My tiny golden violin!

Every so often, I see a new craft on Instagram or online and I know that it is the craft for me! Usually, it involves some recycling or reuse! If it's that, I am all over it!

For me, the craft I gave a go today was just that.

It involves a Tomato puree tube.

Take a completely used metal tomato puree tube and then cut off the ends - the top and the bottom and then carefully snip one side open and open it up so it is a rectangle.  Be careful! It's metal- it can be sharp!

Then clean off any residue tomato. 

You will have a wrinkly, golden rectangle.

Take a spoon and rub it in circles over the metal, right to the edges. You may have to go over parts.  This will flatten the wrinkles generally.

You should be left with a slightly flatter rectangle.

Now you need to choose your design that you will draw backwards on the reverse using a biro pen that doesn't work anymore (or an embossing tool if you have one)

The designs I have seen now are usually stars with trails behind them. In fact, I went to a friend's house in December and saw one hanging up. I knew it was going to be a tomato puree tube. When I turned it over, I was right.

I decided to do something with a musical twist, naturally.

I decided to go for a tiny violin!

I grabbed my little violin keyring purchased from the Beethoven Birth house museum in Bonn to use as a model to draw around and to copy.

I turned the tube over and drew the design hard. It can be a bit tricky especially if there are still any ridges.

You then draw any detail on that you want to. The hardest part for me was the F holes. I decided to add some extra decorations- the purfling (that's the patterned edge on the outline of the violin shape) and also added some hearts on the tail piece below the bridge.  The strings were a bit of a disaster! Should have used a ruler!

You then need to cut out your shape with scissors- bonus is that it sharpens your scissors! 

The downside is, I accidentally cut off the pegs at the top of the violin on one side. I've never been skilled with scissors since I was very young! I was gutted! 

Here is our Jellycat Christmas star modelling the finished violin. Look at the top, you'll notice the missing pegs!

At this point, you could then make a hole to hang it for a decoration for the Christmas tree etc. I haven't done that. You could attach your decoration to the front of a car for a detachable gift for someone.  Beware of sharp edges. I'm not sure if you could perhaps sand the edges. I haven't tried it because it bends and I am clumsy!

I then tried to think what I should attempt next.  I was going to attempt a flute but then decided to just draw a musical stave.

The question was, what musical quote to include?

Being incredibly geeky, I decided to start drawing a quote from my favourite symphony- the 1st symphony by German composer, Gustav Mahler. It's first played by the cellos but it picks up on the motif played for the first part of the symphony by the strings and woodwind bird calls.   However, when I got to the end, the 2 crotchets and minim looked bare so I just decided to alter the quote into something else to make it look better.  If I did this again, I would cut off the f for forte below the stave so it has a neater base. Considering I did this all freehand, backwards, I was quote pleased with it!

Listen from about 4:44 and then hear the glorious cellos come in soon after!

I still have a bit of the tube left so I may fashion some paisley hearts for either a wedding or a valentines card (although I have another idea for that this year as CBC has become rather fond of Tweedy and Fluff on Insta so I may draw/paint a design of them instead!

What do you think of this craft? I must confess that I am utterly enchanted by it!  I can imagine making lots of darling little decorations out of the tubes. Just be careful of the sharp edges!

xx

 

Earth day

What is Earth Day?

I have borrowed 2 sections from the official Earth Day website.

Senator Gaylord Nelson, the junior senator from Wisconsin, had long been concerned about the deteriorating environment in the United States.  Then in January 1969, he and many others witnessed the ravages of a massive oil spill in Santa Barbara, California.  Inspired by the student anti-war movement, Senator Nelson wanted to infuse the energy of student anti-war protests with an emerging public consciousness about air and water pollution. Senator Nelson announced the idea for a teach-in on college campuses to the national media, and persuaded Pete McCloskey, a conservation-minded Republican Congressman, to serve as his co-chair.  They recruited Denis Hayes, a young activist, to organize the campus teach-ins and they choose April 22, a weekday falling between Spring Break and Final Exams, to maximize the greatest student participation. 

Recognizing its potential to inspire all Americans, Hayes built a national staff of 85 to promote events across the land and the effort soon broadened to include a wide range of organizations, faith groups, and others.  They changed the name to Earth Day, which immediately sparked national media attention, and caught on across the country.  Earth Day inspired 20 million Americans — at the time, 10% of the total population of the United States — to take to the streets, parks and auditoriums to demonstrate against the impacts of 150 years of industrial development which had left a growing legacy of serious human health impacts. Thousands of colleges and universities organized protests against the deterioration of the environment and there were massive coast-to-coast rallies in cities, towns, and communities.

Today,  Earth Day is widely recognized as the largest secular observance in the world, marked by more than a billion people every year as a day of action to change human behavior and create global, national and local policy changes.

Now, the fight for a clean environment continues with increasing urgency, as the ravages of climate change become more and more apparent every day. 

As the awareness of our climate crisis grows, so does civil society mobilization, which is reaching a fever pitch across the globe today. Disillusioned by the low level of ambition following the adoption of the Paris Agreement in 2015 and frustrated with international environmental lethargy, citizens of the world are rising up to demand far greater action for our planet and its people.

For me, it's so important to think about how I can make changes in my life to do better for our Earth.  There are a lot of things I do or have done in my life which I could improve on or work on. And I think that is important to acknowledge.  Some things are hard to change, particularly for people with a lower income but there are so many tiny actions which can make a difference.  I sometimes see cynical comments on Instagram or have conversations where people say things like, "Yeah, but the problem is big business," or "They don't actually recycle stuff anyway!" or "Big deal, it's just one straw" or "I don't have time to be washing up all those things." or "Composting is messy."  but there's ALWAYS something we can do.

