. Here are a few things I wish I had known about bathing babies from day one:
Squirties aren’t as cute as they look
We had them all: Santa duck, sailor duck, golfer duck, you name it. I didn’t realize how dangerous rubber ducks were until the first time black goo squirted out of one of them. I recommend the ban from the beginning, because before you know it your bath will be infested with these hard to wash sea creatures that double as hazardous teethers. Choose bath toys that can go in the laundry, or PVC free ones without holes that can drip dry. Here is an extensive guide to safer bath toys.

It always makes me laugh when moving companies try to sell their own boxes. Who would pay for a box with so much cardboard already going into the landfills? In the last month or so my husband has been picking boxes up all over the city. He goes to liquor stores, bars, grocery stores, and restaurants.  MORE BOXES is on the top of the moving checklist every week. Gulp. I suddenly get how this is not the most eco-friendly option. Every time hubby goes on a box run, we’re using that darned car. Need I mention the amount of tape required to make sure the toy hippos don’t fall out?

If we lived in California, we would most definitely use RecoPacks from rentagreenbox.com, a company that takes zero-impact very seriously. Not only do they scour the landfills for trash that is difficult to recycle, such as old car seats and bottles that once held bleach or laundry detergent, they also deliver the containers (when you rent them for a buck a week) in a truck that runs on veggie oil and bio fuel. When you’re done you simply place the RecoPacks on a “poopy pallet” (made partially from the shells of old diapers) outside your new home and the veggie truck picks them up. No secret dumping of boxes in the cover of darkness necessary.

We are a single car family and have been so for five years. This is seen as a sacrifice by some, especially my own father who has four vehicles of his own and just married a woman with two more. To me, living with one car is a convenience. I work from home and we live in a small town where almost everyone can walk to work, school, and the beach. Weeks go by when I don’t even get behind the wheel. This is all about to change as we move across Canada to eastern suburbia.

Though we’re excited about the change and the opportunity to be closer to family, my husband insists that we’re going to need two cars. I think “need” is too strong of a word, though I’m close to admitting that it will be difficult living with one car when the kids get older. Still, I want to try, and this is one eco-battle/financial scrap I’m determined to win. Here are our arguments. What do you think my chances are?

This weekend we had a 40th birthday for my husband and I almost cried at the waste. The fact that we are moving and have already packed most of our dishes made it that much more difficult to keep things eco-friendly. Besides using disposable dishes and leaving the food out so long that it spoiled, I accidentally dropped three quarters of the cake before anyone got seconds. I felt terrible all the next day, not only from the cake drop and the late night, but also because we quadrupled our weekly garbage and recycling output in a matter of hours.

At first I thought it might be possible to do my time right here on Eco Child’s Play by writing a post about WHAT NOT TO DO when throwing a birthday party. However, I got side-tracked reading all of the eco-entertaining DO’s already covered, including the used book donation idea which I loved. This got me thinking that a theme party might be a great way to reduce waste, and convince guests and co-hosting partners (spouses and children) that environmentally friendly can also mean fun.

Here are five eco-friendly theme parties to consider for your next family bash:
The Take Home party
Reinforce a no-gift policy by asking each guest to bring one item they no longer use. As each guest arrives and places their donation on the table, give them a number to decide who gets to pick their take-home gift first.

While out for my monthly moms’ night out last week, I was disturbed by my own request for more salad dressing. With 1/3 of my lettuce remaining, I could have easily gone without. Before I thought better of it though, my extra dollop arrived in a plastic ramekin on a side plate with a paper doily for pretty presentation. Instead of enjoying the rest of my salad, I felt guilty knowing what Mother Earth had gone through to satisfy my need for a mere ounce of strawberry vinaigrette.

Being green is more difficult when you’re on the go, isn’t it? As my mom used to say, one of the hardest things in life is learning to just say no. Here are some of my new no’s for on the go:
Say no to receipts for things I would never take back
I use debit for almost everything and my purchases show up on my electronic bank statement. I’m not going to take back gas, or my daughter’s haircut, or the new crown on my dead tooth, so why do I need a receipt?
Say no to plastic bags for produce
I need five apples, four pears, and a bunch of bananas. Do I need three plastic bags as well? No. The clerk may get annoyed, and she will have to touch my fruit, but so did the teenager who stocked it and I’m planning on washing it well.

When my daughter started preschool last year, my life as a craft collector began. From rock monsters to paper plate people, our family grew by the day. While I always welcomed the creative creatures and inventions into our home, I was disappointed that many of them were adorned with things that had likely been purchased at dollar stores (i.e. pipe cleaners, popsicle sticks, googly eyes), which in addition to being wasteful also made most of them choking hazards for my younger son (80% of the kids had baby brothers or sisters at home).

I was excited to learn about  The Imagination Factory, a website dedicated to helping children turn solid waste into art.  Marilyn Brackney, founder of The Imagination Factory, is an artist and educator  out of Columbus, Indiana who has been reusing materials for art projects for many years. In 1996, she launched her website where she helps visitors learn how to use trash for activities such as drawing, collage, and sculpting. The site also offers educational information for kids, such as  how to be a paper saver. Brackney believes that it is often the children who inspire the adults to be more environmentally conscious. 

We’ll probably never solve the mystery of the missing socks, but what we can do is keep the orphan ones out of the landfills. If you have a family of four or five and each person loses an average of two singles per year, then you’ll be dangling approximately 10 mismatched socks above your trashcan annually during your spring or fall cleaning. If the socks you are searching for belong to the little piggies on your precious baby’s feet, this number is probably even higher. Regardless of size, shape, or colour, here are a few uses for old socks: