March 8-14 and Great Wolf Lodge

Mom: 2- chocolate almond package and plastic around a bottle

Aaron: 3- cheese stick wrapper, Jamba Juice: cup, top and straw (so jealous), and water bottle (all not shown)

Noah: 1- candy (not shown)

Trey: ? by Tuesday he already had 6 and then he lost count. He is too embarrassed to pack lunch and is using his birthday money to buy lunch. This gives him on average of 2 to 3 pieces of waste per lunch. The 6th grade science teachers used our pictures and family as an example this month, as they are learning about recycling and living with less waste. When some of his peers commented that they saw our pictures, Trey was mortified. None of his peers teased him or said cruel things, however I think at this stage of Trey's life he doesn't want to be considered different. I am allowing him to buy lunch, although it kills me, so that he doesn't revolt against the waste war completely. 

Community Waste: milk tab and Aaron's allergy pill 

Noah won this week and we all went to the movies on Saturday. We are now home, enjoying our 17th snow day of the winter. Hopefully, this will be our last storm of the year. I hope everyone else on the east coast is staying safe and warm.

For our February Christmas Adventure, we went to Great Wolf Lodge. Our priority on this trip was of course to have a great time, but also to keep our waste to a minimum.  I had never been before and wasn't sure what to expect. I knew our room came with a small fridge, so we packed enough food for breakfast and lunch. Keeping our trip zero waste was pretty simple, since we spent almost all of our time at the water park, playing miniature golf and playing Magiquest.

I forget my tea at home and the hotel had a Dunkin Donuts on grounds. The first morning, I brought my thermos to Dunkin Donuts and asked them to put tea in my thermos since this one only serves coffee and tea in Styrofoam cups. It is very dangerous to drink out of Styrofoam (and it is horrible for the environment). I was directed to ask a manager, who said no but was willing to sell me the tea bag if I could find my own hot water. I had a coffee pot in my room, so I gladly accepted. After 3 days, I had a wonderful vacation with the boys and felt proud of our zero waste efforts.

Dave and Busters...not as Zero Waste as planned

 

 

 

Week 2

For our January Christmas Adventure, we went to Dave and Busters. I wrongly assumed that this would be a zero waste activity. It pretty much was until it was time to cash in their tickets. I was busy playing a game with Noah when Trey cashed in his tickets for "prizes". Unfortunately, I was not there to supervise and by the time I went to the prize room, Trey had already exchanged his tickets for the bag shown above. We had a talk about overindulging. I'm not sure at age 11 he fully understood. I let him keep the bag, although it pained me to watch him eat so many treats with artificial colors and flavors. Since this was a splurge, I let it go. Noah and Aaron also had a bag of treats, although not quit as much as Trey. Needless to say, I won that week. As my fun activity, we went to a Glass Art Studio. We were there for hours and were able to make some great useful objects with recycled glass. I can not share the pictures yet because one is a gift for someone that reads the blog faithfully.

* I will update week 3 and 4 this weekend.



 

Week 1 of the New Year

Yikes...That's a lot of trash for us!

Mom: 5 - running pants packaging, 2 pillow packaging, sock tags (not shown) and salad dressing container

Aaron: 6- Laptop packing, rechargeable battery packaging, cream cheese container (not shown), Starbucks cup and straw (not shown), and envelope

Noah: 5- 2 drinks during school lunch (not shown), cream cheese packaging, rechargeable battery packaging, sock tags (not shown)

Trey: 7- 3 drinks during school lunch (not shown), Gatoraid (not shown), bag of chips (not shown), Starbucks cup and straw (not shown), and cream cheese container 

Community trash: 2- milk rings

We had a slow start but I'm sure there will be improvement in the future weeks. Since Noah and I tied, our decision is to go to The Cheesecake Factory tomorrow after we enjoy our January Christmas Adventure at Dave and Busters. I hope everyone has a fun, zero waste, Martin Luther King, Jr. Day. 

The Waste War Continues

After a long break, our Waste War resumed this past Saturday.  Since November, we have experienced a lot of changes to our living situation. We sold our house, shipped all of our belongings across the country to California and moved into a temporary fully furnished house.  While finding a fully furnished home during our transition months was a perfect situation, the kitchen was not set up for a zero waste life style. I could only leave behind what I absolutely needed for six months, since we are flying and limited to one suitcase each. I shipped all of my pantry containers and scoured local Goodwill’s for new ones. I was very fortunate to find several and at very inexpensive prices. At the end of May, I will donate them back to Goodwill. It took a few weeks to turn our new home into a properly functioning zero waste home. The boys missed the war and are excited that we have started again (although I think they really missed all of our fun outings that the winner choices). 

