Carbon Offsets

I am seriously looking at The Carbon Fund's Carbon Offsets. This is a tax deductible way to reduce your impact on the earth for the miles you have to drive anyway.


The Carbon Fund clearly promotes reducing your impact on the earth as much as you can (by carpooling, recycling, biking to work when possible, and other means), and then offsetting what you can't. For me, that would be my trip out to Washington to begin my stint with AmeriCorps, two trips back home after a family member was diagnosed with cancer, and the offsets required to heat the house that I share.

All told, it would cost me about $79 to offset a year's carbon production. This seems like an easy, efficient way to offset the carbon that I use.

How do you reduce your carbon footprint?

Frugal Environmental Goals

This year, my two goals are to get my use of handkerchiefs and cloth wipes down to a science. I would also like to walk or bike to school a few days a week. I recently bought a pair of rollerblades from the local thrift store (just $2!), so I have a whole menu of options. My car's revolt will add another incentive to walk to school.

This past year I focused on recycling and using cloth bags for groceries. A lot of stores in my town give a discount to cloth bag users (anywhere from three to five cents per bag), and some donate a small amount to charity when you use a cloth bag. I also began to use a drying rack for my clothes, and cloth pads during my period. Overall, it was a very successful year---so much so that I was left searching frantically for my (nonexistent) cloth bags in stores when I went home at Christmas. What a difference a few months make!

I recently transitioned from plastic Tupperware to glass mason jars, and am feeling really good about the switch. No more lingering food smells (somehow orange scents never come out of the plastic!). No more worries about toxic chemicals leaking into the food when I'm too lazy to heat my food on another set of dishes and just toss it in the microwave. I'm psyched!

What are your green goals for this year?

The Cloth Wipe Challenge (TMI alert!)

In all fairness to our more squeamish readers, this is a post about cloth wipes. Anyone with an intensely queasy stomach, feel free to skip this post. For those that I haven't scared off, don't worry; this isn't too graphic.

I've spent the past few days rereading the details of Crunchy Chicken's Cloth Wipe Challenge, and have decided to attempt it. Since the official challenge dates have passed, I'm going to set my own challenge, and replace my Seventh Generation toilet paper with cloth wipes. Being frugal, I recycled some of my old, undonate-able t-shirts into 5 x 5 cloth wipes.

Not only are these much more comfortable than scratchy toilet paper, but they are also much better for the environment. Crunchy Chicken writes on her blog:

According to Charmin, consumers on average use 8.6 sheets per trip to the bathroom. That's a total of 57 sheets per day and an annual total of 20,805 sheets. There are 230 million adults in the U.S., each averaging a roll and a half per week. Since each roll of toilet paper averages about .5 a pound of paper, that's about 40 pounds of TP per year. That equals 4.6 million tons of TP used each year. And that's just from adults. To take the calculation even further, if all U.S. adults used only Charmin toilet paper or the like (aka "virgin fiber" with 0% recycled content or post-consumer waste), the environmental cost is approximately (not including the issues with Dioxin):

78.2 million trees
1.35 million tons of air pollution
32 trillion gallons of water
2.1 trillion gallons of oil
18.75 trillion Kilowatt hours of energy

That's a pretty hefty amount, for something that's just flushed down the toilet! For me the solution is simple: cloth wipes.

I know I probably lost a few of you out there, squeamishly protesting that there is absolutely no way that you would ever use cloth wipes. But hold on: cloth wipes really aren't all that bad.

They're soft. Really, which would you rather use: scratchy toilet paper (made from wood, mind you), or soft flannel wipes?

They're environmentally friendly. Less water is contaminated using cloth wipes than in making toilet paper, which is used once, and tossed down the drain. Plus, how can forty fewer pounds of paper making their way into our sewage system be a bad thing?

They're inexpensive. Sure, you can buy cloth wipes. There are a lot of cute ones made out there, such as the ones from Wallypop or Etsy. But you can also make your own. Grab a few old t-shirts and give them a second life. Flannel fabric remnants are also a great choice, and can be had for very little at Joann's Fabrics or other fabric stores.

So what are you waiting for? Give cloth wipes a try!

Did I Stumble into a Meeting of the Watershed Protection League?

With the rousing and ever important question of, "What's your watershed?" I began to wonder if I somehow stumbled into the wrong meeting. Wasn't this the AmeriCorps training on creating environmental change in the workplace? Maybe I mysteriously stumbled into a group of radical environmentalists, or innocently wandered into a meeting of the Watershed Protection League. After all, what do watersheds have to do with the workplace?


I was soon reassured that I was, in fact, in the right place. Our presenter told us very matter-of-factly that she was "simply passionate!" about watersheds. And so the rousing discussion of "What's your watershed?" began.


