Archive for the 'Activism' Category

I have always loved bicycles. This love started out with the brand new blue and white Schwinn from my grandparents when I was 7 years old. Then it was the pink ten- speed Huffy. In my pre-teenage years, my friends and I used to ride around on my vintage tandem Schwinn. That was crazy stuff. Life was good. And then cars entered into the scene and stole my bicycle love. Somehow, riding around town in my 1977 White Toronado was more fun than a bike. But never fear, my bicycle love has returned full force.

Why do I love to ride? There is just something about arriving at my destination by pedaling that excites me. I love the wind in my face when I go down hills and the bugs that get stuck in my eyes when I ride too late at night. Nothing gives me greater joy than transporting my groceries via bicycle (our coop gives $5.00 off for every 10 times you ride/walk there ). Bella really likes riding in her Burley. Getting exercise without even thinking about it is a plus…and not having to find a parking spot is one of the best things in life.

I think that I could live and thrive without a car. Even in the winter? Yes! Many people continue to bike throughout the winter…installing “snow tires” and dressing for the cold. Bikes are everywhere in Bozeman. It’s so fun to ride around on a Friday night and see bikes parked everywhere, even at the “fancier” restaurants. The only thing that is lacking are completely separate bike lanes, which would be helpful. Bozeman is not quite as “bike friendly” as a town like Boulder, CO , but they’re coming around. The town is still small and slow enough where I feel relatively safe sharing the road with cars on city streets. Most drivers are respectful of your right to ride on the road.

Those of you that live in the suburbs, I feel for ya. We are visiting my family back in Des Moines right now and everything is so far away! I rode my bike to the Farmer’s Market with Bella and it took 40 minutes one way. Wow! There are many things within biking distance (malls, restaurants, etc), but it’s just not “bike friendly”. When I ride my bike up to a store, people look at me like a have something growing from my head. As I was walking up to unlock my bike from the rack one day, I overheard a little girl say to her mom…”Why would someone ride their bike to the store?!”. It was also a strange dichotomy to ride my bike alongside the Hummers (please don’t run me over! ). Overall, Des Moines is a great city to bike in…and they have a lot of great events happening this week for “Bike to Work Week“. This week, across the nation, thousands of people are riding instead of driving. Wheeeee!

With gas prices as they are right now ($3+ a gallon!) and the greater focus on green living, I suspect you will see more and more cities becoming “bicycle friendly“. Large metropolitan cities have always been more focused on bikes than the suburbs…by necessity. In the suburbs, you find trails that take you around in circles for a pretty ride (which is fun too), but in the city, you actually go places on your bike. I’ve always had the secret dream of being a bicycle messenger (like Puck on the Real World..but with less falling down). If I ever did start my little bike business…I would definitely be getting one of these sweet rides:

• Main Street Pedicabs
• The Dutch Bicycle Company (scroll down to see the “sorte jernhest”)

Aren’t those amazing!? I love the “Pedal Pick-Up“. It just goes to show that you CAN move some big stuff with a bike! If you don’t want to spend quite as much, you can make your own trailer. Cruisers are gaining popularity…I love the colors and designs on this one. I’m trying not to be jealous of Aimee who got this cruiser for her birthday…and Andrea who got one for Mother’s Day. Beautiful bikes!

This week, I challenge you to CHALLENGE YOURSELF. Ride your bike! Ride for fun. Ride to the store. Ride for exercise. Ride to remind people that cars aren’t the only option.

Resources:
CarFree World
How to Live Well Without a Car
Why I Ride: The Art of Bicycling in New York (download the catalog for some fun reading)

Running the Numbers: An American Self-Portrait

I came across this interesting art installation (saw it on Thought Kitchen) and just had to pass it along. Be sure to read the amazing and disturbing statistics with each photo set. You can think about these numbers in your head, but to see it laid out in photo form is crazy. 2.5 million plastic bottles used every hour? That’s just mind-boggling.

Do you know where your food comes from? Do you know how many miles your apple traveled so you could crunch on it’s juicy goodness? You should. I read labels like it’s going out of style (was it ever IN style?). I want to know where my food is produced. I’ve been known to come home from the grocery store and look up the farm who has their sticker on my avocado.