I thought I'd share a few pictures and anecdotes from my day to do with consciously thinking about Earth Day and things to do with it.

This one picture was from my morning. Wearing my pajamas which Mum passed onto me as they didn't work for her and my £2 Tescos Crocs which I bought about 16 years ago for camping.

I woke up and made myself a pot of tea from loose leaf tea bought from an Eco-refill shop. Loose leaf may feel a bit messy but with my Ikea teapot (or an individual strainer), it's not that difficult. I reuse the same mug a few times before it finally gets washed up.

To the right is a reused chocolate box from the staff room- I have now collected the staff room teabags weekly for a year and a half. Every week, I rip and compost (or just throw straight onto the soil in my beds) between 50-120 teabags on behalf of the staff room users.  Everyone is used to the container now and most people pop them in the box.  My other colleague also pops in her banana skins. I always put these round my fruit trees for added Potassium.  Yes, it's a grim job but the thought that:

52 x50 =2600 MINIMUM teabags have been saved from landfill and have benefitted my garden is a happy thought that makes it worth it. Even better would using fully compostable teabags that don't have any plastic in them but I am not in charge of the buying and there is a budget.

Down the bottom left is compost caddy. Composting is one of the single best eco-actions you can take! My compost bin was acquired from a random person in the neighbourhood who left it outside the front.  I don't put new bags inside it to line it, I use any sort of scrap paper bag or compostable material- chipshop paper, bakery bags, compostable-junk mail.

You will see a lot of strawberries at the top.  As we were walking out, my work colleague lobbed a full massive box of mouldy strawberries at the bin he'd just collected from the fridge.

"SSSSTOPPPP!" I hollered! He said that he'd not got around to eating them for breakfast.

I told him I would take them home and compost them (as I couldn't bear to see them thrown like that, container and all. I examined them all and cut off the manky bits on those that could be eaten still (minimal and added the rest to the compost.  I put aside the container for later...

Bottom right is an old aluminum food tray full of baked egg shells. I just keep this tray in the oven permanently and add egg shells to it when I've had an egg (aforementioned work colleague often also puts egg shells in my teabag box for this purpose too) and they get baked when the oven is used. I don't need to wash the tray ever.  The egg shells then get crushed and put into an old M&S plastic treat tub in the shed and saved all year for when I have new seedlings that need slug repellent!

One area that I am still very much needing to work on is my habit of buying new clothes. I have way more clothes than I will ever need. But, there are choices one can make that count:

1. My top was bought second hand.

2. My Indian blockprint skirt was bought from a small ethical company. It's made from natural materials

3.  My schools were bought secondhand from a community charity shop in Hebdon

4. My cardigan (below) may come from Primark (a place I virtually never shop at any more) but I've owned it over 10 years, like about 5 other Primark cardigans I own and I have no reason to get rid of.

5.My earrings are from Lorelai LQ who made them out of bubble wrap envelopes saved from Landfill- her entire business model is based on saving Single-use plastics from Landfill.  I also chose to support a small business rather than big business and send materials to Lorelai including her packaging to reuse.

I spent a lot of time in the garden planting out some veg.  Spending time in nature is so important and really grounds you.

I was bought this Growbar as a present last year or so. It's all compostable and contains bird friendly seeds in Coir which you add water to to expand.  I used the strawberry tray to place the coir in and I will plant these into my planter

I changed the bed clothes (and plumped up the feather mattress topper)- the message was for CBC to avoid him sitting down on it and squashing it and his shower.  He ignored it! grrr!!!). I use an Eco-friendly washing powder bought from the Refill place (which I only visit when I have a reason to be there). No packaging.  The bed clothes and towels were washed and hung outside. I've never used a tumble dryer.

Appreciated the Spring foliage. 3-cornered leek has self-seeded in this bed. I ate some as I worked. Must remember to harvest this to eat and make pesto!  Find out if any of your weeds are edible.I also muched on Dandelion leaves.

I picked the newly grown mint leaves to make a lovely, soothing hot drink.  Threw the old tea leaves onto the garden.

I read a book borrowed from a friend when drinking my tea and appreciated the beautiful Spring weather.

I sit here and type on a third-hand laptop. I am watching Doctor Who on it as I do it (not eco-friendly in itself but it uses less power to watch on here than on the TV).

The majority of these actions are easy for people and I hope that sharing them gives ideas to anyone that reads them.  They aren't rocket science but I like a reminder so I hope that someone, somewhere thinks something is helpful.

I had a Whatsapp conversation with my old childhood friend earlier who said, "Btw, I've been taking a leaf out of your book and trying to buy mainly preloved clothes. For me and the kids. So thank you for that."  Like staff obediently putting their teabags in a box, you can inspire someone to do an action.

Hope all is well with you.

x

Recycled Materials Crafts- Used Envelopes for Christmas decorations

Good Evening!

Greetings from sad and lonely Kezzie whose husband did not tell her he was going to the Staff Christmas party until late! I totally would have made social plans if I had known!

Anyway, I am going to do some marking but I thought I'd post before that.

Thank you for all the love on my recycled cardboard Advent calendar!

Today, I thought I'd share some other crafts that I tried the same weekend as my calendar.

I saw this idea on the web (not sure of the original source but I saw it on Pinterest in Google.

 

A concertina paper tree on a skewer seemed a cool idea to try.

