Extra Wood?

If you have extra wood, then instead of letting it set in your garage I suggest that you build a bridge across to your neighbors' yard. Sure, their respective girlfriend/wife will think it is ridiculous but what else were you going to do with those old pieces of decking/swingset?

Speed Limits!

I drove the speed limit this morning. All the way (minus exit ramps which seem a little ridiculous to slow down to 30-40mph and then reaccelerate to the same speed limit you were driving before).

60 was easy (I have been driving 60-65mph since my last speeding ticket in February...). 55 was an easy stretch from that. However, dropping all the way down to 50 when I-70 enters downtown Indy was tough. I was getting passed left and right and tailgated like crazy even at 4AM on a Sunday (in the slow lane no less).

In the end my car's fancy "how many miles until you need to freak out and get gas" gauge rose from 411 at the beginning of my trip to 445 at the end (with driving a total of ~25 miles in between). I think that qualifies as more efficient. I am going to continue doing this whenever possible but I am not sure if it can be done safely when I am the only car doing it during rush hour and the "pack" is doing 70mph.

It was amazing how less stressful the drive was. It did take an extra 11 minutes but heard "Highway to Hell" and some Styx back to back so all was fine....

Market bags!

When I lived in Mexico, all of us ladies used to carry around Mexican market bags - frankly, because "women be shoppin'," and the bags hold a ton. In the Yucatan, these bags are usually a plastic woven mesh with plaid; in Oaxaca, they're made out of a vinal-esque panel that's reinforced at the edges. Either version allows one to carry bricks a long distance without breaking the bag. I make this last comment both for emphasis, and because we actually did see construction workers use these bags for this purpose. But I digress.

Over the course of many trips to visit various areas of Mexico, I accumulated quite a quantity of market bags of various shapes and sizes...honestly, sometimes without fully realizing how many I owned. I began to use these bags as gift bags, as well as for my "teacher/work bag" to transport anything between work and home. However, a stock pile of the larger ones still remained.

When Wally and I moved here two years ago, and were having the first merge of our belongings, I found myself having to defend my need for somewhere near 85 Mexican market bags - as, to Wally's (accurate) observation, the frequency with which they were used was disproportionate to the number of bags I possessed. Yet when Wally and I were adding green components to our lifestyle, these bags naturally came back into play, particularly as we slowly rid our lifestyle and home of plastic bags, paper bags, and sandwich bags.

While I realize that using one's own bags to bag groceries isn't a radical new idea - though, from watching others at the grocery store and market, a drastically ignored and underutilized one - it's an important one. I can fit a large shopping trip's worth of groceries into 3 bags, which is impressive to me.

I also keep one of the bags in my car at all times, to help with unplanned errands to Target, the mall, drugstores, etc. Nothing is more priceless than the look on the salesperson's face when you refuse the fancy department store bag in favor of slipping your purchases in a giant vinal bag with a side panel written in Spanish.

Just something to keep in mind as you green your lifestyles. These bags are available in all parts and markets in Mexico for anywhere between $1US and $5US, but tote bags work well. Ask any educator if you'd like to start using tote bags for these types of purposes - teachers have more access to unused tote bags than any profession I know.

Obama Family Dog!

Regardless of political affiliation or leanings for this election, it's hard to deny that adopting an animal from a shelter is the best idea for any current or potential pet parent. But more on shelters and animal rescue in subsequent posts...

Here's the summary on why I mention Obama and adopting animals from shelters in the same post: Sen. Obama has promised one of his children that they'll get a family dog in November. The AKC came forward with recommended breeds, which naturally caused the national shelter advocacy groups to take notice. I firmly believe - as a parent of four rescued animals, a shelter volunteer, and an avid recylcer - that adopting from a shelter is the way to go. Plus, with such a public figure being an advocate as a first-time adopter, this could be a huge push forward for rescue groups.

If you also agree (which I'm hoping you do because you're reading a green post), you can sign a petition to this effect online. It can be found here, along with other great information about why to adopt and do your part to help companion animals find their forever homes.

As the motto for our shelter goes, "True Love is Rescued."

Easy Drip Irrigation!

Would you grow more plants if you didn't have to water? We started drip irrigation for our trumpet vines and climbing hydrangea. We used old cran-raspberry juice bottles (which is the best kind of juice btw...). I poked holes in the lids using a corn cob holder and drilled a hole in the base using a 3/4" wood bit. Then you simply bury them and they will leach water into the soil as needed based upon the soil's moisture content. They can then be filled through the pre-drilled hole with typically holds about 2-3 days water. It combats over/under-watering as well as evaporation. This would also work well with milk jugs and possibly water cooler jugs in larger applications like a garden (which I want to try next year)...

Arbor Day!

Do you belong to the Arbor Day Foundation? If not, join here: http://www.arborday.org/

I have been a member since my time at New Dominion Wilderness School and this year we planted four trees: two flowering crabapple on the westside of the house and two hawthornes in our neighbor's yard to help shade their yard and create some sort of barrier between the yards (in about 5 years). These were part of the 10 complementary annual trees you receive as part of your membership along with the lilac bush we got for an additional $5.

Herbs!

Don't buy herbs. Just grow them instead. We built this planter out of scrap wood, painted it to match, and mounted it outside the kitchen window. Our plan is to put fresh cut herbs in an ice cube tray and freeze them in water so that we have tablespoon size quantities of "fresh herbs for recipes throughout the year.

We currently are growing parsley, basil, chives, garlic chives (yeah, you read that right the first time...) and something else but Adriana is asleep and I don't remember....

Birds!

They are currently nested in the upper white birdhouse mounted on our sweetgum tree, and we think they might be sparrows or starlings...

One year after putting up these birdhouses we finally have some bird neighbors in our yards. Tala has been highly concerned with their presence in our yard and has followed her Dad's lead and reported them as potential threats to the security of the homeland.....

I will be using this success to leverage my arguement for a bathouse in the near future...

Shade!

Last summer our house was extremely hot so this year we built a pergola while Adriana was in Spain. I guess "we" doesn't work here. It works to shade the house, especially our West-facing bedroom doors and windows. Within a few years the trumpet vines (2) and climbing hydrangea overhead will hopefully curb our need to run the air conditioning on the 90+ degree days...

Compost!

We compost almost everything. From household trash and grass clippings/yard waste (our own or "creatively repurposed" from neighbors' Sunday night trash god offerings). Composting is a good way to start a garden, fill holes that your rotten dog has dug in the yard or to restart a dying lawn (all of which we did this year). We estimate that we are able to harvest about 340 gallons (~10 trash cans full) of useable compost every ten weeks on average or 1700 gallons a year. It also keeps approxiamately 480 trash cans full of useable trash ranging from leaves/grass/all non-meat food products/shredded paper and cardboard/and newspapers from the dump each year. We only put out one trash bag in the month of June. It was all cat litter because they hate the environment since they live indoors.


To the right are our two Costco purchased compost bins (held together by bungee cords because the plastic tabs that hold the sides together are flimsy at best) and below are our two compost tumblers built with old barrels from a pancake syrup factory - no joke.


Build your own out of "creatively repurposed" pallets or find our how to make tumblers here: http://www.wikihow.com/Build-a-Tumbling-Composter



Personally I like the bins but the tumblers are better for getting the compost started and for going through the "final cook" especially if you have hard Indiana clay soil like we do and need to add sand or plan on mixing it with bagged topsoil. Plus they are easier to turn.