Tips to Help Reduce Your Carbon Footprint

We live in an urban environment and have a rain barrel in place to help water our garden in the spring and summer months. We went on a trip to Puerto Rico recently and while we were there we noticed a lot of homes in an urban environment had large rain barrels either on the roofs or sides of the house since portable water is hideously expensive. I'm glad we have easy access to city water, but I hope in our area people become more aware that water really is a precious commodity and we only have so much to go around.

One way we save on water in our aging house is to take a half gallon jug that was once filled w/ milk, fill it w/ water, and then put it in our toilet tank. By displacing the water in the tank we use less water per flush.

I bring reusable shopping bags with me everywhere: the grocery, drug store, mass merchandisers. It helps the environment and means I'll never have a cheap plastic bag break on me while hauling my groceries into my apartment. I always have a reusable water bottle as well.

I suppose the ways I contribute to the environment are pretty common these days. I turn off water when I'm brushing my teeth. I bring reusable shopping bags to the grocery store. I buy local when I can (I love supporting my local farmers!). I recycle (my town has a great program). I donate or repurpose clothes that I don't wear any more.

I use reuseable bags when going to the supermarket. It saves lots of plastic and paper bags from being used and thrown away.

I keep a reusable bag on the back of the garage door, in the kitchen and upstairs so that whenever we have something to recycle we just throw it in one of the bags. It keeps us from walking out into the garage each time we have something to recycle. This way no one throws something that can be recycled into the trashcan.

Wash clothes in cold water, use the back side of used paper as scrap paper for the kids, consolidate errand driving, reuse grocery bags as trash bags, using tap water instead of bottled water, car pool when possible.

When I bought a Swiffer sweeper several years ago, I quickly realized that it was both expensive and earth-unfriendly. The pre-moistened towels that went over the flat mop came about 8 to a package and cost a lot. I thought a bit and one day realized I could cut up old bath & dish towels, moisten them with water (and soap if desired) tuck them into the slots just like the packaged ones and then wash and re-use them! Voila! Cut the expense and the waste of using the packaged towels!

I do many things to save the enviroment, composting, cloth napkins and shopping bags, washing clothes in cold water and hanging them up in the enclosed breezeway in winter and outside the rest of the year. Using CFL's and having a programmable thermostat, that way you do not forget to turn down the heat.I use a travel mug and rarely eat out. I use cleaning cloths rather than paper towels. Turn off the lights and TV when you leave the room. I recycle every piece of paper possible. I even tear out the cellophane in the envelope and throw it away. Turn over computer paper and reuse it to print coupons etc.

Conserving water; shutting off the tap while brushing teeth., shorter showers, making sure the wash machine is on cold and set to the right size load, not only saves water but electricity. We also purchase food locally and grow or raise our own foods.

I just discovered a little trick a few years ago! I use a lot of celery when I cook, and I never have to buy it. Once I have cut off all of the clerey I take the bottom part and replant it, in 8 to ten weeks I have my own celery stalks. I have about fifteen of them now, and they are so easy to maintain, need to be in full sun and water once a day.

I reuse ziploc bags all the time! Rinse them out and dry them on my baby bottle drying "tree."

my mom grows her own vegetables and gets eggs and produce from a local farmer.

Using recycled paper for printing, turning the water off while shampooing, brushing, etc., and composting are all tips that I use to help the environment.

Don't throw out your coffee grinds. Acidic soil loving plants like azaleas for instance would love your used coffee grinds. Just mix them into the dirt around the plant