Luckily for me, Montana and the surrounding states have a huge number of organic farms. AND, if it’s not organic, it’s local. BUT SARA! Aren’t we always supposed to eat organic so we don’t die a horrible pesticide-induced death? Well…yes. However, buying local has many, many advantages. I love going to the farmer’s market and meeting the farmer’s face to face. When I eat that delicious, red, tomato…I know who picked it. If the farm is not certified organic, I am able to just ask the farmer what they use on their produce. There were several vendors in Iowa at the Farmer’s Market who were not certified, but did not use pesticides. You just have to ask. However, it’s harder to call up the corporate farm in California what they used on their crops.

I started thinking more about buying local foods when I found the 100-mile diet site. It’s radical and wonderful. I love my avocados and bananas a little too much to do it, but I love the concept. Last summer when we had a share in our local CSA, I experienced a little of what it might be like to eat 100% local and 100% in season. When the tomatoes were done, they were done. You better savor it now, because pretty soon, they won’t grow anymore! Boo hoo! But it made me appreciate the food so much more. Someday, I would love to grow all of our food…canning and preserving along the way to sustain us through the winter. Oh, and I want to live in a sweet yurt. But that’s another blog.

On my most recent trip to the coop, I was looking at salsa and I was disappointed because almost all of them were made by “big organics” (companies who are owned by a larger, nastier corporation…i.e. Boca, which is owned by Phillip Morris! Oh the horrors!). So I turned around and in the cooler, I found a yummy, bright red salsa made just a few miles north of town! It was not organic, but in that case, I would much rather support my local grower than Muir Glen…which is owned by General Mills. It also tasted so much better than the jarred variety.

I walked over to the bread section and I made sure to grab 2 loaves made locally by Wheat Montana instead of the Rudy’s, which I used to buy. They aren’t organic, but they have the ingredients I look for and no added sugars…except honey. AND, they are made right here. We also have a delicious bakery just a few blocks from our house called On the Rise…and I buy yummy crusty bread from them.

If I can’t find something completely local, I go for the next best thing…the surrounding states. I will choose Oregon, North Dakota, Washington, and Wisconsin over other states. Be sure to READ your labels! Every mile your food travels (a.k.a. food miles) to get to you is gasoline being burned and resources being used up. Most sources say that the average piece of produce travels about 1,200 miles to get to your plate. Yuck! I just don’t like the thought of all my food traveling in a truck to get to me. I especially don’t like thinking about buying food from other countries. How do I know that those organic grapes from Chile are truly organic…and who knows what kind of residues are on them from the trip. Call me paranoid. Just another reason to buy close to home or grow your own.

When we are thinking about going out to eat…we try to always think about where the restaurant is getting their food as well. We have a great Farm to Restaurant program here…and most of the places we support buy locally, and some are organic too. We have so many amazing local restaurants here…the food is so fresh and perfectly prepared. Living in a tourist town has it’s perks.

To sum it up…buying local is tastier, better for your local economy, and great for your body. If you can find something that is local AND organic, life is good. KNOW your food. KNOW your farms. Where you put your grocery money is as important as your vote! Be informed about your food choices.

Photo credit: Flickr/KbH

Tree Hugger. Granola Girl. Eco-Freak. Crunchy Mama. There are lots of ways to describe me…and all of the aforementioned names are compliments in my mind. My path to “green living” has been slow and steady…definitely not an overnight conversion. Every piece of knowledge has led me in a new direction, and helped spark interest in other areas (i.e. I cloth diapered, so it was a natural fit to use cloth toilet paper). As a Christian, I feel even more compelled to be a good steward of the earth. It’s not just about stopping global warming or saving trees, it’s to honor God and to be wise with the resources He has abundantly given us. We live in a nation of excess and ease…we need to get back to the basics and “live simply so that others may live” -Gandhi.

After reading a great thread on Mothering, I thought I would do a quick overview of the things I do to reduce my footprint on the earth (and things I am still working on). It will be a reminder for me to remain diligent in them, and will hopefully encourage you to start or continue in your own journey towards natural/green living.