I picked up a junk mail envelope from the table and decided to use it to experiment with rather than waste a piece of fresh paper.

https://www.pinterest.pt/susanafrgomes/christmas/

I liked the way it looked, rather than just a white tree so I rescued a few more envelopes from the recycling and tried making a few more.  CBC had bought a pack of skewers for a Duke of Edinburgh expedition so I grabbed some to put them on.  They slipped off a bit so I guess you'd have to glue them.

There were a few pieces left over so I decided to try making paper snowflake cut outs in the remains.

I wondered if using variations on patterns would look more interesting than white.

They're easy to make.

I'm sure you know how to make paper snowflakes but just in case, here's what I did.

1.  Cut out a square of paper. Any size will do but make sure the sides are equal.

2.  Fold it in half, from one diagonal to another so you end up with a triangle. You shouldn't fold so you end with a rectangle.

3.  Fold in half again and half again.  You should end up with a triangle each time.

3. Hold the middle point (where all the folds are) in your hand and cut a curve from one point to another.

4. Cut little triangles or curves from each edge but don't let any of the cut outs join with other ones or they will just make one big cut out.

5. Use a hole punch to make holes further into the shape.

6. Unfold and you will have a lovely snowflake!

I've sat here making a few more and I think I might try to decorate our upstairs windows!

Have you ever made paper snowflakes? Why not try reusing old paper to make them?

xx

Vegetable Bouquet

 Who needs to buy expensive flowers and vases when you can have a perfectly lovely display from chopping off your onion or Leek flowers and display them in a glass juice bottle!

This display has been going strong for 2 weeks. It was inside but CBC decided it was a bit smelly so it became an outdoor display for his party for his colleagues.

I love the perfect pom-pom shape of these beauties! They are the same family as Allium flowers of course so you can achieve a similar effect without the smell! I like that they are multi-functional though!

Last year, I displayed bouquets of Artichoke flowers so there are lots of different vegetable beauties!

Hope you are having a lovely day!

xx

MY HUGE FOIL BALL! (there's an eco tip in there somewhere....)

 

I'm probably speaking to the great educated on this subject but I thought I'd share, just in case you didn't know.

Aluminium foil is one of the most recyclable materials around- Aluminium in general is brilliant to recycle!  You can turn it 100% back into an equally good aluminium product.

However, do you know how to recycle your foil correctly?  I only learnt this about a year ago.

Aluminium foil is incredibly light and if you put small pieces of it into your recycling, chances are it won't be spotted and seperated for recycling- I am not sure if this is dependent on human-selection or some sort of magnet.

In order to allow your foil to be recycled properly, you need to try and scrunch all your small pieces together into one big ball and don't put it into your recyling until it is the size of a tennis ball as the minimum smallest size.  All, do make sure it is clean and free of grease, food or dirt. I always wash min my washing up water.

I rarely use foil but at last, I have a big enough ball to go into the recycling!!!  My milk bottle tops and juice bottle tops are foil. Luckily, Christmas has brought some minced pie foil tins and in addition, some foil-wrapped chocolates have contributed.  In addition, I am that nerdy that I carefully washed and squirrelled away all the Christmas cooking foil in Northumberland in my suitcase.  I know my mother-in-law (and husband) think I'm mad but I made my pledge that if I saw an opportunity that I could get something into the correct place for reusing or recycling, I would do it, even at inconvenience to me.  (She was not impressed when she saw me trying to save veg peelings to take down the hill to my friends' compost bin...)

It's so satisfying to be able to put this ball out although I've still got a few of the Christmas chocolates left so perhaps I can allow my foil beast to grow for a few weeks more...??

Be the change- eco actions for the person who wants to make small changes to help #1

 Hi there,

I have been meaning to write some small actions and things that I find have worked for me to try and make a change in terms of environmental awareness and doing something.  Many of the things I try to do may not make a huge impact but I strongly believe in EVERY little action mattering and absolutely refuse to bow down to the doubters who maintain that the little things don't make a difference and only largescale leader-led change is worth doing.  Yes, we do need leadership to show us that (and the stinking Tories are not any sort of leadership that I have much faith in) but we all should do things.  One person can do something and eventually it can inspire all of us.   I may be teaching Grandmother to suck eggs, so forgive me if you do any of these, but I still think someone, somewhere may gain something from sharing ideas.

Be the composter at work:

Food waste and putting food into the regular bin is one way that our Carbon emissions are raised.  At my work, I started collecting my used teabags in a small box and I used to bring them home to rip open and put them straight onto my raised bed.  I also always bought home all my food waste, no matter how inconvenient it was.  This year, I decided to try and offer other staff members the option to put their fruit and veg food waste in my box.    I saved one of those large party-size plastic tubs that sweets or chocolate come in and I've invited anyone in the staffroom who I see with banana skins or apple cores or anything they don't finish to put it in the box as well as any teabags.  I do also do some bin diving if I see any teabags or banana skins etc. I'm not too proud to do this, nor too prissy. I think DOING something is more important. All I need to do is wash my hands after doing that.  It sits in a cupboard above the work top in the staffroom.  Then, once a week, I bring it home to put the things into compost bin.  I clean the tub and bring it back on a Monday. It's easy and I've got into the habit of doing this. Today, I came home with a box of discarded strawberries from the bin to add to my compost. 

Even if you don't want to do food waste, a teabag collection box would be small and easy to manage.

What if you don't have a compost bin?  Well, you could still rip open the teabags and put them straight onto the earth in your garden. The worms will soon take it down and deal with it.

