Daylighting

What is daylighting? Daylighting is the use of natural light instead of electricity to illuminate buildings and homes. Daylighting will save you money while reducing your carbon footprint. New buildings are being designed to take advantage of natural light - check out www.daylighting.org for more information.

Our house was not specifically designed to take advantage of natural light, but we are fortunate that it gets great daylight in most of the rooms. We are able to get great natural light all day and only need to turn on lights after the sun sets or on cloudy days. See if you can take advantage of daylight by opening the curtains instead of turning on a light.

Ceiling Fans

Looking for a simple way to stay cool and save electricity this summer - install ceiling fans in your house. With ceiling fans you can save up to 40% on your air conditioning bill while only using as much power as it takes to light a 100-watt incandescent bulb. While ceiling fans themselves do not cool the room, the air circulation will produce a comfortable breeze which will make you feel cooler. Be sure to check to make sure you blades are rotating in a counterclockwise direction during the summer.

Phonebook Overload

Well it's that time again - new phonebook delivery time. In the next few weeks, phonebook companies will deposit their huge phonebooks on my doorstep. Their are two reasons that I get annoyed by all the phone books - first, I rarely use a phonebook as I tend to look up numbers on the internet and second phonebooks are a big burden on the environment - their printing require tons of paper & ink.

Now I need to unload last year's phonebook and the numerous unnecessary editions I will receive this year. Fortunately I can recycle the unwanted books in my newspaper recycling bin, check www.earth911.org to see how to recycle phonebooks in your community. Since reducing is always better than recycling, I wish the companies would change their delivery system and only deliver books to those homes that actually want them.

This lead me to do some research online to see if there was a way to stop phonebook delivery and was very pleased with what I found. To opt out of phonebook delivery visit http://www.paperlesspetition.org

Hopefully next year I will not have a mountain of phonebooks destined for my recycling bin.

Earth Day 2009 Freebies

With Earth Day coming this Wednesday several companies are offering some earth-friendly freebies.

Home Depot
Starting April 19th Home Depot is giving away one million Ecosmart CFL lighbulbs and water-saving faucet aerator inserts in their stores. Home Depot is also offering a free Eco-Options workshop Saturday April 25th. Visit www.homedepot.com for more information and to find your local store.

Calypso Studios
Calypso Studios who make great reusable bags is giving away $10,000 worth of their Acts of Kindness bags. Visit their website and register before 12pm on April 22nd for your chance to win http://calypso.cameoez.com/catalog

Grist.org
Join grist.org by April 23rd and receive an exclusive free download of their award winning book, Wake Up and Smell the Planet and you will also be entered for a chance to win tickets and airfare for two to the 2009 Bonnaroo Music and Arts Festival in Manchester, TN June 11-14.

eco-officegals.com
The Eco-Office Gals are having a “Green My World” giveaway worth over $400! I love this site they have tons of great tips & green product info

Reynolds Wrap
This Earth Day, try Reynolds Wrap® Foil from 100% Recycled Aluminum Free with mail-in rebate (up to $3.99) Rebate available for download only on Earth starting at 4:22am at their website www.reynoldsrecycled.com

Target
On April 19th Target is giving away 1 million reusable bags with any purchase. Visit www.target.com for your local store.

Earthbound Farms

In honor of Earth Day, Earthbound Farms has a Sustain Yourself, Sustain the Planet Pledge you can take. The pledge explores simple changes you and your family can make to help the Earth like eating organic foods, switching to reusable water bottles, reducing your meat consumption, composting, and more. As an added bonus for taking the pledge, if you are one of the first 10,000 people to take the pledge each week in April, you’ll win an Earthbound Farm reusable shopping tote! Take the pledge and learn more at http://ebfarm.com/AboutUs/SustainYourselfSustainThePlanet/index.aspx

Get Cozi...

