Setting Green Goals for the New Year

by Emily on December 27, 2010

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The following post is from Emily of Live Renewed:

setting green goals

source: Zach Dischner

In just a few short days we will be ringing in the New Year, and I’m sure that many of us are thinking about our resolutions and goals for 2011.  I really want to encourage you to think about setting some green goals for yourself and/or your family this year.

Making changes toward greener living doesn’t have to mean a complete overnight lifestyle change.  I am a huge advocate for making simple changes that don’t require too much thought or energy, as well as taking baby steps.  When you add a lot of small changes together over time, it will lead to bigger overall lifestyle change.

So, I want to give you some ideas and tips for making green changes in the upcoming year:

1. Decrease Disposables

Have you ever done a garbage inventory?  Do you know that Americans create an average of 4.6 lbs of trash per person per day? Set a goal this year of reducing the amount of waste your family creates and throws away.

Here are a few simple ways to start decreasing disposables in your home:

Use Kitchen Cloth. Instead of paper towels and paper napkins, use cloths for washing dishes, cleaning, wiping down little hands and faces after meals, and as napkins.  Our family has not purchased or used paper towels for more than a year and a half, and I can honestly say that I don’t miss them at all.

Use Rags and Wipes for Cleaning. Reuse old t-shirts, towels or receiving blankets for cleaning rags around the house.  Also, find alternatives to specialty disposable cleaning products like Swiffer mops and dusters.

Switch to Cloth Diapers and Wipes. If you have little ones at home, you know how much waste their diapers create.  Switching to cloth diapers, and cloth wipes, even part-time, is better for your wallet and better for the earth.

Reuse and Re-purpose Items. Before you place something in the trash or recycle bin, think about other ways that you could use that item.  Lots of thing make great craft supplies or containers for organizing.

Compost. I have to say, this one is on my list of green changes to make this next year.  Composting your food scraps instead of throwing them away is a great way to make a difference in the amount of waste your family creates.

2. Natural Homemade Household Cleaners

The air inside our homes can often be more polluted than the air outside.  This is partially due to toxic cleaning products that we use around our homes.  Make a resolution to switch all your cleaning products to natural, green and even homemade cleaners.

Use Vinegar and Baking Soda. These are my two favorite multipurpose cleaners. With a spray bottle of vinegar and water mixed 50/50, and a reused parmesan cheese container filled with baking soda, I can clean pretty much my entire house.

Make Your Own Multipurpose Cleaner. There are lots of different recipes out there for homemade multipurpose cleaner, but my favorite is simply water in a spray bottle with a few squirts of castille soap and a few drops of tea tree oil.  It smells great and works great for cleaning all around the house.

3. Personal Care Products

As shocking as it may be, the reality is that personal care products and cosmetics are not regulated or required to be tested for safety.  It is just as important to be aware of the products that we use on our bodies as it is to be careful of the kinds of foods that we eat.  Set a goal of switching over your personal care products to safe and natural alternatives over the coming year.

Check EWG’s Cosmetic Safety Database. Start by looking up products that you currently use on the cosmetic safety database which rates products for their safety based on their ingredients.  If your products get high scores, browse the database for alternative brand and products  with lower scores.  I like to make sure the products that me and my family use score below a four, on a scale of one to ten.

Get Rid of Antibacterial Products. Stop using antibacterial soap around your house and switch to hand soap that does not contain triclosan, or make your own foaming hand soap.

Use Natural Alternatives. I’ve mentioned before that I wear homemade deodorant, use the no ‘poo method for washing my hair, and I’ve been cleansing my face with the oil cleansing method for about a month now.  I love these natural and homemade alternatives to conventional products because they are inexpensive and have simplified my personal care routine.

Choose one (or all three!) of these areas to begin making small changes during the new year.  Start my making small, easily attainable goals, and then move on as you achieve your goals.

If you’re already doing all of these things, that is great!  I’d love to hear what your green goals are for the upcoming year, I always love to add new things to my “changes to make” list!

