Eco Chic, Vol. I

I followed the advice in Real Simple today for repurposing glass bottles and came up with a super sweet centerpiece. I have other pictures of the actual various bottles...beer and pasta, mostly, with a small Starbucks liquor bottle thrown in for kicks.

We close on our house on Earth Day, which I'm not taking as coincidence at all (and no we didn't plan it like that). Since we're doing renovations to the house, we're trying to be health-minded and do the extra research in order to find the paint/countertops/flooring that is sustainable/recycled/low VOC and whatnot. Sometimes we're creative about it, sometimes we totally steal the ideas from other cooler people who went green way before we were born (Like Ed Bagley, Jr.) but I do know this - we've been given the responsibility of redoing this house and we've got my mom's chemical sensitivities to take into consideration and just flat don't want to live in a house that does more harm to the planet than good. Also, when we decide to have kids this blog will get REAL interesting, and though they might get laughed at at school for having hummus and sprouts in their lunch pack, they'll know that the hubs and I are doing everything we can even now to keep them healthy by surrounding them with as natural stuff as we can.Plus, I'm sure we'll make mistakes along the way (I mean, so far I have the black thumb of death when it comes to gardening) but the point is for this to be a community effort and we can all learn from each other.

Our ever-growing list of things we want to do at said awesome abode are:

1. Recycle - you should've seen the look on the lady's face at City Hall when I told her I was really, REALLY excited that we wouldn't have to drive 15 minutes to recycle any more. This morning as I opened a new squeezy tube of toothpaste I also considered that we so easily think to recycle things in the kitchen but don't really think about all the boxes and plastic we toss in our bathroom receptacle. The solution is either dig through the trash, get TWO trash cans, or design something suitable. You know which one I'll pick. Yes yes, Nerd on both of those.

2. Compost - I used to compost with my dad when I was younger and I was at once totally grossed out by the coffee-puke smell and also fascinated by the process, especially when worms get involved. I've done some reading about this and seriously that's going to be the first thing I do when we move in - figure out where to compost in our yard so our dog doesn't roll in it (which is going to be tough, he loves disgusting stuff).

3. Play Chicken - We are seriously considering buying baby chicks and having our own chickens, and we're looking into our city's building code. Not a rooster, we don't want MORE chickens, and only 3. Why? Well, apparently chicken poo is good for the soil so we can, er, harvest that. Plus, fresh tasty eggs. Remember, I'm not vegan.

4. ORGANIC GARDENING! - I know I said I have the black thumb of death but grrrl, I can grow tomatoes like you wouldn't even believe. Or at least, I did last summer. My in-laws have this wonderful back yard where during the spring and summer when we visit they've been known to grab tomatoes, squash, herbs, and chives from the raised beds and throw them on the grill with the pork loin. Seriously, this stuff makes my toes tingle! I love nothing more than grabbing fresh fresh fresh herbs and throwing them into whatever we're cooking. We've got a bigger front yard than back yard, so figuring this part out will take some time, but I'm stoked. I think we have enough room/sunlight for a raised bed immediately behind our house, so we'll look into that first. The hubs wants to plant an avocado tree, tomato plants, onions, jalepenos and cilantro so we can have fresh guacamole and salsa in the Spring and Summer. See? He loves being married to a Latina :) Also, the lady who owned the house before us did the Tru Green stuff, but after talking about it, we decided we don't want to put a crapload of chemicals on our lawn. The hubs has ordered two organic gardening books from Amazon so far, I'll let you know what they are when they come in and if they're actually worth their salt.

So, there's a start. If anyone out there wants to post ideas, experiences, etc. I would LOVE to have good, green conversations, especially from people who have personal experiences with this because I've really just started this and haven't done a lot of research yet.

Ciao!