Just a few little things I have done or have noticed in the last month or so with an eco or waste reduction theme.
Milk and More are now doing plastic-free bread and bakery products from the Artisan Bakery. You can have bread and pastries delivered to your door plastic free! I've taken advantage of an offer for two Pain Au Chocolat for £1.35 for a few Saturday treats in February and March! Useful to know we can get plastic-free bread delivered with the milk in case we have not been able to get to the supermarket.
Speaking of Pain-au-chocolat and bakery items. I've had one of those weeks where I really needed to have something for breakfast but was running late or missed a train so I have had my pain au chocolat and an egg roll put into my little fabric sandwich bag so I don't have to have any packaging. These are really useful!
Been taking my own containers to the Chinese and Indian on my way to orchestra on a Tuesday night.
Bought CBC 's brother a bamboo cutlery and straw set so he can avoid plastic cutlery when out. He seemed really pleased.
Been removing things from the bin again... cans, bottles, card, paper. At school, at home, at Mother-in-Law's.... they WILL be recycled!
I'm very happy to send clothing items to a charity shop if I am not wearing them anymore but I sometimes worry that the right person might not find them and they will end up in the rag bag. Therefore, I was happy to pass on a dress to a colleague (who I knew would like it), a shirt to a friend in Yorkshire, a cardigan to a friend in London and my work colleague passed on some bits and pieces that she'd bought that didn't want. I managed to find homes for them with a couple of other friends who were delighted with the bits and pieces. It's nice to be able to find good homes for items.
We've been asked to make Silver stars covered in foil by the Music service for our concert at the Royal Albert Hall in 3 weeks and I was pleased to be able to use (well, thank you to lovely TA who has done this for me!) from some large cardboard boxes that were delivered to school rather than to use new card.
I'm saving some single use plastic items to send to Lorelai LQ who used to make acrylic jewellery. She realised last year that she couldn't keep making plastic jewellery when she was trying to rid single use plastics from her life so she has decided to make jewellery out of single use plastics that would otherwise be thrown away. (See the blog article about it here at https://lorelai-lq.co.uk/blogs/news/my-big-decision ) been experimenting over January and February and has been making some incredible pieces of jewellery and art work with them. They are really impressive.
She has a Patreon account where you can see what she has been doing or look at @lorelai_lq on instagram.
Have been continuing to print as many music sheets and worksheets at school onto old paper which I retrieve from other people's recycling bins. I reckon, since September, I've saved about 1500 sheets of paper at least! The children are now entirely used to it!
I've mentioned that I always send a message to the sellers on eBay asking them to reuse old packaging or only use paper if possible, saying that I am trying to avoid being the reason that new virgin packaging is being used and reducing my waste, especially plastic. Quite often, they say, "Yes," or don't respond but this message I received this week from a seller made me happy:
I hate plastic too!! If I had my way I wouldn’t use any but then if the clothing gets wet it isn’t so great. But never fear - I have used some bags that I keep in my ‘shopping bag’ of bags bag! :) so they’ve been used a LOT! I hope that’s ok (I know it’s not he best but it’s the best I have) and amazingly - I was going to message and ask that you try to re-use them :) we are on the same page.One day, we will have a waterproof paper that’s a bit stronger than greaseproof! :)A girl can dream...Have you had any success with waste reduction or waste avoidance at all? Do share!
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I just wrapped a couple of little items for my Etsy shop - and was delighted to realise that the jiffy bags were each on their 4th outing!
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ReplyDeleteA great idea to take a bag for your bakery products, and to print music sheets and work sheets on recycled paper. Every little helps! xxx
ReplyDeleteI don't need to print as much now we're allowed to read on-screen for work but when I do print something I always use it as scrap paper afterwards to write notes or to-do lists of what I still need to do for work or which jobs I need to send to the proofreader the next day after having another quick read through it. Always good to get as much use out of the paper as possible 🙂
ReplyDeleteYey love all your eco friendly-ness!
ReplyDeleteI bought a bar of soap for work, as our liquid soap in the kitchen had run out (someone else has since bought a new liquid soap, but at least the bar is an option now!). And at work, we used to wrap reserved books in a plastic poly pocket with the customer's name on so they could pick it up, we'd reuse the pocket but it was still plastic and they got worn out or taken by customers. So we decided to change it, so we just wrap the books in a piece of scrap paper now, much less plastic involved :)
Our council has declared a climate emergency, and is trying to go plastic free (they've even got a farmer to put a milk dispensing machine in the main council building, so employees can fill their own bottles up!!)
DeleteBuying bamboo cutlery and straw set for your brother in law was such a sweet gesture and it sounds like a great green idea.
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