When you know better, you do better. -Maya Angelo

• Use clothesline/hang clothes outside. Our landlord is going to build me a clothesline this summer…I could not be more excited! In the meantime, we do hang some clothes on a rack inside.
• Be mindful of what lights are on and turn them off when not in use. We do have lots of natural light in our apartment, so this is pretty easy.
• Keep the thermostat set low. This is so difficult for me to do because I LOVE being warm. Our utilities are included in our rent, so I’m not motivated by the money savings. I must decide to motivate myself for the pure ecological impact.
• Reuse clothes that aren’t dirty. This is another hard one, especially with Bella. She changes clothes about 5 times a day…and yes, they are all dirty. It’s so easy just to run a load now that we have our own washer and dryer. Luckily, it is an efficient front loader and the dryer has a sensor in it. However, still not a good excuse.
• Decrease garbage. With recycling and composting, this has become easier. We go through about 1 bag a week. Go check out “Garbageland” to understand the business of garbage better. I think it should be required reading for everyone!
• Use cloth bags at the grocery store. I have been out of my “routine” with this for awhile and need to get a system in place so I have them when I need them.
• Use hand dryers in public restrooms instead of paper towels.
• Carry stainless steel water bottles for drinking when away from the house. (Sigg or Klean Kanteen). I phased out all of our Nalgene bottles a few years back due to health concerns, especially regarding women. This is controversial, but when it comes to plastic, I don’t like ANY of it. Especially for food. They just haven’t been around long enough to perform long-term studies.
• Use cloth hankies/bandanas instead of tissues.
• Use cloth napkins.
• Use cloth towels for cleaning.
• Use cloth mama pads and The Diva Cup.
• Use cloth toilet paper/family cloth.
• Rinse/reuse plastic bags and aluminum foil.
• Use glass jars for storing food in fridge and for bulk items.
• Recycle everything.
• De-clutter and donate on a continual basis.
• Don’t buy anything new.
• If I must make a purchase, buy locally…from small stores.
• Shop at thrift stores.
• Buy more in bulk to reduce packaging.
• Use natural bar soaps with few ingredients for hand/body washing.
• Use all natural body care products.
• Would like to wear only natural fibers (wool, cotton, linen, flax, hemp…).
• Dreaded my hair. I am now able to use less products and less electricity.
• Use earth-friendly/homemade cleaners (my next blog will be about natural cleaning products…stay tuned).
• Would like to get rid of particleboard furniture in the house (off-gassing).
• Would eventually like to get an organic/natural mattress. I have my eye on one of these…they are locally made.
• Replaced all Teflon and similar cookware with cast iron and stainless steel.
• Replaced plastic containers with glass storage containers for food storage (dry goods and in the fridge).
• Compost! We are just starting to compost and I am amazed and saddened at how much food we have wasted in the past. I am very aware of how much food I toss because we don’t have a disposal either.
• Eat organic foods at home…we are at about 90%. When we are out and can’t choose our meals as much, I try very hard to avoid the “dirty dozen“. This is not only for our health, but for the health of the earth by reducing pesticides, etc.
• Eat more raw foods as a way to prevent disease, feel more alive, and save energy by not cooking. To learn more about raw foods, check out Alissa Cohen’s site. Eating raw food doesn’t have to be difficult…just add a smoothie for breakfast and a big salad for lunch and you’re on your way.
• Eat a vegetarian diet. Read “Diet for a New America” or “Food Revolution” to learn how your food choices affect more than just you.
• Buy locally grown foods when possible.
• Breastfeed Bella for optimum nutrition.
• I’d like to learn to can and freeze this year.
• Start gardening this summer.
• Walk more, drive less. Even in the winter, we can walk to the co-op to do grocery shopping, get coffee, etc.
• Ride bike more often. Obviously this will be easier when it’s not snowy and icy…but I am so excited to bike to my errands! Wheeeee!

This is by no means an exhaustive list..because it’s always changing and growing…but it’s amazing to me how adaptable humans are. Five years ago I would have laughed out loud at the thought of most of the things on this list. So, if you are just starting your journey, take heart! Just pick one thing at a time to change and keep moving forward.

Several of you have asked me to post about buying Christmas gifts while doing the Compact. It’s really quite simple. Here are my tips:

• Shop early.
  • It’s pretty much impossible to buy used/barter/trade at the last minute. Well, you could, but even Goodwill is pretty picked over by Christmas eve!
  • I’ve been slowly collecting gifts from consignment stores and thrift stores..and occasionally trading for photography.
• Always keep an eye out for a gift…even if you aren’t specifically shopping for that person.
  • I have found the greatest gifts when I wasn’t really looking. Keep a list of all the people that you are shopping for so you can keep track.
• Keep a gift “box” under your bed or in a closet so that you can have them all in one place.
  • I love this. Anytime I find a cool gift, I just pop it right into my gift box and know that I can forget about it until Christmas! This is a great thing to have year-round…because as birthdays pop up, you can just grab a gift from the box.
• Don’t buy gifts for everyone.
  • I used to do this…because I LOVE giving gifts. But this year, I am limiting it to family and a few close friends. For Bella, we would like to start the tradition of 3 gifts only…representing the 3 gifts the wise men brought Jesus.
• Homemade is fun.
  • Last year I made cool magnets. It’s always cheaper to do something crafty. I usually do a lot of photo-related gifts, especially for the grandparents. I have some crafty things that I am making this year, but I can’t reveal it on my blog…that would ruin the surprise!
• Don’t get stressed. The focus is on Jesus, not gifts. The gifts are just a great symbol of what God gave us in His son.

