My Eco Friendly Grandma
Being “Green” may be a new term, but it is not a new concept...Ask my grandma.
By DeAnna Holman
Last year, the magazine I publish, Community Seeds Eco Magazine, sponsored The Threshing Bee at the Patrick Ranch in Durham (As we will this year).While at our booth, I met great people, had great conversations, and learned a great deal. One sweet woman came to our booth and was interested in the magazine. She shared with me ways she has been “green” for over 40 years. Over 40 years! How can that be? It got me thinking about my grandma, now 95, and how she has actually been being “green” ever since I can remember. Actually, before I can remember because she tells me her stories, true stories.
My grandma did so many things to be kinder to the earth. She would always turn off the water when brushing her teeth and she would never leave a light on in an empty room. I remember she had fruit trees in her backyard and she used “natural” ways to keep pests off. She did not have access to many chemicals and she wasn’t interested in them anyway. Granted, she was living in Los Angeles and the pest problem was minimal, but still it is noteworthy. I remember she would bury compostable items in her yard to make “mulch” and I thought that was odd. Now, I am making compost or “mulch” and people are writing about it for my magazine! I remember her telling me time and time again how coffee grounds were so good for her roses. She had a bowl near her kitchen sink for composting materials and come to think of it, she had very little waste at all.
If my grandma did not finish a glass of water, she would dump the rest into a house plant. She never had a dry, wilting plant in the house. Those house plants emitting oxygen in her house was just another way she was being green. She has the smallest carbon footprint of anyone I know. She has even taken public transit or walked all of her life. She has always thought there is no need to get a car if you live in a city. I always thought she was being frugal, but she was simply not being wasteful.
Perhaps having parents that were immigrants from Russia helped my grandmother to be more conscious of wastefulness. Or maybe it was because of WWII and the hardships faced. Everyone around her worked, they had to ration food and necessities, and no one was wasteful. People appreciated the smallest of things. It may seem like it was a complicated time, but there was no TV, no clutter, no fast-pace rat race and no, “what’s in it for me” attitude. It was innate to reduce, reuse and recycle. It was not a chore to be eco-friendly, it was a way of life... Yes, over 40 years ago!
We can learn so much about being “green” from our grandparents and their grandparents. It would certainly be worth while to interview them about the ways they were less wasteful. And, although I always chuckle when my grandma tears a napkin in half to use the other half later, I now appreciate that small gesture.
For more articles like these, go to www.communityseeds.com!
Saturday, April 4, 2009
Monday, March 16, 2009
The Spring Issue Of Community Seeds
The Spring Issue Of Community Seeds Magazine is Packed Full of Good Stuff! Don't Miss it!
If you haven't had a chance to see the spring issue of Community Seeds Eco Magazine, be sure to check it out at http://www.communityseeds.com/! There are many articles about:
- Making a small green contribution to your environment
- Green spring cleaning
- Organizing your photos
- Going solar
- Using a Kill-A-Watt
- The 100 People Under the Sun Project
- VW's Green car of the Year
- GreenCrafts
- Throwing an Eco Friendly Birthday Party
- Kids' Stuff
- Spring Recipes
- And Much More!
11 Ways to Be a Wee Bit Greener
(sent to us by Jennifer at idealbite.com)
1. Swapping is the New Shopping.
Want free clothes, more closet space and free personal stylists for a night? Throw a Swap Party where all your friends trade (a.k.a. "recycle") clothes from their closets. Serve organic wine, swap 'til everyone drops and you've got yourself a contender for party of the year. (Get the full Bite.)
2. Compute This.
Set computers to enter sleep mode after 5 minutes of idle time – you’ll be saving energy during those meetings! And, shut them down at night – contrary to eco-myth, its better for the earth and your computer to shut them off when you head home.
(Get the full Bite.)
3. Use Direct Bill Pay.
Say goodbye to the days of writing checks, buying stamps, and licking envelopes. Use direct bill pay and you’ll save hassle, trees, and energy. Just ask your bank - most major banks have free bill pay services. If all U.S. households viewed and paid bills electronically, we’d save 18.5 million trees and 15.8 billion gallons of water per year. (Get the full Bite.)
4. Go Veggie - One Day a Week.
Becoming a full-time veg head not your thing? No worries... just pick up a veggie cookbook and try cooking veggie once a week. Since meat production's so resource-intensive, if 10,000 people gave up eating steak just once every seven days, it would save enough water to fill 22,719 Olympic-sized swimming pools and the weight of more than 9 humpback whales in fertilizer.
(Get the full Bite.)
5. Fancy Your Fancy Napkins.
Forget the notion that cloth napkins are for fancy occasions. By using cloth napkins everyday not only will you save a few trees, your friends will be impressed with your class and elegance (well, maybe just for a second or two). If 10,000 people all used just one less paper napkin per day, in a year we’d conserve the annual paper usage of 58 Americans.
(Get the full Bite.)
6. Just Say “No” to Junk Mail.
Junk mail is more than just annoying. If everyone in the US was able to reduce their 10.8 pieces of junk mail received each week, we could save nearly 100 million trees each year. Search for “junk mail” in our Tip Library to get the links to online forms to get your name off junk mail lists. (Get the full Bite.)