Now, I use cloth bags and even cloth pads for crying out loud, but I do not for the life of me know what my watershed is. Even back in my home state, if you asked me at gunpoint to identify my watershed, I wouldn't be able to. I mean, I'm thrilled to realize that I even know what a watershed is!


That conference on understanding poverty is starting to look better and better all the time.

Amy's Rag Bag (Cloth Pads)

I just organized a barter with Amy's Rag Bag. I sent in my old, worn-out pajama pants, and received four pieces of a pad for each pair. I was able to specify the style of the pad, and the colors and themes. I'm now the proud owner of two Halloween pads, and several dark blue and green pads. These pads are just gorgeous.

These are possibly the most reasonably priced pads that I've seen on offer. Since she is willing to trade and barter (books, cookies, cloth, and more), they are affordable to just about anyone. There are tons of different colored fabrics available, and pads can be made out of organic cotton, flannel, terrycloth, or cotton. They can have a non-leak core piece, too.

You buy the pads piece by piece, to best fit your cycle. On light days, you may only need the topper, without a core. Heavier days, you may use an extra long protective piece, an absorbant middle layer, and a topper.

Amy is willing to make recommendations based on a short questionaire you can fill out, to find your best pad combinations. Everyone's period is a little different, so the products you use should be specialized to your specific needs. Her responses are very thorough, and prompt.

I wear my pads as a backup layer for my Diva Cup, and they work wonderfully. They are so beautiful and soft, and so unlike all of the commercial pads which can chafe and irritate. Best of all, they are washable, and don't contribute to landfill waste.

TMI Warning: The Diva Cup

Every woman has experienced it: the dreaded feeling that your menstrual products has let you down. Maybe you're out on the town, or in a meeting, and suddenly you realize that your pad has leaked. You casually delay standing up for as long as possible, waiting for everyone else to file out of the room before you do. Now is when idle chit-chat becomes very annoying! You desperately search for anything to cover up, and even contemplate using your shirt, even though it means stripping down to your undershirt. That wouldn't be at all obvious though, would it?

I am happy to tell you that yes, there is another option. It is the Diva Cup. This reusable silicone menstrual cup can be left in for up to twelve hours without leaking. It can be worn during yoga, sports, or at night. It can even be worn before your period, for maximum protection. There is nothing worse than not expecting your period for another day, and then getting it during class or an important meeting.

The Diva Cup has a little bit of a learning curve, but after you get the hang of it, it is incredibly easy to use, and very convenient. I loved having it when I went down to Guatemala. I lived with a host family, and at times there were six male boarders in the house. A wasteboard basket at the side of the toilet held all used toilet paper, and if you were unfortunate, poorly disguised used menstrual products. My Diva Cup saved me from this awkward situation, because I could simply empty the contents into the toilet and rinse the cup in the sink. Much less embarrassing!

It was also very handy. I can empty it at night in the shower, and then just once more when I get up in the morning. On heavy days, I might empty it once more during the day, but this is nowhere near the number of times I would have to change a tampon. There were days when I would have to change my tampon every two hours, and wear a pad as well! Not with the Diva Cup!

Some people are put off by the $30 price tag, but this is a one time cost. Before, I could easily go through thirty pads a period, and seven tampons during my heaviest times. At best, I was getting these for $10 a month. In just three months, I had recovered the money spent.

The Diva Cup is also a lot more environmentally friendly than disposable menstrual products. It is produced without the use of pesticides. The environmental costs of producing, shipping, and disposing of disposable menstrual products is astronomical. The average woman will use 15,000 pads or tampons during her lifetime. That's a lot of waste! In comparison, even if you were to replace your Diva Cup every year (instead of every ten) as they have begun recommending after gaining FDA approval for Diva Cup use during the menstrual cycle, the waste is still far less.

The Diva Cup has a lower risk of Toxic Shock Syndrome, as it does not absorb the blood, but merely contains it. It is made of medical grade silicone, and is latex-free. It has FDA and Health Canada approval.

If you are still worried about leaking, the Diva Cup can be paired with washable menstrual pads from etsy, online retailers, or natural food stores. These pads are very soft, and extremely comfortable. I'll be publishing a post later on washable menstrual pads.

I have thoroughly enjoyed my experience with the Diva Cup. It has been a lifesaver while I was traveling in Central America---I never had to worry about running out of supplies or where I was going to throw my menstrual products away. I could put it in the day before my period was supposed to start, and not worry about my period's sudden arrival. I really enjoy not having to change tampons constantly during heavy flow days. It has also been a huge money saver. So check it out! You just might like it!

Frugal, Environmentally Friendly Day

Today I have:

1. Hung my clothes out to dry on the line.
2. Walked to the bank and the post office instead of driving.
3. Recycled one huge load of cans and paper products.
4. Shut down the computer we weren't using.

What frugal, environmentally friendly things have you done today?