Giving gifts is so much fun for me. I thought about just not doing any gifts this year…but then I realized how much joy I get from seeing someone’s face light up. Compacting this Christmas has been enjoyable and easier than I thought! And I am THRILLED to not be out at the malls. Wheeeee!

Photo courtesy of Nathan Gibbs/flickr.com

I came across a wonderful website today. The Miniature Earth explores what the earth would “look” like if it was reduced to 100 people, but the proportions remained the same. It’s so easy to forget that we, as Americans, are not the only people on this earth. It’s easy to forget that we are wealthy beyond measure when compared to others across the world.

Along the same lines, Peter Menzel has created 3 books that have been life-changing for me. Material World, Hungry Planet, and Women of the Material World. He compares famililes from around the globe and give us a glimpse into their everyday lives. Here are a few of the families that are featured. These books were pivotal in my journey towards a more simple and sustainable lifestyle…I just could not go on doing the same wasteful things, knowing that the rest of the world has so much less.

I subscribe to very few magazines, but one of my favorites came this week. VegNews is packed with great recipes, vegetarian news, fun interviews, and more. I was pleasantly surprised to find a fabulous article on Daryl Hannah and her efforts to promote green living and other social issues. She has a website with “mini-documentaries” that I have fallen in love with. Each little movie is so rich with information. She covers a wide variety of topics…from bio diesel to hemp to bike culture. Go check it out for yourself!

Another celebrity that I have come to love is Woody Harrelson. Woody isn’t afraid to speak the truth, and I think anyone who is actively trying to educate others about living “greener” and more simply deserves respect. I first learned of his activism when I found the documentary “Go Further” on Netflix. The film shows Woody’s bicycle trek down the West Coast. He makes stops along the way to educate students and anyone else who will listen about bio diesel, the sustainable uses of hemp, deforestation, raw foodism, and more. There are tons of “extras” on the DVD, including a little clip of Julia Butterfly Hill, whom I also admire. You can check out more of his work at his website, Voice Yourself. If you decide to watch the movie…you will also love the companion book, To Go Further: A Guide to Simple Organic Living. It’s a favorite on my bookshelf.

No, not your shoe size. Your ecological footprint. I’ve taken the footprint quiz before…but Jessica’s blog reminded me how much I love to try to lower my score. Right now, my footprint is at 5 acres. In comparison, the average footprint in the U.S. is 24 acres. Worldwide, there are enough resources for each person to have 4.5 acres.

So that puts me .5 over my “allotted” acres and now I must REDUCE so I can stop using up more than my share of the resources! Here are some other changes that I would like to make:

• Eat a completely vegan diet. I have eaten a vegetarian diet for a little over 2 years now, but have gone back and forth between vegan and vegetarian. For those of you that don’t know, a vegan is someone who eats no animal products at all (no milk, eggs, butter, etc.)
• Walk more. This is a little harder in the wintry cold and ice…especially because our neighborhood is very hilly! I will implement this more in the summer. It’s so easy because we are within walking distance to everything.
• I have always wanted to use public transportation more. However, Des Moines has a really poor system. I have contacted the metro transit authority with route questions, etc. and I want to try it soon! I am definitely not used to riding the bus, so it will be an experience. It takes more time and planning, but I love the idea of it. Much more relaxing than driving myself. There is a possibility that we will park the bus this winter and become a one-car family again, so the bus may be a necessity!
• Focus on buying only package-free foods and less processed foods. Right now our only “processed foods” are chips, bread, almond milk, and cereal. I’m not counting condiments. I would like to start making my own bread again, make my own almond milk more consistently, my own granola, and my own chips. Does anyone know of any good tortilla chip recipes!?
• Reduce, Reuse, Recycle… I am learning more about this everyday. I am actively reducing my belongings and I am reducing the amount coming in (The Compact). I am re-using plastic bags, jars, clothes, I use cloth everything in our household, and I recycle everything that is allowed.
• I would like to be even more conscious of my energy and water consumption.