If you don't have a compost bin but DO have local food waste, you could put it in that. Obviously, I do have a garden.  Don't have a garden? Do you have a large plant or a balcony with plants? Empty the leaves into the plant pot.  Don't have a plant? Why not empty the tea leaves into a pot (discard the paper outer) Is there anywhere wild near you where you could empty a tub of tea leaves into the earth?  

I don't drive and I carry this with me so it is possible to do this without a car.

Doing repetitive small actions like this is really good for your mental health and sense of well-being. I get such a joy out of making this small difference. I don't want this to seem like virtue-signalling (like me, me, me, I'm so good... PLEASE, I don't want to hear, "You are so good!" in the comments which is what always happens when I share things like this and that's NOT why I do it.)- I just want to share an idea and make a suggestion for something that can make you feel really happy to be doing. I never feel helpless in the face of the climate  and plastic crisis because I know I am trying and doing a few things. I only hope I can inspire someone to make a change or say, "Yes, I am willing to do  THAT little something."  Because, perhaps  you might then inspire other people to try it. And that's when things become normalised and attitudes and actions can change on a large scale.

Have a lovely day.

xx

Eco-moves

Most people I know want to change their actions and things they do to help the environment.  For some people, their circumstances- be that domestic arrangements, location, financial situation, family size, jobs- make it much harder to make all the changes that might be possible for others. I constantly try to find new ways to reuse or reduce packaging but I am really aware that I am very fortunate in my situations that there are things that make this possible- I am able to use public transport easily for work, I have the financial resources to spend a little bit more on buying certain items from a Zerowaste shop (e.g. shower gel....by the way...that shop changed their price after my query!), I have my own garden, I am able to easily access plastic free veg (of some varieties) due to proximity of greengrocers to where I live and work, etc, etc.

However, there are little things we can all do to reduce waste or at least TRY to ensure things end up in a situation where they can be reused, even if we can't do everything we could possibly want to do.

The picture above is an example. The picture above shows three things.

CBC's coffee grounds NEVER go down the sink or in the bin on my watch- they go on the garden- be that the roses, the raised bed etc

Back in Lockdown, I came home from school with 20 banana skins each day which came from the free-fruit the children in KS1 get- if I am with a class eating fruit, I will always collect their peel to put onto my raised bed- apparently, chopped up banana skins are really good for fruiting plants, e.g. tomatoes...  these were all chopped up and go on the raised bed- they go black really quickly and rot down without the need for putting them in the compost heap.  I read a tip today that said that if you soak banana skins either for 24 hours of 72 hours in a closed jar topped up with water to the top, you can make a great fertiliser for your house plants (I have a jar started to see if it works) .  The children are always willing to put their peel in my little plastic bag and they like the fact I am avoiding it going in the regular bin. I think TELLING them these things and actually putting them into action in front of them, is really important in sowing the seeds of the importance of reuse.  They often ask about how composting works when I say I am taking things home for the compost.

The leek end was one I chopped off and put into water which then resprouted.  The little glass pot it is in comes from the plastic-free yoghurt pots from the Milkman which I occasionally buy CBC as a treat.

Today, my Mum came over with CBC's birthday present for next week (a bird bath bought from the RSPB but shhhhhhh!!!!) and we had tea in the garden. As is customary, she has a look round the garden and I manage to inveigle her into doing some sort of gardening work for me.  This time, it was shifting the compost bin a bit with me so I could scoop out some of the new compost for the raised bed.  It's so cool when you see it has completely turned into Earth/compost at the bottom. I put four large pots worth onto the raised bed...it was teeming with worms!  The Robins were then immediately on high alert!  It's SO satisfying to be able to put that onto the garden and know I MADE that (well God and the worms did it but I facilitated the process!).   It was good to have the level of the compost go down as well!  A few bits and pieces had to go straight back into the top as they hadn't rotted yet (e.g. corn cobs!) but it was great to get some back. I ate a satsuma and chopped up the peel into small bits and added into the pot with my Blueberry plants (which need acidic/ericaceous soil).

I came home last week from visiting my Dad for a walk with two bags of wood chips which my Dad had made from a lot of branches which they chipped up- I will be using them to mulch my garden. It was FREEZING in his garden!

My friend Lara came round for a lovely garden catch up on Wednesday (much nicer weather- we sat in sun!) and I passed on about 25 small cardboard boxes as well as brown paper and bubble wrap for her crochet business- mum and I both save them for her- again, finding someone local who posts things as a business is a good way of passing on resources to someone that can reuse them before putting them into the recycling.

Similarly, CBC's new bike came wrapped in some white foam wrap which I am commandeering for the Year 5 Antartica collages for next year.  I've already passed on a load of white tissue paper and bubble wrap for them to have ready for the collage as well as a load of After Eight wrappers- as inevitably, they have a last minute frantic scramble to find materials so I like to have things ready to offer them.  Again, it's much better to REUSE collage materials rather than using brand new materials.  Having a little imagination and knowing where people might be able to make use of things is a good idea.

For example, if you end up with any NEW, not used clean, plastic straws that you don't want to use, as you don't want them to go into landfill as single-use, contact Lorelai LQ to pass them on (as well as other single use plastics) as she uses them for her jewellery but DO READ her Plastic Amnesty list as apparently she has been sent lots of totally unsuitable items by people who haven't read what she uses in her work and has ended up with lots of junk and dirty, unsuitable materials.  I recently sent her about 100 unused white plastic straws from the milk at school when they didn't get used.

