Yes, Even YOU Can Compost!

We've heard it many times: people are more than a little squeamish about composting. They're worried about odor, bugs, vermin and just the general "ick" factor. Let us put some of your fears to rest. It's really easy to compost. It really isn't gross, and it is surprisingly satisfying.

First of all, what's the big deal? The big deal is you can divert about a third of your household waste to compost; turning it into rich food for your garden and diverting it from landfills. Wouldn't the organic waste compost just as well at the landfill? The answer is no. For the composting process to work properly, oxygen is needed. Material in landfills is compacted so tightly that biodegradable material does not receive enough oxygen to break down efficiently. Instead of turning into rich nutrients for the Earth, the food waste takes much longer to break down and releases the greenhouse gas, methane, in the process. In the U.S., organic materials rotting in landfills account for nearly 40% of man-made methane emissions. Besides that, our landfills are being filled to the brim; many states have to truck or ship their waste elsewhere. Anything that can be diverted from our over-burdened landfills should be.

The next question the compost-fearful have is, "Doesn't it smell?" Not if you do it right. To break down properly, the compost pile needs to have both nitrogen and carbon rich elements. We'll call these "green" and "brown" material. Green materials are nitrogen rich and enable the decomposing microorganisms to grow. Brown materials are carbon rich and add energy. Green Homes recommends a ratio of about 3-1, brown to green. Too much green material and your compost will smell, too much brown and it will decompose too slowly.

So what should you use to reach this magic ratio? For your brown material, include: leaves, bark, wood chips, chopped brush, shredded newspaper, non-recyclable paper, sawdust, fireplace ash, vacuum cleaner and dryer lint, wool and cotton rags. For your green, use: grass, yard trimmings, fruits and vegetables (including peels), bread, eggshells, coffee grounds and filters, tea bags, house plants and manure from vegetarian animals. To keep your compost pile pest and odor-free, DO NOT include the following: Oils, fat, meat, fish, dairy products, bones, cat or dog manure, sickly plants, peanut butter.

I keep a bowl or pot on my kitchen counter, put my kitchen waste in it throughout the day and dump it in the compost bin after dinner.

Now that you are completely sold on the idea, you're probably wondering how to begin. Just follow these easy steps:

1) Find a partially shaded, level spot in your yard, not too far from your kitchen.
2) You can create a pile or use a bin. A pile works as well as a bin, but a bin will prevent things from blowing.
3) Now you just need to start adding your compostable material. (See above.)
4) When adding kitchen scraps, dig a hole in the pile, drop the scraps, and cover them.
5) Every two months or so, turn over the materials and mix up your pile a little with a shovel or pitchfork to make sure oxygen is getting through.
6) In about six months, you will have compost or hummus at the bottom of your pile. This can be used on your lawn, garden and houseplants.

For more detail, check out the information available at Compost Guide. You can find a compost bin for purchase at this super-thorough web site or find instructions on how to make your own compost bin.

The type of composting described above can be done all winter long, the process just slows down in the colder months. However, some of you may be interested in indoor composting as well. There are easy kits that can be purchased for use in your kitchen or pantry. Some can be found at the Compost Bin Store on Compost Guide or at Low Impact Living.

Indoor composting is great for apartment dwellers, those with limited outdoor space, and people who just don't want to bring their waste outside in the winter. Indoor composting can be done with or without worms. (Yes, I did just say that you might actually WANT worms in your house, and, indeed, in your kitchen!) This process is called vermicomposting. The little wriggly guys use their natural taste for organic material and their biological need to then rid themselves of it (read "worm poop") to hasten the composting process and minimize any potential odor.

Green Homes November Challenge: Try Composting! It's easy, it's good for your garden (and the planet) and it's a fun, practical science project the whole family can be involved in! So, start composting and watch your garden grow and your garbage shrink!

CSF

Green Homes in the Tribune!

Check out today's Chicago Tribune to see Green Homes' tips: 5 ways to make your home healthier.  

http://www.chicagotribune.com/features/lifestyle/chi-healthy-high-rise-side-1026oct26,0,5310860.story

My friend Julie Deardorf, who wrote the article, covers health and fitness for the Trib.  She's also in my book club.  Well, she never comes, but she's always welcome.  Anyway, Green Homes is thrilled to lend our expertise to the subject at hand.

