Plastic is EVERYWHERE

I dare you to pay attention to the products you use for 24 hours.  I triple dog dare you.  How much do you throw away in an average day?  How much do you recycle?  Do you know what happens to your trash when you put it on the curb?

Do you even care?

I grew up in the late 80s and 90s, and I remember learning about Reduce Reuse Recycle.  I remember turning off light switches constantly, making sure we didn't use too much water.  Anyone else remember this, or is it just me, from my small town in Wisconsin the 90s?  Have we lost our consciousness about how we are treating the Earth?

I watched this video produced by Buzzfeed a while back and I felt like her mission of producing ZERO TRASH was completely impossible. I still feel like it's impossible.  I always want to have a more full recycle bin than the trash, but it's not.  My city doesn't even recycle glass!  I bring my own bags to the grocery store, but sometimes I stop on my way home.  Or I don't bring them to Target or Walmart, or Old Navy.  I use a grocery delivery service and ask for paper, but most of the time the grocery store is out of paper.  My stash of plastic bags was embarrassing! I took them to Walmart and put them in the box they have at the entrance to recycle them, and I pray that they actually do recycle them and not just throw them in the dumpster in the back of the store.

It's all so overwhelming, but there are little things I realized I can do that will hopefully make a difference. The most recent trend in environmental conservation is banning the use of plastic straws.  I don't really use straws at home, but we do go out to eat frequently, and I use straws then.  Why?  I don't need a straw.  But, I bought some reusable, stainless steel straws.  I use them with my water bottles and cups at home now.  (In the summer heat, I always have a large cup of water near by.)  However, I have yet to bring them with me when we go out to eat.  Major fail on my part!  Sorry, turtles!  I promise to try harder.

I found that I also use a lot of plastic storage bags once, then throw them away.  I bought some reusable bags from Amazon and so far they are great.  One of them tore at the seal, but I super glued it back together and it's holding up well.  I used the disposable ones to store the half of avocado I didn't use with my eggs, or the half of cucumber I didn't use in my salad.  These reusable ones are saving us money on buying the disposable bags, and saving the amount of waste we throw out.  The company that I bought the straws from was offering a deal to get a set of 15 mesh bags for free, so I added those to my cart, as well.  I haven't used the mesh bags yet, but I bet they would be great for buying produce at the grocery store, or at the farmer's market.  I might just use them when we go to the river on Sunday. I will put a link to these items at the end of this post.

Now that I only have a month of summer left, I feel like I didn't achieve much with the goal of eliminating plastic from our house.  So many items are wrapped in plastic at the store (mushrooms!  They come a recyclable container but are wrapped in plastic wrap!), and Amazon items come shipped wrapped in plastic.  (Even the reusable stuff I bought above arrived wrapped in plastic!)  Sometimes I wish I could run with a trash bag and pick up trash on the run but honestly I would be stopping so much that it wouldn't be a run.  I know the more populated an area is, the more likely trash will be left on the side of the street. It can all be prevented if people didn't throw trash in their open truck beds before driving off, or literally throwing trash out of their car windows, or making sure your trash bags are secure in your trash cans when they are picked up by waste management.

Everyone has to be all in to stop the waste.  I know there were some people who thought my reusable bag purchase was silly, as they reach for their disposable bags and then throw them out the next day.  And that is the problem: we've forgotten our impact on this Earth. We are just living our lives in the now and not preparing for the future.  What kind of Earth will our kids have to live with in 25 years?  In 50 years?  What are you doing in your daily life to make sure your kids and grand kids will have a place to live in the future?

My goal of eliminating our waste is not over; it's never over.  I will give you updates on what we are doing to eliminate trash and the use of non-recyclables in the near future.  Hopefully I've inspired someone to bring their reusable shopping bags to the grocery store, or recycle more often.  We all have to do our part.

Cheers,
Kasey

Links:
YIHONG set of 8 Stainless Steel Straws
YIHONG Reusable Mesh Bags, set of 15
E-Z Seal EXTRA THICK Reusable Storage Bags