One Small Change - June

My One Small Change for May was to get a small garden started. I must say, my plan was to grow vegetables, but I just like flowers so much more! I did get one tomato plant planted topsy-turvy style. However, that's about as far as it went. I think it might be too late to plant much else, but I plan to look into it.

These were taken several days ago. That one little tomato is a bit bigger now!

So, while May didn't go so well, my plan for June is sure to be successful. I started learning to knit a few months ago. I love it, but have not been doing much lately. For June, I plan to get back into knitting and make my own reusable dish cloths. You can read about our change to a paper-free kitchen here. I started on a pretty little cloth this weekend. We will be heading to the beach soon, and I figure the long car ride will be a good time to get to knitting!

I am also reading a book my mother-in-law let me borrow.
It is full of great resources for making small changes.

One Small Change - May

We are still enjoying the One Small Change challenge. I totally missed the wrap-up where I was supposed to post how the changes went for our family! I am so glad we joined the challenge, and I plan on continuing with a change each month. I think our most successful change was the switch to cloth napkins and "paper"towels. I love using cloth. I do still have an emergency roll of paper towels for really gross clean-ups, and guests who can't get into the cloth thing :) I have also been successful with my reusable water bottles. I use them daily...hooray! I've gotten better at remembering to take my reusable bags into the grocery store. Now if I could just remember to take them into Target, Walmart, etc... Our April change was to use reusable baggies instead of plastic. It has gone really well. I have tons of cute cloth bags!

Some of my favorites are in mine and AK's lunch bags, so they didn't get in the picture!

My change for May is to plant a small container garden. I have a tomato plant that's waiting to be planted. I am going to make my own "topsy turvy" style planter for it. I found a tutorial for one at the Crafty Crow. As soon as John finishes the ginger ale, I'm on it!

We have a huge wooden barrel that my mother-in-law gave us last year. I think I will use it to plant some other veggies. I haven't decided which ones yet. I better get on that!

What changes are you making?

One Small Change

Our One Small Change for March did not go quite as well as I hoped. The change was to switch to our reusable bags for shopping. I have had the bags for well over a year...maybe two years. However, I can't seem to remember to take them into the store with me. Or even have them in the car. I would say we used the bags about half of the time we went shopping. I will keep trying. My intentions are good, but my memory is not! As far as our previous changes, they are all going very well. We are no longer using paper towels or napkins (January change) and I always remember to use my reusable water bottles (February change). I think I have only drank from a plastic bottle 2 or 3 times since February, and that was because I was at a birthday party where that was the drink provided.

April snuck up on me. I realized this morning that I had not thought of a change for April because I didn't even realize it was April until I got to school and my Kindergarteners started in with their "April Fool's" pranks! I have now decided we will stop using plastic baggies for lunchboxes or food storage. We have kind-of already been doing this, but not consistently. I bought some cute fabric sandwich and snack bags when I was in search of cloth napkins and paperless towels. I use them daily, but still use plastic baggies quite often. Maybe I need to find more cute fabric baggies :) I would really love to learn to make them myself. I have my Grandmother's old sewing machine, but I have no idea how to use it. I need to look into sewing machine lessons...

One Small Change for March

It's that time again...the end of one month and the beginning of another. That means it is time to reflect on my One Small Change for February. February's change was to switch from plastic water bottles to reusable stainless steel. You can read about it here. This change has been successful, but not as easy as January's change, which was surprising to me. The hard part for me is having to wash my bottles every night. I was trying to get by with only buying 2 bottles. I had three, but one makes my water taste funny, so I'm down to two. I am not a fan of washing dishes. It ranks up there with putting away clean laundry and emptying the dishwasher...shudder. I get tired of scrubbing my water bottles every night, but I have done it! I have not drank out of a plastic water bottle except for when we went to my cousin's son's birthday party. They had bottled water for guests. I plan to continue with this change, but I will have to add a couple of more bottles to my collection. That way maybe I can just wash every other night!

So I have been thinking about a change for March, and I decided my change will be to use reusable bags for shopping. I do this already...sort of. I have a good collection of bags, but I always seem to leave them at home or even in the car! My plan is to use them everywhere I shop, not just the grocery store.



I bought 5 of the Earth Saver bags off of eBay a year or so ago. I looked there today, but the seller does not have anything listed right now. I get compliments on them from store clerks because they stand up when they are open. They are made of a burlap material and have a waterproof lining. They hold a lot! I also have a couple of bags I bought at Publix during Christmas. I feel weird taking Publix bags into other grocery stores. Should I worry about that? Is it bad manners? Comments??

Let me begin by saying how excited I was to have three...THREE...comments!! When I say excited, I mean EXCITED!! I was beginning to get discouraged. I know my mom checks in from time to time, but she doesn't comment. Thank you, thank you to those who commented. I love it!

So onto my first day of using non-plastic water bottles. I didn't actually start on Feb. 1 or 2 because when I went to fill up my bottles before work, the Brita pitcher was less than half full. It takes it a while to filter so I didn't have time to wait. That taught me a good lesson though...I have to fill them up at night. What a revelation :) So last night I spent about 30-45 minutes filling bottles and waiting for the pitcher to fill. This morning I packed them in my cooler...with a little help from my favorite little girl.



I enjoyed my pretty bottles today, and I'm looking forward to using them from now on!

Sunday - One Small Change Challenge Review

This challenge has been a good experience. My family has learned to live without paper towels! I never thought it would be possible. We did slip up a couple of times, but for the most part we stuck to using cloth. I feel good about our part in helping reduce the use of paper products. I have also enjoyed shopping Etsy.com and eBay for paper alternatives. Who doesn't love a little shopping?
Here is a very small sample of my purchases. Most are in the wash right now :)

For February's challenge I plan to cut out plastic water bottles. I pack a cooler everyday to take to work so I can have easy access to cold drinking water. We had to give up our mini fridges earlier in the school year due to electrical problems in our building. I used to buy a jug of water every few days to keep in the fridge and pour from. So, now, I pack 4 water bottles to drink during the day. I do recycle the bottles, but I feel guilty even using them. We bought a Brita filter pitcher for our house last year for the sole purpose of not buying bottled water anymore. My husband reminds me of this when he has to buy my bottled "school" water. So yesterday I decided my challenge for February would be to use these beauties that I bought at TJ Maxx this weekend.

They will fit in my cooler, and help reduce my use of plastic bottled water. Hooray!

So I hope to go from this:

To this:

Thanks to my dear hubby for modeling this change for me :)

Let the challenge begin!!