I have various friends, some of whom have very tight financial situations, who I often pass on clothes to before I send them to a charity shop as I KNOW they will have ended up with a home (they do get to refuse items!).  We always had clothes passed onto us as children and I am sure people still do this lots now.

My good friend Ang has been a real model for being organised in finding new homes for unwanted items as she begins her retirement and has moved to Norfolk- she's passed on SO many things and sold things at a very reasonable price, just so they can be reused.

Eco-actions really can be as simple as the slight inconvenience of carrying your own cutlery,cup or carriers around in your handbag/pocket/bag so you never get caught out without one. 

I don't drive and I manage this one really well- it really is just organisation.

And again, if you are going to take a tin of beans to work for your lunch rather than sandwiches, it surely makes sense to wash up and carry your own tin home to recycle rather than just chucking them in the bin (which I have colleagues who do EVERY DAY....I fish them out of the bin and wash them and then take them home in my pannier on the train....as well as the ones which people have washed up and put in the recycle bin). 

If you have tea bags at work, could you collect the used ones, like I do and then take them home and rip them open to put into the earth/garden, even if you don't have a compost bin?  It's all organic matter and it's really not an inconvenience to do once a week for me. 

Do you have any simple solutions to getting waste to the best place it could end up?

xx

 

I've got staaaaaars, they're multiplying....

Here's another DIY recycling project I've been involved in this week.

During Lockdown, we ordered a few takeaways from our local restaurant which is Madieran.  The food came in big aluminium tins with silver card lids.  I used a previous set of them to make all the tiny stars for my children's constellation project in June but recently, CBC ordered a meal from there and I saved the lids.

This time, I decided to make big stars out of them and then made subsequent smaller ones from the trimmings.

I used an old, not working, biro to draw lines from the centre out to the sides and it gave them a really lovely finish.  Now I just need to find my hole punch to string them up somewhere...

You can make something beautiful from rubbish if you take the time to think about what you can do with it.

Eco things- Trying to be eco-friendly during Covid stay at home

            A lot has had to go by the wayside in terms of making eco-friendly, waste-avoiding decisions and actions during lockdown.  This has been quite hard to deal with but of course, sometimes, you can't do your usual ways of living in a crisis. However, it's trying to do little things which are important.

I thought I'd have a look back on what I've been able to do or things that have not worked out so well.

1.  Avoiding of fresh food waste.  Being at home all the time is very good in terms of avoiding food waste. We are able to monitor things that are going off and use them better, except the odd radish that has gone amiss.

2. Using up older items in the cupboard.  Some of the discoveries include: Self-raising flour with a BB2014 date on it- it didn't have weevils so it made a nice Leek and cheese pie.   A jelly with BB2015 and various flours and nuts and seeds have been utilized.

3.  Still getting our milk and juice from the Milkman and the milk and juice bottles are returned and reused.

4. Vegetables and fruit at school:  When we first went into lockdown and we were at school on that first Monday, there was a trolley full of apples which were/are the ones delivered for KS1 children for free. But we only had 10 children and there was no way of getting the apples to our kids at home. Leaving them in a box outside the school might be viewed with suspicion. I encouraged all the teachers to take bags home after all possible ways of getting them to the children was discussed.  I ended up taking home 3 bags of 10 apples which lasted me a month at home.  I also went to the allotment bed and picked 2 massive bags of Kale which was going to seed- this lasted us until April.  I also brought home all the items of food and drink I had at school to use.

5.  Thanks to a local Facebook group that CBC follows, we discovered a wholesaler not so far from us where we could go and buy vegetables and eggs from.  A tray of 30 eggs - so saving having lids for 5 boxes of eggs worth, a cardboard tray of potatoes, loose tomatoes, avocados, beans, spinach, cabbage, broccoli, lemons, courgettes, peppers, sweet potatoes, beetroots, satsumas, apples, pretty much everything.  So no plastic for our vegetables which are the majority of our food.  So happy to be able to get plastic-free vegetables. Even better, when we've been there, there's been no one else there so no queues or panicky trying to get out of everyone's way.

Also, managed to get asparagus from a local grower on our cycle ride and rhubarb. No packaging except for rubber bands.

6.  Did you just read number 5?  Well, we've managed maximise use of the eggs. Every egg that has been eaten in Lockdown has been shoved in a baking tray in the oven and left. Then, when the oven is used, the egg shells are baked and then I have crushed them and shoved them in an old M&S cake box- I have them strewn them around seedlings and plants that slugs and snails might be interested in to use as natural slug repellent.  In addition, I attended on online webinar on using 10 frames with children to support place value understanding and they recommended using egg boxes- so I've cut up my 30 box into 3 ten frames ready for school!

7.  Before lockdown, I ordered a box of 10 packets of 150g crisps from Two Farmers who make compostable crisp packets- it came in cardboard which I am saving for projects and to share with a friend who posts craft products.  In addition, I ordered my usual bulk order of Eco-Leaf toilet roll in compostable packaging, made of recycled paper.

8.  Any card packaging which has food on it that can't be recycled has been torn up and put into the compost, like chip papers from the few times we've had chips. This is something I do anyway.

9.  Religiously putting the coffee grounds and tea leaves onto the garden after every pot full.

10.  For lovely decoration, have been picking a few common wildflowers to put in my jugs in the kitchen- cow parsley and stitchwort. Free and providing interest and variation and bringing nature into the house.

11.  Being at home has been I've been using the herbs in the garden constantly- chives, rosemary, mint, lemon balm, sage, thyme, sorrell, marjoram.