Two of my personal green goals for the new year are starting to composting and continuing to make changes to my personal care products. Join me at Live Renewed in January as we talk more about safe and natural personal care products, and I share all my green goals for 2011.

What green goals or resolutions are you making for the new year?

Emily McClements is passionate about caring for God’s creation while saving money at the same time. She is a blessed wife and mama to two young children, and blogs about her family’s journey toward natural and simple living at Live Renewed.

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Tagged as: emily, resolutions

  • Randomrecycling

    Great, reasonable steps for anyone. I’m going to work on the cosmetics this year. Good luck with composting, it helps in the long run with amazing soil for growing your own vegetables.

  • Anonymous

    I have to admit that being green has not been at the top of my priority list the past 2 years! (crazy times crazy story!) Now, however, my life has calmed a bit and 2 things I want to do are begin recycling our plastic bottles, and look for major ways to reduce packaging. One example, we go through quite a bit of laundry detergent with 2 teens in the house. I seemed to be buying a bottle each week! I finally found the most concentrated and the biggest bottle I could find and chose that. Another thing, instead of buying 4 paks of regular size rolls of toilet paper, buy the biggest pak of double (I have even seen triple rolled) paper.
    These seem like small things, but if we ALL do the little things, it will start to make a difference!
    Bernice
    http://livingthebalancedlife.com/2010/christmas-2010-what-worked-what-didnt/

  • http://twitter.com/TheBellWitch Eeshul

    This year I’m going to try and go back to the personal care products – I’ve gotten lazy with flying back and forth (2000 miles + one way) over the past 2 years to help take care of sick, dying, and elderly family members and it was just easier to carry made stuff then to try and explain the homemade. So this year I want to start making my own deoderant again, get back to no poo and make some special hair degreasing shampoo for the hubby. I went back to making my own laundry det last year – it was getting impossible to find anything without a scent that would set off the asthma in times of stress. We already compost like mad, and this year I’m gonna attempt to build 3 more compost barrels along with rain barrels.

    We’ve been using kitchen clothes for years and for cleaning and dusting as well – I also take athletic socks with holes in the ball of the foot – can’t get anyone to wear them if I have to darn them there and use them in the garden to hold up tomato vines and other plants!

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  • Joyce

    Ok, I really don’t quite get the Oil Cleansing Method; I tried it with 20% Castor Oil and 80% olive oil since that’s what I had on hand. I have no idea how I was supposed to “feel” the impurities coming out of my pores–is that literal or is it figurative, i.e., I am supposed to be visualizing it or should I actually be feeling something? In addition, it says not to do it too frequently–well, I wash my face 2X a day, so what am I supposed to wash it with the rest of the time? I found the post a little confusing even though I am familiar with the concept of oil normalizing your skin. Then what about treating wrinkles, sunblock, etc? I feel like the article wasn’t very comprehsive as to homemade alternatives for skincare.

    • Kelly

      Hi Joyce-I just bought castor oil the other day to try this out. Having not tried it yet, my reply is geared to some of the things you point out. I’m no expert though, so take it for what it’s worth to you. I only “wash” my face every other day. I use a warm washcloth to just wipe my face, especially this time of year. In the summer I use an apricot scrub about every other day. I’m wanting to try the oil method to see if it removes the blackheads I’ve had all my life.

      As for sunscreen, you may want to research the studies being done. Many are finding that the chemicals in them are worse than what the sun supposedly does. I say supposedly because I rarely use sunblock, live in an arid, sunny climate, and look about 10 years younger than I am. Having said that, I have no advice for treating wrinkles. Maybe simply embrace them?

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  • http://www.mommymisadventures.com/ Michelle

    Oops, double reply, sorry!

  • http://www.mommymisadventures.com/ Michelle

    We love a pot of freshly cooked rice every day. After dinner, I take any rice leftovers and put it in a tupperware and storage it the fridge. On the weekend, we look forward to either a nice family style serving of fried rice or a pot of rice porridge. These are all great ways to stretch any leftovers you may have!

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