Julie sent an email a while back  asking for tips to make your home healthier as a sidebar to a larger story entitled "Is your highrise healthy?"  Healthy.   It's a tricky topic.  Does healthy mean green? Non-toxic?  Active?   So Catherine and I decided we'd combine all of the above.   Here, again, are Green Homes' five tips on how to make your home healthier.

1.Get rid of toxic cleaners. Why would you put on your floor something you need to lock up under the sink?

 - Simple truth, right?  There are a lot of good, all-natural cleaners out there, but we are partial to Shaklee's Get Clean products, (http://www.shaklee.net/greenhomes) which we also distribute.  They work, the company's carbon-neutral, and the stuff smells good. 

2.Buy local food. Avoid excess packaging, eat fresh food and eat together as a family.

- Try to buy like the europeans do.  Go to the market regularly, buy fresh food that's in season and build your menus around it.   And everyone's healthier and happier if you have a family dinner as often as possible. 

3.Wash your hands regularly with regular soap. Don't use anti-bacterial soap that contains chemicals such as triclosan. (Waterless hand sanitizers are OK.)

-It's the best thing you can do to stay healthy, especially if you live in cold weather climates.  And some germ exposure keeps your immune system on its toes, so to speak:  good old fashioned soap does the job just fine.  

4.Ditch the plastic food and beverage containers. Never reheat in plastic, don't use plastics No. 3, 6 & 7.

-In sum, plastic leaches dangerous chemicals when its temperature fluctuates.  Don't heat plastic in the microwave.  Don't leave plastic water bottles in the car.  And get rid of all plastics 3, 6 & 7 in your house.  It's not worth it.

5. Leave your shoes at the door. So you don't track in the pesticides and pollutants from outside.

-It's the best way to improve your home's indoor air quality.  We track in tons of toxins, dirt and pesticides that eventually turns to dust and settles on your stuff and, eventually, into your lungs.  Ick.  Take 'em off.

It's the little things.  They add up.  

-

Lunch Duty

Let me be clear: I hate making lunches. Loath may be more accurate. Abhor. Every morning when I take that ten minutes to put my kids' lunches together I get grumpy. But while I would love the convenience of hot lunches, the options at both of my kids' schools are below par at best. And it's important to me that my kids have a decent midday meal. 

So while the lunchable, pre-fab meals would solve these problems, I just can't do it. They're a crime, in my opinion, both nutritionally and environmentally. They're over-packaged and over-salted. So what's a lunch-packing person to do?

Consider the average elementary school lunch. If you're lucky your kid uses a reusable lunch bag. But there is where many, if not most of the waste reduction stops. Plastic baggies for sandwiches, ziploc baggies for snacks, individual containers of applesauce or raisins, plastic spoons, paper napkins; does any of this sound familiar? The amount of food that gets tossed each day is bad enough, but the packaging that goes into the trash with it is cringe-worthy. Yes, those disposables are convenient, and on field-trip days there's just no getting around them, but on a day-to-day basis, we can do better.

That brings me to the next Green Homes Challenge:  

No disposables in our or our kids' lunches! 

We can do it! I promise!

The key is making it easy. And with a little effort out front, it is. Green Homes has found some lunch containers that virtually eliminate your need for disposables.


You can buy 'lunch kits' that have compartments for all the different food groups, or you can buy loads of reusable plastic containers in varying sizes. Here are a couple places to find them:

http://order.tupperware.com/pls/htprod_www/tup_show_item.show_item_detail?fv_item_category_code=21808&fv_item_number=P10055361000

 Your classic Tupperware - never goes out of style!

                    

http://www.laptoplunches.com/products.html

            Aren't they cute??

Locally, Healthy Green Goods on Main Street in Evanston carries the laptop lunch kits featured above.


So buy a couple kits, fill up the compartments, and send a cloth napkin and real silverware with their lunch. It's easy, it virtually eliminates any waste and maybe it'll catch on in your school cafeteria.  Most importantly, bring your kids into the process.  Tell them we're trying to have zero waste.  Maybe ask them to challenge their friends to do the same.   Remember, when you throw something away, there is no away.  It goes somewhere!

Small steps.  Big impact.  

Good luck!

September, Storms and Sarah

How are we doing on walking/biking to school? I have to tell you, it feels pretty great to stand in my driveway with a cup of coffee (free trade certified of course) in my hand and wave good-bye as my three older kids head off. For their part, my kids love the independence and the time out in the fresh air in the morning.