7. Set the Lint Bunnies Free.
Cleaning out your dryer's lint screen after each load is an easy way to save energy and reduce fire hazard. Believe it or not, a dirty lint filter can cause your dryer to use as much as 30% more energy. (Get the full Bite.)
8. Get Carded.
Your library card gives you free access to books, movies, and music - plus borrowing keeps paper and plastic out of production. More than 3.1 billion books are purchased in the United States each year, and most are made from nonrecycled paper and petroleum-based inks. (Get the full Bite.)
9. Join The Jones’.
If you can't beat 'em, join 'em. Pooling your resources with your neighbors for purchases like camping equipment and lawnmowers helps save those other, natural kind of resources. If 10,000 Biters go in on a 19-ft ladder with the Biters next door, we'll avert enough steel to fill 12 dump trucks, and save a little moola along the way. (Get the full Bite.)
10. Fix Your Faves.
Shoehorn a local cobbler into fixing or refurbishing your worn down shoes (yep, cobblers still exist outside of fairy tales). Same goes for clothes: Take them to a tailor, since repair is way cheaper than buying new and doesn't require the extraction of raw materials from the earth. New heels for your shoes or a skirt-hem stitch-up usually costs around $12 - much less than any new shoes or skirt. (Get the Full Bite.)
11. Which Fish to Fry?
When shopping for seafood, take along a free pocket guide or tap into a cool, new phone-text service that'll tell you whether that Chilean sea bass is eco-friendly-fine enough for your kettle. Scientists predict that there will be no more seafood by 2048 unless we change current (unsustainable) fishing methods. (Get the Full Bite.)
(sent to us by Jennifer at idealbite.com)
1. Swapping is the New Shopping.
Want free clothes, more closet space and free personal stylists for a night? Throw a Swap Party where all your friends trade (a.k.a. "recycle") clothes from their closets. Serve organic wine, swap 'til everyone drops and you've got yourself a contender for party of the year. (Get the full Bite.)
2. Compute This.
Set computers to enter sleep mode after 5 minutes of idle time – you’ll be saving energy during those meetings! And, shut them down at night – contrary to eco-myth, its better for the earth and your computer to shut them off when you head home.
(Get the full Bite.)
3. Use Direct Bill Pay.
Say goodbye to the days of writing checks, buying stamps, and licking envelopes. Use direct bill pay and you’ll save hassle, trees, and energy. Just ask your bank - most major banks have free bill pay services. If all U.S. households viewed and paid bills electronically, we’d save 18.5 million trees and 15.8 billion gallons of water per year. (Get the full Bite.)
4. Go Veggie - One Day a Week.
Becoming a full-time veg head not your thing? No worries... just pick up a veggie cookbook and try cooking veggie once a week. Since meat production's so resource-intensive, if 10,000 people gave up eating steak just once every seven days, it would save enough water to fill 22,719 Olympic-sized swimming pools and the weight of more than 9 humpback whales in fertilizer.
(Get the full Bite.)
5. Fancy Your Fancy Napkins.
Forget the notion that cloth napkins are for fancy occasions. By using cloth napkins everyday not only will you save a few trees, your friends will be impressed with your class and elegance (well, maybe just for a second or two). If 10,000 people all used just one less paper napkin per day, in a year we’d conserve the annual paper usage of 58 Americans.
(Get the full Bite.)
6. Just Say “No” to Junk Mail.
Junk mail is more than just annoying. If everyone in the US was able to reduce their 10.8 pieces of junk mail received each week, we could save nearly 100 million trees each year. Search for “junk mail” in our Tip Library to get the links to online forms to get your name off junk mail lists. (Get the full Bite.)
7. Set the Lint Bunnies Free.
Cleaning out your dryer's lint screen after each load is an easy way to save energy and reduce fire hazard. Believe it or not, a dirty lint filter can cause your dryer to use as much as 30% more energy. (Get the full Bite.)
8. Get Carded.
Your library card gives you free access to books, movies, and music - plus borrowing keeps paper and plastic out of production. More than 3.1 billion books are purchased in the United States each year, and most are made from nonrecycled paper and petroleum-based inks. (Get the full Bite.)
9. Join The Jones’.
If you can't beat 'em, join 'em. Pooling your resources with your neighbors for purchases like camping equipment and lawnmowers helps save those other, natural kind of resources. If 10,000 Biters go in on a 19-ft ladder with the Biters next door, we'll avert enough steel to fill 12 dump trucks, and save a little moola along the way. (Get the full Bite.)
10. Fix Your Faves.
Shoehorn a local cobbler into fixing or refurbishing your worn down shoes (yep, cobblers still exist outside of fairy tales). Same goes for clothes: Take them to a tailor, since repair is way cheaper than buying new and doesn't require the extraction of raw materials from the earth. New heels for your shoes or a skirt-hem stitch-up usually costs around $12 - much less than any new shoes or skirt. (Get the Full Bite.)
11. Which Fish to Fry?
When shopping for seafood, take along a free pocket guide or tap into a cool, new phone-text service that'll tell you whether that Chilean sea bass is eco-friendly-fine enough for your kettle. Scientists predict that there will be no more seafood by 2048 unless we change current (unsustainable) fishing methods. (Get the Full Bite.)
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