#15

We have made a few green changes in our household.


1. Recycling - We have started recycling more. Before we would sorta use the recycling bin when it was convenient. But now we're really using it. I realized that when this past weekend we were up at the lake house and I saved all the beer cans/bottles from the weekend to bring back to the house and the recycle bin. Plus our bin is full almost every week!

2. Reusable Bags - We got some reusable bags as a gift (the ones shown here). They aren't the prettiest bags, but man can they hold a lot! Today I used my reusable grocery bags for the first time. I take that back, I used them for the first time in the grocery store. In the past I've used them to move and to take on trips, but I always forget them when I walk into the grocery store. Lately its been driving me nuts when I check out at the grocery store and they put like two items in each plastic bag. I end up with sooooo many plastic bags at my house. So that is my motivation to keep bringing the bags into the grocery store with me.

3. GreenChoice - We just signed up for green energy through Austin Energy. When you sign up for it, it doesn't mean that the energy that you use necessarily only comes from green sources (like wind) - it could be coming from the coal plant - but it does give the energy company an opportunity to buy more green energy and not have to buy as much as that nasty coal energy. It is going to cost us a little more money right now than our normal energy, but it is a fixed rate for like 20 years, so hopefully it will even out one of these days (or years...). To curb the cost, we cut back a little on our cable bill, so it all works out and is better for our community.