Condo Blues: eco
Showing posts with label eco. Show all posts
Showing posts with label eco. Show all posts

Tuesday, April 23, 2019

6 Ways Plastic Helps Me Live Zero Waste

Almost every blog post I read that offers tips and tricks how to live Zero Waste they almost always use plastic free as a synonym. They say something like, “We got rid of all of our plastic stuff and bought the same exact thing in wood/bamboo/natural fiber to replace it and wow how cool we are living zero waste now!”

It. Drives. Me. Crazy.

Throwing away usable items to buy a cool looking replacement is the exact opposite of zero waste living folks!

Zero waste living means giving up using disposable single use plastic and items as much as possible, not no plastic at all.

Plastic free is great but that is a different goal.


6 Easy Ways to Live Zero Waste (ish) and Save Money Doing It!

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Photo used with permission  by Sophia Marston on Unsplash


Wednesday, March 28, 2018

8 Zero Waste Lies

If you are trying to be a Zero Waste or Trash Fee home you try to reduce the need to use the landfill by refusing, reducing, reusing, repairing, recycling, and donating your household waste to get your output to as close to zero as you can.

There are some in Internet Land who show you how they do it with Pinterest perfect photos of bamboo toothbrushes like these, stylishly minimalist rooms (you can learn about the minimalism movement here), and  haughtily looking down their nose at people who  – gasp! – follow low waste practices because their primary goal is to pay off bills, live within their means, or save money, with environmental concerns coming in a close second or even lower down the list.

Disclosure: I am including some affiliate links in this post for your convenience.

8 Truths of Trash Free and Zero Waste Living

In my over 10 years of blogging about green living and doing it in one form or another for even longer, I know there are some truths to Zero Waste Living and I also know that the reality is not always what you see in those Pinterest perfect Zero Waste Kitchens either.


8 Truths of Trash Free and Zero Waste Living
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Tuesday, March 6, 2018

6 Ways to Use Less Plastic without Going Crazy

Many folks in the United Kingdom are looking for ways to live plastic free or with less single use plastic for the 40 days of Lent. This is as part of a national Plastic Free (Less) Lent Challenge influenced by the BBC TV program Blue Planet 2: Seas of Life (this show has such gorgeous nature photography and information that I have no problem recommending it to you and using my affiliate links to do it!)

So far, the folks I’m working with are excited when they find a plastic free bamboo toothbrush (read more about it here) or their grocery store allows them to use reusable cloth produce bags and that's fantastic! 

But as they have been living awhile with the low plastic challenge, there are many people who are becoming overwhelmed, or are too time poor to DIY plastic free everything, or worse, being shamed when they admit that they can’t afford the perfect plastic free option. That’s not cool.


6 Ways to Go Plastic Free without Going Broke or Crazy
Pin this list of ideas for later and share it with your friends!


I feel for ya, because I think I am the only person in the world who lives in an area where my farmer’s market, bulk food bins, and fresh vegetable summer CSA subscriptions are typically more expensive than a conventional grocery store. I want to do my bit but I don’t always have the time to regularly grocery shop at three or more markets every other week when one conventional grocery store has everything I need.

Sunday, November 5, 2017

18 Gift Ideas for People Who Are Always Cold

I am that person who is always cold and as luck will have it I’m also the one who is assigned the frozen tundra polar ice cap infused office at work. Because apparently most office buildings think you have to keep the IT department people as cold as the servers and computers we work on – or at least it feels that way.


Pin this list for later and to share with your friends!

Influenced by a unseasonable cold snap and freezing while I shuffled around the house while wearing many layers, I put together a holiday gift guide for people who work outside in the cold, inside a cold building, or just like the snuggle up at home when it it cold outside.

Holiday Gift Ideas to Keep You Warm When it is Cold


Sunday, July 9, 2017

Quick and Easy DIY Wood Shower Floor Tile

I absolutely adore high end teak in a bathroom, especially the trend of using it for a shower floor. It is warm, it has texture, and not to mention wood is more eco friendly than the vinyl shower pan that came with my house.

On the flip eco side, keeping the current shower floor during our bathroom remodel to be is uses less new resources than ripping it out and replacing it with a new shower pan and wood shower tile just for looks sake.

Fortunately the solution was a quick, easy, and split the eco friendly middle IKEA hack away – install removable outdoor wood deck tile over the current the shower floor.

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Tuesday, April 25, 2017

9 Ways to Replace Plastic Wrap in the Kitchen


I have a like – hate relationship with plastic cling wrap. I like on those rare occasions that it actually and fully sticks to a container to keep food fresh. I also hate it most of the time because, no matter what type or brand, it never sticks, food dries out or gets freezer burn, and I end up tossing the spoiled food and the plastic wrap in the trash.

So it was no great stretch for me to find a way to keep food fresh without plastic wrap. Once I started using my Swiss Army knife of easy alternatives,  I noticed we also reduced the amount of weekly household trash by quite a bit. Yay!


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Sunday, April 23, 2017

How to Make a Brick and Pallet Rain Barrel Stand

There is an issue with the French drain in my side yard which leaves my side yard is wet and spongy days after it rains. I installed a rain barrel as a temporary fix until I can get my Homeowner’s Association to repair the poor drainage problem. Not to mention being able to capture and use rainwater to water our flowerbeds. A quick drainage fix, free plant water, and being green – high fives all around.

Originally I planned to hook a soaker hose up to the rain barrel as a lower waste way to water the front yard and garden but it didn’t work as well as I hoped because the rain barrel water pressure was practically nil. Turns out the height of your rain barrel determines how much water pressure flows from it and not what I thought – the amount of water in the rain catch system.

How to Increase Rain Barrel Water Pressure the Quick and Easy Way

Tuesday, April 4, 2017

What’s in Your Trash and How Do You Reduce it (or Not?)

I’ve been thinking a lot about trash lately. The stuff in the bin outside your house, not about tawdry things. Lacey is a genteel lady who not tolerate dirty things in her home (unless it is something muddy or smelly to roll in.)

 I love mud!

I’ve been mulling over ideas to share how to reduce your household trash since the New Year.  I’m coming up short because every draft I write sounds like some big green guru sitting on a mountain top looking down  her nose at the world thinking that my Swiss Army knife of low waste options are the Pinnacle of One Size Fits All Solution to reducing household waste.

Or at least it feels that way and that is not my intent at all.

I want to offer options not absolutes because, honestly, there aren’t any one size fits all eco friendly low waste living solutions. It all depends on where you live, how you like to live, family size, etc.

Sunday, March 12, 2017

Tiny Mall Micro Loft House Tour

Tiny houses are all the rage, so it should be no surprise that city dwellers can live cute and with a ridiculously small carbon footprint in tiny micro apartments – in a converted historic shopping mall!



 Pin this tiny house tour and share it with your friends!

You don’t have to be a shopaholic to live here. In fact, given that the average size of each tiny apartment is 220 square feet it is probably best if you aren’t.