Speaking of fresh air, as we are moving closer to fall, the morning air is getting a little crisp here in Chicagoland. In coastal regions however, the warm ocean air is generating a lot of storm activity. September is the middle of hurricane season, which officially runs from June 1st to November 30th. The National Weather Service Climate Prediction Center has predicted an above average level in the number and intensity of storms in 2008. As of early September, there were 10 named storms, 5 hurricanes and 3 major hurricanes. Although there is no scientific consensus as to whether this increase is related to global warming, the 2007 Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change concluded that the increase in number and intensity of Atlantic storms was "more likely than not" caused by anthropogenic (human-induced) climate change.

Whether or not the recent increase in hurricane activity in the Atlantic is attributable to Climate Change, few scientists doubt the existence of such change or its anthropogenic nature. Republican Vice-Presidential nominee Sarah Palin (you know, the moose-hunter who sued to prevent the protection of Polar Bears) bucks not only the scientific community, but the Republican party line, in her belief that there is no relation between human activity and global warming.

Make of it what you will... I'm having another cup of coffee and feeling thankful I don't own any beachfront property.

CSF

THE SEPTEMBER GREEN HOMES CHALLENGE

MAKE BACK-TO-SCHOOL TIME BACK-TO-GREEN TIME

If your summer was anything like mine, it wasn't quite as green as you wanted it to be. Oh sure, you may have biked a little more, but road trips to see friends or visit the beach didn't exactly reduce your carbon footprint. Nor did all those take-out meals with the kids. Not to mention running the air conditioning a little more than strictly necessary. You may have even cooled down with bottled water!

Well, now is the time for a fresh start. Green Homes will help you green your back to school experience. Let's start with the school supply list. Unless the old ones are torn and unusable, you can reduce your consumption by skipping the new back pack and lunch box (A reusable lunch box is a sustainability must. If you didn't have one last year, move this to the top of the list.) For ideas on how to pack a more eco-friendly lunch, check out Wastefreelunches.org.

Many of your basic school supplies come in environmentally friendly options. Most of the big retailers now sell notebooks, paper, and other supplies made of recycled content. Your local Office Max, Office Depot and Staples (and their on-line counterparts) all have eco-friendly alternatives for your paper needs. If you look a little harder, you can even find pens, pencils, highlighters and markers made of recycled content. Go to greenearthofficesupply.stores.yahoo.net/index.html for eco-cool items like pencils made from recycled jeans and old money. However, their most eco-friendly option is the EarthWrite pencil. The older version is made from 100% recycled paper, the newer ones from reclaimed wood.

Once you've stocked up on school supplies, time to jump in the car and head to the mall for new school clothes - right? Wrong. Many people don't realize that on-line shopping is the more eco-friendly option. Although shipping items by truck or plane has an environmental cost, it is less impactful than the hundreds of separate trips to the mall that consolidating all those items into one load eliminates. If your child goes to a school that requires uniforms, odds are it has a uniform exchange program. Take advantage of this wallet and earth-saving option. Drop off your old uniforms and pick up some new ones. This is the basic Reduce, Reuse and Recycle, people!

Speaking of the Environmental 3R's, what are you doing with all the rest of your old stuff from the last school year? We've already talked about the back packs and lunch boxes, see if your child can reuse her old calculator, ruler, compass, protractor, binder and book covers as well. The left-over pages in last year's notebooks make for great scratch paper. Reducing consumption and reusing what you can makes sense for both the environment and your bottom line ; especially in these challenging economic times. That leaves the "recycle" bit. Make sure you are properly disposing of old electronics. Most municipalities have drop-off centers or collection dates for used electronics. http://www.nrdc.org/cities/recycling/gelectronicsrecycling. Your school might even be interested in some of your old equipment. Did you know that your old sports equipment and gym shoes can find new homes as well?


Okay, so your child is all geared up. You've donated or recycled your old stuff. Now it's off to school. But how to get there? This is a BIG part of our September challenge: at least one day a week have your children walk, scooter or ride their bikes to school. Transportation accounts for 66% of all U.S. oil consumption. (U.S. Dept. of Energy.) And eighty-eight percent of all trips are by car. If your child can walk or bike even more than once a week, the health and environmental benefits will quickly add up. There are psychic benefits as well, nothing clears their heads for a day of learning like a little exercise and fresh air.



So there it is: the September Green Homes Challenge. Green your back-to-school experience. On an on-going basis, have your child bike or walk to school at least once a week, but more often if possible. Keep checking here for tips on how to green your child's school days.