12. We had such a spell of sunny weather in April that the waterbutt was empty so I took to having a shower with a bucket to catch the water which I then used to water the garden. Usually, I'd have no time to do this when going to school.  When it finally rained, I made sure to fill up the watering cans with water from the waterbutt so they could fill up more, I also took the bucket outside and did the same and the indoor watering can plus all the jugs and empty milk bottles- the water was then used to water all the indoor plants.

13.  I've spoken before about how I use cotton handkerchiefs.  When at home, I've been continuing to use these as my germs are in my own home. At school, I made sure to use disposables as to conform to rules.

14.  Bought Tony's Lonely chocolate in Sainsbury's. This comes in paper and foil and is very fair trade and slavery-free plus palm-oil free.

15. Most craft projects have been made out of packaging and things I've had already.

16.  Anything bought online has been second-hand.

17.  Tried to walk or cycle only except when going to the wholesaler to get the vegetables..

18.  CBC shared some bread flour with a work colleague when flour was scarce and we'd ordered a 13kg bag of flour from a local bakery.  We reused a large clean paper bag I'd carefully preserved from another order to put several kilos of flour in for him.

17.  We've reused some plastic yogurt containers for making hummus, planting seeds

18. My tomato seedlings were all planted in toilet rolls and all of them are in two plastic drawers bought home from school to save from being chucked. 

Things that haven't gone so well include buying various bags of crisps, sweets and biscuits, super noodles that have come in non-recyclable plastic wrappers (which I am saving to take to Terracycle at the library when it reopens), choux-buns and cheese and fish (a few times) in plastic packaging, having some things sent through the post, having bought a few things (though I have asked for recycled packaging to be be used if possible) but I've tried my best.  

In addition, making donations to charities that help others is an eco-friendly thing to do in this time, if you have the money to do so which I am lucky enough to be able to do.  Signing petitions to help others, including those who are the worst off is important- if we don't care for humans, how can we say that we care for the Earth?

It's important to remember that being eco-friendly is about being conscious and making the best choices that are available to YOU! Not everyone has a wholesaler with packaging-free vegetables or a milkman, or a garden or a bike or space to store a stack of crisp packets or even a council who are still picking up your recycling. I do the best I can and that's the important thing.  Circumstances are individual.  How much or how little you can do depends on doing what you can physically do in the circumstances you have available to you. It's making the conscious decision to do SOMETHING that is important.

Hope you are all well and sending you love.

xx

A totally eco birthday present!

My mum is so clever!

She knows I like a good eco-friendly present and a useful one!

The timing is also perfect! I had just finished my Lush Imperialis face cream and I bought a jar of handmade Carrot and Avocado cream in Northumberland so I will be needing a new face cream soon.
She made me a jar of natural facecream with Shea Butter, Cocnut oil, rose hip oil, Argan oil, vanilla, Sandal wood, geranium, Frankincense, Sea buckthorn and rose oils.  It smells beautiful.

But, as well, as being handmade and eco-friendly, the jar is actually a Georganics toothpaste jar I cleaned out and gave to her to reuse.  Furthermore, she made a little bag to put it in out of a Who Gives a Crap toilet wrapper, along with some gold gift ribbon she was given and some paper washi tape!
What an excellent present!

x

Eco things

Hi there,

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!
erere

Eco-December

I haven't written many Eco-posts recently.  I think perhaps because I felt I hadn't done anything particularly noteworthy or new but that's no reason not to get on and post so here's a few ways I have tried to be a bit more eco-friendly in December or seen this that have been more eco-friendly

At our School Christmas party last year, I was distressed by vast quantities of Caprisun cartons and juice cartons that went into bin bags.  This year, I was super pleased to see that G, the person who was responsible for the parties was making up fruit squash into 90 plastic disposable tumblers which she was then rewashing after each party and reusing for the next one. Although it would be better to have 90 non-disposable ones (like borrowing them from the Canteen?), it is still an improvement on last year.  I helped her when I saw her washing them up and then after the party which I was at, I made sure we washed them and dried them ready for her so she would be willing to do this again. I made sure to tell a teacher for the next party that they needed to wash the cups up. I then made sure the tumblers went into the cupboard to be used again.

At the same party, the children were given a packet of crisps each. My local library collects Crisp packets to send to Terracycle to recycle into something else so I made sure the children at my party flattened their crisp packets for me and put them into a bag.  I made sure to ask the teachers at the remaining 3 parties to do the same. I'd already missed 3 parties the previous day but that is still 270 crisp packets that didn't go into Landfill and hopefully made some money for the library.


I have not purchased any wrapping paper.  Not least because I have A MILLION gift bags from children at school.  I've chosen to wrap my presents in old tissue paper, old wrapping saved from last year (in fact, my Eco-club colleague from school laughed when I handed her her Christmas present because I had used the exact parcel she wrapped my birthday present in and just crossed out our names on the label and wrote them in the other way round and then changed Birthday to Christmas Everything else is wrapped in 'Who gives a crap?' toilet paper external papers which didn't even come from my own toilet rolls!!!! I asked the loo ladies at my Music camp to save them for me when my did their jobs in the loo and came home with about 50 sheets of patterned paper!  I then used sticky delivery labels from school which the eco-friendly caretaker at school gave me after saying, "Agrgh, what is the point of them sending this massive stack of sticky labels with addresses." I said, "I can use those for parcels." and have been for the last few months!  Yes, my presents may look a bit scruffy and unconventional but frankly, I am not bothered and anyone who is, doesn't deserve a present from me with such a snobby attitude! ;-)

Our headteacher announced that there would be an afternoon tea provided on the last afternoon and so, in that meeting, I reminded people to bring along a container with them to take things home so that nothing would be wasted and lo and behold, people remembered and nothing was wasted! This made me happy!  I think everyone who had a container was also happy!