Why not save a few trees by switching to a paperless calendar this year? Consider one of the free online planners, such as Cozi. The Cozi calendar allows you to personalize your calendar display with different colors for each family member. Cozi also has a family journal, shopping lists, Christmas Card list,a screen saver option from your personal photos, you can send emails to your family members, jot notes, store recipes, and it can even be synced with Microsoft Outlook. When entering activities you choose their frequency - daily, weekly, every Tuesday, etc. - eliminating the need to enter the same information multiple times. Depending on your child's school district you can even download school calendars onto your family calendar. I love the fact that when I have access to the internet, I have my calendar no need to remember to carry my planner with me and best of all nothing to recycle at the end of the year. Check out Cozi at www.cozi.com

Greening your Christmas Cards

If you're like me, you're torn on the whole Christmas card issue. On one hand it's a time honored tradition and on the other hand it's not very earth friendly - all the paper which rarely gets recycled, the chemicals in the photos, the gas used to transport the cards...the list goes on and on. This usually results in a yearly debate with my husband on whether or not I'm doing cards this year. In previous years I have done handmade cards with gorgeous photos of my daughter which some people still display, this does eliminate some of the waste issue but is very time consuming. Last year I rebelled and went the earth friendly route and didn't send cards - while this was better for our planet it felt like something was missing. This year I feel that I have found the perfect solution - Smilebox. Smilebox is an easy way to go green and send environmentally friendly digital photo scrapbooks with personalized messages to family & friends. There are tons of designs to choose from and customizing you scrapbook is super easy and best of all it's free. I personally upgraded our scrapbook to the premium package for just $2.99 - this allows my family & friends to watch my scrapbook free of commercials and for those who would like to have a hard copy of our scrapbook they can print the scrapbook out. To me this is the best of both worlds - no wasted paper, but for those on our Christmas list that would like to keep the photos they can. Best of all it's not to late to send your card - scrapbooks can be completed in just a few minutes and can be send via email immediately or even posted on your family's blog. www.smilebox.com

Finding green...

Have you been finding more green in your wallet lately in the form of extra dollars? With gas prices plummeting to the $1.90 range, you have a great opportunity to save some green while living green. Almost everyone I know limited their driving when gas prices were hovering near the $4 mark, stick with your lifestyle changes and you can save money and the planet. For example, I limited my driving so I only filled up my gas tank once a week. My tank is around 12.5 gallons, so with gas prices dropping over $2 a gallon I can pocket at least an extra $25.00 a week if I stick with my reduced driving plan!! With the holidays approaching that will make buying all the great sustainable gifts on my shopping list that much easier. Do the math - how much could you be earning without changing a thing?

Should you preheat your oven?

As the holiday season rolls around, many people increase the use of their home's oven. Most recipes will call for you to preheat the oven, but is this step really necessary? Preheating the oven uses a lot of energy to heat up a small amount of air which then escapes when you open the door to put your food in. When older recipes were developed, wood & coal ovens were slow to heat, therefore preheating made sense to our ancestors and early cookbook authors. With modern electrical or natural gas ovens, preheating may save some cook time but wastes a lot of energy in the process. When cooking remember these energy saving tips:

1. Don't preheat your oven.
2. While your food is cooking avoid opening the oven door to peek at your food.
3. Cover your pots when boiling water.
4. Consider turning off your oven a short time before the food is done. With the door closed, it will retain the heat.

Free & Green

One of the main complaints I hear about trying to be greener is the cost. Many items that are eco-friendly are more expensive than their conventional counterparts. So here are some green tips that will cost you nothing and may even save you money!

1. Reuse your towel - after showering, hang your towel up so it can be reused

2. Turn off lights, televisions, etc. when you leave a room.

3. Use natural daylight as much as possible, open blinds or curtains during the day to limit the number of lights you need to turn on.

4. Use your library for books, movies & magazines

5. Recycle!

6. Freecycle - check out this great movement at www.freecycle.org

7. Use cloths to clean up spills instead of paper towels

8. Stop using disposable items - paper plates & cups, paper napkins, etc.

9. Reduce your shower time - by keeping your shower time under five minutes, you can save as many as 1,000 gallons per month.

10. Go paperless with your bills and use the internet instead.