There will always be something to “work on” when you’re living green…but that’s what makes life fun!

Photo credit: Flickr/pingnews.com

Last year I discovered a delightful, but disturbing, little book…called Stuff: The Secret Lives of Everyday Things (by John Ryan and Alan Thein Durning).

The book goes “behind the scenes” of your “stuff”. Where did it come from? Who made it? What type of working conditions did they have? What components went into making that item? What kind of environmental impact did it have? It’s an eye-opener to see how complicated and wasteful making “stuff” really is. The different items it examines: coffee, newspaper, t-shirt, shoes, bike, car, computer, hamburger, french fries, and cola.

Here are some excerpts from the intro:

“Made in Taiwan”. I’d seen thousands of such stickers in my life without ever giving them a second thought. Taiwan. Taiwan. Not just a word on a sticker. It’s an island. A country. A real place with real people across an ocean from me. Suddenly, the overloaded shelves around me looked different. I was stripped of the illusion that stuff comes from stores and is carted away by garbage trucks: everything on those shelves came from a real place on Earth and will go to some other place when I’m done with it. Everything had a history — a trail of causes and effects–and a future. Everything had a life, of sorts. If you tried very hard, you could put a “Made in __________” sticker on each car wax bottle, speaker component, or old magazine on those shelves.

I started wondering where the things in my life come from. As coffee beans, newspapers, and soda cans make their way toward me, what wakes do they leave behind, rippling outward across the world? And what had to happen for millions of people like me to go about our ordinary business…using lots of stuff?

What happens around the world to support a day in the life of a North American is surprising, dramatic, and even disturbing. Multiplied by the billion members of the world’s consumer societies, it adds up to stresses greater than the world can withstand. The first step toward solving any problem is recognizing it. I’ve started by looking at the things in my life in a new way and learning what I can about their secret lives.

One of the reasons why the Compact is so appealing to me, is that it forces me to find new avenues of acquiring things. I am becoming more creative and more patient as I search for an item that I need. When you buy something used or someone gives you a used item…you are helping to stop the need for NEW resources to be tapped to replace that item you bought from the store.

A great example of this from the book is the chapter on the life of a T-shirt. If I went to the mall to buy a new t-shirt (instead of the thrift store), the following resources would be used (paraphrased from p. 20-25):

• Oil: the polyester in the shirt started as a few tablespoons of petroleum (they go on to talk about all the effects of oil drilling, environmental concerns, etc.)
• Cotton: to get the 2 oz. of cotton needed for the t-shirt, 14 square feet of cropland in Mississippi were harvested. The soil was first fumigated with aldicarb, one of the most toxic pesticides applied in the U.S. The cotton seeds were also dipped in fungicide.
  
• Dyes: Regulated by the EPA as hazardous substances.
• Sewing: the fabric was shipped to Honduras. Honduran women cut and sewed it into a T-shirt and earned 30 cents an hour. After it was completed, the box of t-shirts went to Baltimore, by train to San Francisco, and by truck to Seattle. It was unpacked on a department store shelf under a 150-watt floodlamp. That’s where I found it. I bought it because I liked the earth-tone color. And I brought it home by car in a bag of low-density polyethylene from Louisiana.
• Laundry: I spilled coffee on myself and had to change…and I threw the other one into the laundry chute. Later I washed it in water heated to 140 degrees by natural gas flames. Boxed powder detergent and chlorine bleach from a high-density polyethylene bottle removed the coffee from the fabric. The coffee, detergent, and bleach washed into Seattle’s sewer system. An electric dryer evaporated the water from my shirt. The greatest environmental impacts associated with my T-shirt arose in my own laundry room: washing and drying the shirt just ONCE demanded 1/10 the energy as manufacturing it in the first place.
  

What can one person do to make a change in this process? Well, let me tell you. Little things make a big difference. In the case of the t-shirt, you can…

1. Buy USED or vintage clothing.
2. Wash only full loads of laundry.
3. Use warm instead of hot water when you can.
4. Wear your clothes more than once before washing.
5. Look for organic cotton apparel.
6. Encourage others to do the same.

If anything, I hope this has encouraged you to THINK about the secret life of your stuff.

My neighborhood graffiti artists…they are quite the activist bunch. They must have known I was starting the Compact and wanted to give me some encouragement.