We ran out of glasses so my head asked for some plastic cups so I went and got the aforementioned ones from the party and brought them in. I also made sure to wash them up so they could be used again. Oh, and the crisp packets were all saved too...

My work colleague came into the staff room and grabbed a box of open Shreddies from on top of the cupboard (presumably left by someone a long time ago!) which had a Best Before date of June 2019 because he wanted the box for whatever craft they were doing in class.  He was just about to chuck the nearly full bag of Shreddies in the bin and I hastily stopped him and said I'd take them home for the Compost/food waste bin. I did, but actually, I've tried them and they taste good so free Shreddies for me for the holidays!

There were three 12 unopened packs of chocolate fairy cakes left on the table which were going out of date and were going to be chucked out so I grabbed them and took them to church for the carol service yesterday as an option for the mincepie haters!

I already mentioned my 'Secret Santa' gift at school was to buy 20 bamboo, plastic-free toothbrushes to be given out in hampers to school families- nice to include an eco-message.

I must say that one area CBC and I are struggling with is Toothpaste. We've been using glass jars or toothpaste and tooth tabs for the past few months but really aren't so keen on them. I caved and bought a tube of Colgate. I do miss proper toothpaste!

Went to the Refill room and filled our 3 Shower gel bottles- we haven't had to buy shower gel bottles for a year now as The Refill Room celebrated its 1st anniversary last week!
It's a small thing which is outside my control really but this year, whenever I have bought anything second-hand on eBay, I have always sent the seller a message asking them if they can reuse packaging rather than giving me something new and by and large, they have done that, a few saying what a good idea it was to actually ask!

I wanted to share an eco-message for Christmas presents and birthday.  I bought my niece a bamboo hot drink cup for her birthday and have bought handbag rolls which contain a fork, spoon, knife, chopsticks, straw and straw cleaner  made out of bamboo for a few people. Also bought shampoo bars for people from Lush for Christmas.  For my Mum (STOP READING NOW MUM!)

I have sourced several items in the charity shop and filled them with food items that are plastic free. Herbs and spices and dried goods given in washed out jars.  Same for my Dad! His chocolate cashews come in an old honey jar!

I'm quite pleased that with CBC's family, we all decided to give no Christmas presents this year but to just share food and joy together. It is quite a relief not to stress about presents and it is better to save resources.

This afternoon (written on 23rd December), I wanted to make some soup so I used the bag of carrots rescued from school which are about 2 months past their best before date. Of course, when peeled, these are perfectly good carrots, I also added in a lump of courgette that CBC would definitely have thrown away had he seen it plus using the small lump of Chorizo from CBC's party Paella and the plastic-free sundried tomatoes from Italy plus Tumeric, Paprika, lentils and herbs (plus a tin of butterbeans) from my beloved Refill room- proving it is stupid to live by Sell by dates and also that you can make things with a little of everything. We now have hearty-soup to eat on the 27th, 28th and some freezer portions.

Have you done anything particularly noteworthy with an eco-message recently?x
xx

Ecothings- Looking at the A Swap a Day May challenge- 5-6 Reusable cup/bottle and Clingfilm

Here's my next installment of A Swap A Day- trying to swap waste and packaging heavy items for more eco-friendly, less wasteful alternatives. As always, these are here to inspire you, give you ideas and just allow me to waffle. If you budget means things are prohibitive, things are harder to swap and you may not be able to  It was lovely to receive your responses on the previous post of this regarding Swaps 1&2.

The next Eco-swap is a great one though one that has not been without pitfalls:

View this post on Instagram

I'm already behind but I will be joining this #swapaday insta thing. Although we did a swap a month to really get habits changed we have now done nearly all of these so can share! Now to catch up... #sustainableliving #sustainablelivingonabudget #zerowastejourney #goingzerowaste #plasticfree #plasticfreejourney

A post shared by Sustainable living (@sustainablelivingonabudget) on May 2, 2019 at 11:29am PDT

6.  Reusable cups/Bottled water:
The reusable cup and water bottle change is one of the easiest swaps that one can do.  I have reused a water bottle for many, many years now but I made a conscious decision not to buy bottled water at all a few years ago (which is why I found it maddening in Italy where a bottle was brought to your table and opened and put onto the table in a restaurant or where they told you they COULDN'T/DON'T/WOULDN'T serve tap water even when you were ordering a 3 course meal for 8 and were ordering other drinks anyway). 
I've had my glass water bottle for at least 4-5 years (bought in TK Maxx) and various other water bottles before that. My pretty metal bottle has been with me at least 3 years, if not more (Also TK Maxx) and I brought back WOMOTM's reusable water bottles from his flat when we cleared out his flat so we had spares to use for a long trip or to offer other people.  Buying bottled water in a country with clean, fresh water on tap is, to me, capitalist consumerism gone bad.  Why pay for something you have anyway at such a mark up? 
Every morning, I fill up my stainless steel bottle and put it in my bag and drink it on the train.  I posted about the refill station at Shenfield station so even if you are waiting at this main train station, you can refill your bottle- you just need to get into the habit of carrying it.  It is completely habit now, I am used to carrying it so there is no issue.