I am happy to report that having Christmas experiences, limiting the amount of presents they opened was happily accepted by the boys. We have several trips planned for the future, with our first one to The Great Wolf Lodge. They view this as Christmas that lasts all year.  

School Lunches

 

 

 

 

 

When I went to order some bamboo utensils from UKonserve (click here for link), I read some statistics on their website that really shocked me. Each day I sit with my students at lunch time. I am amazed by the amount of food and trash waste that is mindlessly thrown away every day but I had no idea of just how much was being discarded.

*Children's lunches create 3.5 billion pounds of garbage each year
*18,000 lbs of trash is generated each year from one-average sized elementary school
*It takes a 15 year old tree to produce 700 brown paper bags
*The average child generates 67 lbs of lunchtime trash each year
*Trash is often mistaken for food and eaten by sea life
*The US has 6% of the population and produces half of the world's garbage
*38 billion plastic water bottles end up in the landfill each year
*Plastic water bottles take 700 years before they start to decompose

What can we do about this? There are some very simple steps to take that would drastically lower this statistic and save you money.

1) Use a reusable lunch bag or box VS.paper bags

2) Use cloth napkins VS paper napkins

3) Use a thermos, lunch bot, or some type of reusable container VS. foil or ziploc bags BECAUSE: The Center of Ecoliteracy reported that "One average elementary school student eating homemade lunches is estimated to generate between 45-90 lbs of ziplock bags, foil pouches and other packaging waste each year, roughly equivalent to the body weight of a third to sixth grader".

4) Make food from scratch and/or from the bulk section VS. processed food in prepackaged, single serving bags

5) Reusable utensils VS plastic utensils

6) Use stainless steal water bottle VS juice boxes or disposable plastic water bottle

Week 1 Count Down

The boys have looked forward to opening a new card every morning. With an unexpected parade and winter weather that moved into our town, we had to delay Day 7 to a later day. Besides that one hitch, we have enjoyed putting our electronics away to spend more time together.

Day 1: "Scavenger Hunt for your favorite candy" 

Only used candy that I could get from the bulk section.

Day 2: "French Toast and Hot Chocolate for dinner"

The Hot Chocolate we made from scratch. It was unbelievably easy and tasted so much better than the processed version in the packets.

Day 3: "After dinner we are making chocolate covered pretzels." 

Again, so easy and delicious. Sprinkles and candy we found in the bulk section. I normally try to avoid foods with artificial colors or flavors at all costs, however I do allow them to eat them on special occasions.

Day 4: "Stop at Goodwill and pick up a new board game."

The boys picked out 'Encore' which is a singing board game. We had a lot of great laughs since the majority of my family are not the best singers.

Day 5: "Random Act of Kindness Day: Do something nice for someone at school without being asked. We will talk about what we did at dinner "

I gave my co-worker a small gift.

Aaron gave a friend his a chocolate covered pretzel.

Noah cleaned the kitchen for Aaron.

Trey gave a friend a small gift.

Day 6: "Watch Elf with Egg Nog and Popcorn"

Day 7: Moved to future date

25 Count Down to X-mas

This time of year we are (like most families) especially busy.  Aaron has band practice, parades, banquets and concerts. Trey has wrestling practice and meets. Noah has chorus practice and concerts. Therefore, I spend a lot of time running around like a crazy woman without a lot of quality time with my family. At some point in late November, I took a step back, took some deep breaths and tried to figure out how we could continue with a crazy schedule AND still incorporate family time together.


This is why I came up with the idea of our own 25 day count down to Xmas, to run parallel with our 'experience' theme for presents. I broke down the activities as follows: 2/3 of zero waste activities (from making chocolate covered pretzels, playing a board game during dinner and eating dinner by candle light) and 1/3 of random act of kindness days. I found many great ideas online, however most were geared for young children and it was challenging to think of 25 activities teenage boys would enjoy.

I was a little apprehensive about the idea at first and  if they would feel they were too old, however they were very excited to open the first envelope on December 1. It is now the first thing they talk about in the morning and anxiously await to see what is written on the card.  The activities help remind my family of what is truly important during this time of year. Not the presents, but our family and spending quality time together.