Girl Going Green

A year ago, I got on my little health crusade that I tackled. I worked on us and our health as much as I could living in a small town without alot of product selection available. With Paul having some skin condition, I decided to do my research and eliminate all parabens and Sodium lauryl sulfate (SLS) or sodium dodecyl sulfate (SDS or NaDS) from our household products. So replacing laundry soap, shampoos, conditioners, body washes, toothpaste, dish soap, dishwasher soap.......anything that "foams" as well as makeup which has parabens was a challenge. When you start reading ingredients it is amazing what all has those ingredients in them!! This wasn't JUST for Paul but it started the research. You would be amazed if you take the time to research those ingredients and find out what they really are. It will make you think twice before putting those things into or onto your body. I won't get into detail because I am a little short on time, but just "Google" those things sometime and do your own research.....you'll be amazed!!

The next "Green" projects started when Seneca came to my office with me one day for a few minutes and saw our "blue paper recyling bin" with the recycling logo on it!! Her eyes lit up as she said, "Mom, I didn't know you recycled! That is SO COOL!! I sure wish we could recycle at home". So, I decided that would be our project. So I began to research what our town takes for recycling and where we drop them off at since they don't do curb side pick up with recylables. So this was our creation.........

I had always used the excuse "We don't have room", which really, we don't. Any of you that have seen our garage know that once the car and the truck are in there, you are lucky to have room to walk around the car. The truck, to get to the passenger side, you have to pull out to access anything on that side. When we buy new vehicles, we have to "measure" to make sure they will fit in our garage. So, after some rearranging and lots of measuring, and searching for just the right bins for recycling, we put these in the garage for Seneca to put her recyclables in! We don't go an hour without her picking things up and looking for the recyling logo and what number, etc. it is and if we can recyle it! Our next challenge will be to buy as many products as possible which the containers can be recycled. Thank goodness for "drugstore.com" in my search for products which containers can be recyled AND the products that don't contain parabens or SLS and are as natural as possible. Now if I could only find organic food in this town..........the joys of a small town.