CSF

Sam’s Club by Bike

Gas is really expensive. My 2001 bright red minivan boasts a respectable 25mpg for a 7-seater, but it now costs me $110 to fill my tank. So I don’t drive it. Well, occasionally I do, but because the weather here is finally glorious and because my bike-enthusiast husband rides either to the train station (green) or downtown (very green,) I have his zippy little Toyota Matrix at my disposal. Makes a huge difference. I drove to Phelps - the lovely hamlet where Doug’s family owns a lake home – twice this summer. The van can make the 350 mile ride on one 26 gallon tank, but that’s over $200 round trip now (I know – math wiz.) The Matrix can also make it on one tank, but its tank only holds 12 gallons and thus sets us back only $50. Obviously, we take the Matrix whenever possible.

Last Monday was a glorious day and, after driving those 350 miles a day prior, I decided I’d do as much as possible on bike or foot. I took the dog for a run. I rode my vintage Schwinn Collegiate to see two clients. I ran with the dog to Best Buy to get Doug’s birthday present. But the kicker was when Corey, my daughter, and I decided to go to Sam’s Club via bike. Sam’s, as you know, is a wholesale club, so there are obvious limitations on which items I could purchase. Since the primary mission was coffee, I decided we’d be fine. We loaded our reusable grocery bag with three packs of batteries, a honeydew melon, a package of grapes, a gallon of milk and, of course, a 2.5 lb bag of Starbucks Coffee.

When we got back to our bikes, we compared the size of our load and the size of my wire basket and got nervous. I carefully loaded all of our items in my wire basket, took off, and promptly lost the melon. I reloaded, tied the bag off and set off. Driving home was a bit hazardous. The load in front made my bike unwieldy and it felt so front heavy I just prayed we wouldn’t have any sudden stops. But bit by bit we made it home, very satisfied with the outing. We got it all done, we replenished our coffee and fruit supplies (both key summer life ingredients) and did not use an ounce of gas. Thank God we didn’t need toilet paper.

JCH

Can you have a green vacation?

I tried. I really did. I took the train to Connecticut to visit my family instead of driving. Let me repeat. I took the train to CT from Chicago with my three kids. That's 20 hours on Amtrak, folks, and I recommend it highly. I did start to get that caged animal feeling after about 16 hours, but on the whole it was pleasant and so lovely to be able to stand up, read my book and drink water with abandon. Speaking of which, I bought two plastic water bottles at the train station when I realized I had forgotten reusables - but Amtrak has water spigots in each car and we reused those bottles the whole weekend until I dumped them in my recycling container at home this morning. I know, I know, you're not supposed to do that, but there were no wild temperature fluctuations and aside from the fear that we'd all catch Dylan's fever, we braved reusing plastic bottles.



Failure began on the train, ten hours into the trip, when I ordered a cup of coffee. Paper cup, paper tray, four-fold paper napkin. I dispensed with the napkin and the tray, but guiltily accepted the cup, in which I emptied a disposable container of half and half. By the time I ordered our breakfast I had resigned myself to green failure- we had muffins, egg sandwiches and scones, all individually wrapped in plastic and served in, you guessed it, cardboard trays with four-fold napkins.

Once we got to my parents' house we were able to keep our waste to a minimum, largely because my parents do the same. But on my first visit to Walgreen to get supplies I realized I didn't have a reusable bag, (my mother later said there were several in the trunk) so guiltily accepted plastic. First time since March. It got worse. Shorehaven's delicious beverages were served in plastic cups. And the Circle Line Tour serves its beer and water in disposables only with no recycling on board. Toss. And in central park's Leap Frog Cafe every single utensil and serving piece was disposable. Toss.

So the question is - is it possible to have a green vacation? Ironically, had I driven I would have had more control over my immediate environment while sending significantly more carbon into the atmosphere. I would have brought my cold and hot portable cups and reusable bags for that quick run into the store.

On the positive side, the experience made me realize that many things that used to seem like a hard habit to break or form have now become rote for my kids, my husband and me. We compost. We don't use paper napkins. Our town recycles everything so we produce very little trash. But once I got outside of my little green cocoon, it all fell apart. And it was depressing to realize that my family's efforts are such a drop in the bucket.

What's the answer? Short of traveling only to recycling friendly cities, I have to plan better or just do the best I can under the circumstances. And next time I'll at least bring a Green Homes coffee mug.

Jane