My Ecofesto

Green is hot! It’s trendy and sexy and political and powerful! I want to be GREEN! I want to love the earth so much that it makes Al Gore look like a Republican. I want to single-handedly stop Global Warming, repair that hole in the O-zone layer and feed the world’s hungry.

Unfortunately, I’m busy raising three kids, so I have to squeeze in my environmentalism when I can.

Here’s how I do it:

1. Skip Baths. For some parents, bathtime is an essential part of the bedtime routine. In this house, the part where I shut the door and walk out is the only essential part. Baths are optional, and the best option for the earth is to limit them to once or twice every week or two.
2. Cook Less. Raw foods preserve nutrients, that’s better for my kids right? Plus limiting cooking means limiting the energy used to actually cook the food and the resources used to clean up afterwards.
3. Limit Cleaning. Cleaning involves harmful chemicals like bleach and other terrible bleach-like substances. Keeping your house looking shiny and new, means dumping countless poisons into our atmosphere. That doesn’t seem right does it?
4. Limit Laundry. You know how going a couple of weeks between washings prolongs the fit (and life) of your jeans? Start taking that approach to all your laundry. One or two or three wearings doesn’t make anything but underwear truly dirty. Just ask my husband, he wears the same clothes over and over again for weeks at a time (he did this even before I became and eco-warrior). Holding off on doing the laundry can save you a ton of water, a ton of gas, some detergent and a whole lot of time. Plus, not doing laundry means not folding laundry, and c’mon isn’t that every housewife’s dream?
5. Car Pool - The advantages of sharing a ride are almost infinite (a la Xavier, anything over five is infinite). Car pooling saves gas, reduces emissions, slows tires from hitting landfills… but car pooling means that someone else can pick up my kid, and then a different someone can drop her off, and if I work it right (like my college roommate did with the divvying up of essay questions on take-home exams) I can spread the driving over enough other parents that I don’t actually have to drive anyone anywhere. And then there’s the whole grown-ups driving other grown-ups thing where refusing to drive on girls night out isn’t selfish, its green!
6. Recycle. Obviously you should recycle. But recycling goes beyond pop cans and beer bottles and cereal boxes. Recycling means reusing all sorts of things over and over again, like using the pretzels your kid left in their lunchbox on Monday as the pretzels in your kids’ lunch box on Tuesday (and Wednesday if necessary). Or using the picture your kid drew you for mother’s day that says "I love you Mom" and changing it to "I love you Grandmom" to cover your own mother’s day obligations.
7. Recycle Some More. Let your kids take on some of the recycling. Especially at snack time, in the car. I happen to know that "Found Objects" are a very hip and happening part of the new Green movement. Helping out Mother Nature feels so good, let your kids discover that special feeling as they scrounge for their very own found snacks - between the seats, under the floor mats, in that hollow part of the car seat base. Whoever made the five second rule did not love the earth as much as I do.