Do you own an outdoor composter or have a compost heap in the yard? If you do then you will know that collecting compostable fruit and vegetable waste can be a difficult routine to maintain. You need to collect the scraps of compostable food and take them out to the compost heap after every meal is prepared. I often find myself asking;

I wished there was a way to store compostable fruit and vegetables in the kitchen until I was ready to take all the scraps out to the main compost heap!

I was given this perfect solution by my Mother and Father in law for my birthday and it makes the routine of collecting compostable food waste so easy… It is a counter top kitchen compost bin with a built in odor filter and it works great.

Counter Top Compost Bin

In the beginning

We have a small area in our side yard that we are going to turn into a garden spot. We had a couple of tomato bushes and some onions last year, but the roses around the area did not allow for much sun. So we have moved the roses and made a space around 8 x 8. We would like to grow tomatoes, oni0ns, and put a trellis for zucchini and squash. I also have some strawberry plants I would like to put in the center in a raised bed, still working on that idea. We have put a four foot fence around it with a gate to keep out the dogs, rabbits, etc. This was made out of left over cedar pieces that our contractor friend had. We now have to put in the boards to keep in the soil and then add organic soil. Come spring, we will plant our little garden. I can already visualize the paintings from the produce and the good tasting homegrown veggies on the table.  We’ll see how that works out. I’ll keep you posted.

New fence out of cedar scraps

You are probably about to decorate this years Christmas tree so we wanted to share our Top 10 list of ornaments made from recycled materials. Many of these awesome eco creations could be made at home from recyclables but each of the top 10 recycled Christmas tree ornaments shown below can be purchased online.

Number 1: Recycled Mother Board Ornaments

These ornaments are made from recycled computer circuit boards and they’re some of our favorites, a top pick for any green geeks!
Avialable from MotherBoardGifts.net

Recycled Christmas Tree Ornaments from Used Motherboards!

Are you ready for a green Thanksgiving celebration? If you are struggling to come up with ways to be eco-friendly and still celebrate in style then just follow the three L’s for a truly green Thanksgiving;

http://www.flickr.com/photos/48089670@N00/ / CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

Green Thanksgiving - Follow Our Three L's

Buy produce with LESS packaging… Reduce waste before the food even hits the table!

http://www.flickr.com/photos/coollibrarian/ / CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

Buying bulk foods uses LESS packaging

We have been using the Berkeley Institute of the Environment carbon footprint calculator to track our average ecological impact and our progress is shown below. When we started tracking our carbon footprint back in March 2009 we assessed that our household produced a shocking 68 tons of CO2 per year, this is equivalent to 158 barrels of oil in energy and would require managing 13 acres of forest to offset!

This was simply un-acceptable in our eyes. We purchased our current home 2 years ago, it is an older home and needed lots of upgrades to make it more energy efficient.

Our Carbon Footprint Back in March 2009 shown below…

Our Carbon Footprint in March 2009

Back in March when I saw these results I decided to really commit to reducing our household energy consumption and check our progress at the end of the year… (more…)

Here we are at the start of the Holiday season, around our house, Thanksgiving plans are in full-swing! What can we do to get our holiday season off on a green foot? A lot!
How about shopping for your Thanksgiving meal with two words in mind, organic and local. If you buy local, you enjoy fresher food and you support your local economy. If you drink wine with meals, consider buying organic wines to be more eco-conscious.

Instead of planting yourself in front of the TV for the day, well maybe just for the Football game, consider getting out some and getting fresh air or play a board game. Take advantage of the time together with family while decreasing your energy usage.

If you are going to someone else’s home for dinner, consider turning down the thermostat and turning off the lights to save energy at home while you are gone.

Don’t forget to recycle. Encourage everyone to pitch in and put the recyclables in bins. Recycling all the packaging from the fixings for the meal, as well as any beverage containers, will significantly reduce the number of times you have to take the trash out, as well as the amount of garbage you send to the landfills.

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I’m always on the lookout for new green products and last week I found another great addition to th our everyday green household. Scotch Brite have come up with an awesome product for any eco warrior which keeps cleaning dishes and kitchen counter-tops green and biodegradable. New Scotch Brite “greener clean” sponges are made from 100% natural materials including 23% recycled paper, they are certified as biodegradable to the ASTM D6400-04 standard and they work great!

Scotch Brite Scrub Pads

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