Reusable cups:   I've been using reusable cups for at least 4-5 years now and used Thermoses (Thermi???) for the car journeys to Northumberland before that.  Consciously, I made a decision back in around December 2017 that I would NOT get a throw-away cup for drink EVEN if I was desperate and I would have to make sure I ALWAYS carried a cup with me.  This has worked out pretty well- even with a train journey to Italy this Summer.  An insulated cup lives in my handbag now. I carry a fairly large bag (well, rucksack) but you can get fold-up ones so it is possible to have one in a smaller bag. I really like those Infographics that show you 365 paper cups compared to one Reusable cup to show a year's usage if you need to drink on the go.  Or wait until you get to house/building with a real ceramic mug?
I've had slightly cunning conversations with builders in the queue at Greggs about reusable cups- I've noticed those in the building trade carrying several paper cups with plastic lids and I always make sure I have a conversation about being glad I remembered my reusable mug. It may not plant a seed but I hope it might....at some point!

7.  Clingfilm:
I'll be honest with you. I LOATHE clingfilm and always have- I have NEVER grasped how to pull a piece of the stuff and CBC banned me from using it as I kept wrecking them (I'll be honest, I only ever used it if someone asked me to use it for something, not voluntarily.)
Instead, I will use a box with a lid, some of my lovely beeswax wraps made by the lovely Ang and my Bassoon friend Mary, a bowl with a lid, a plate but never cling-film.  It's horrid, awkward stuff!

There are countless other ways to store things such as elasticated lids, even foil I'd prefer but I'd prefer not to use single-use materials.
I've got several glass Pyrex dishes with lids- these seem a good idea and now, I even bought a cute fabric sandwich bag with velcro to store in my rucksack at a recent Eco-fair. I've kept snacks in here too!

What have you managed to do on these swap front?  If you haven't, would you consider swapping?

Kxx

Ecothings- Looking at the A Swap a Day May challenge- Shampoo, Conditioner and Deodorant

Here's my next installment of A Swap A Day- trying to swap waste and packaging heavy items for more eco-friendly, less wasteful alternatives. As always, these are here to inspire you, give you ideas and just allow me to waffle. If you budget means things are prohibitive, things are harder to swap and you may not be able to  It was lovely to receive your responses on the previous post of this regarding Swaps 1&2.

The next Eco-swap is a great one though one that has not been without pitfalls:

View this post on Instagram

I'm already behind but I will be joining this #swapaday insta thing. Although we did a swap a month to really get habits changed we have now done nearly all of these so can share! Now to catch up... #sustainableliving #sustainablelivingonabudget #zerowastejourney #goingzerowaste #plasticfree #plasticfreejourney

A post shared by Sustainable living (@sustainablelivingonabudget) on May 2, 2019 at 11:29am PDT

3.  Shampoo/Conditioner:

Status:  Swapped.
Shampoo comes in plastic bottles- these CAN be recycled but if a waste-free, non-plastic solution was available, I wanted to try it!

For many years, I tried to use Natural Shampoos as I have not been happy about the use of SLS and parabens but my hair has not always got on with it.  I don't wash my hair daily- I probably wash it every 5-7 days. Some people might look aghast at that but generally, your hair gets used to it- I am awful at getting up early and even if I WANTED to wash it on school week days, I generally can't seem to get up in time to do it! This means, it generally takes me a long while to get through a bottle of shampoo which, I suppose is a method of waste reduction in itself.

My first attempt at swapping to a Plastic free solution was to refill my shampoo and conditioner bottles from The Refill Room, my local Zerowaste place. They had a fragrance free natural shampoo which you fill up from a big stainless steel vat and you can add your own essential oils to.

Right from the start, both CBC and I didn't get on with this shampoo.  It didn't seem to make our hair feel clean, it felt tangly and CBC, who is sometimes very disgustingly apt with his descriptive skills, described it as 'Horse sperm' (not sure how/if he genuinely knows what this ACTUALLY looks like!).  Alongside using this, I still had SOME of the Tre Semme shampoo I'd nabbed from WOMOTM's flat when we cleared it (a large bottle lasted us a year!) so this was BACK up between washes.

However, especially since CBC is not so good at using things up if he doesn't like them, I stated that we WOULD use up this shampoo and conditioner before we bought anything else but it was rather a chore as both of us didn't like it!

Here's a picture from where I first tried the shampoo bars

My next attempt, after recommendation by Vix was to try Lush's Shampoo bars which come completely naked.  Making solid products is a MUCH more Eco-friendly solution in terms of space needed for the product as liqud takes more room up and more travel costs as well as the plastic used to house the product so swapping to a solid product is a GREAT easy swap to attempt.

I went into the store and asked for advice on which Shampoo bar to use. As my hair has greasy and dry bits, I went with the Montelbano bar which costs £8.00 online for 55g.
(There are cheaper Shampoo bars from other places that are cheaper- I've seen them for around £3-5).
I also bought the American Cream Conditioner bar and bought tins for them to go in which cost £2.95 each.   CBC was skeptical at first but as soon as I showed him how to use the shampoo, he was impressed.  He's subsequently said, most approvingly, that he prefers it to all the shampoos we used in the past- he likes the smell, the way it lathers, how it leaves his fair feeling and looking and when he went away to Scarborough for 5 days, he took the tin happily away with him with our shampoo.  I've been happy with using these products and whilst I still prefer how my hair feels after using my old Tre Semme shampoo, it looks good and shiny with this new shampoo bar and is liveable with. It feels clean, brushes and smells good so that is fine even if it feels a bit different.  For the sake of waste reduction, I can live with this- I'm not UNHAPPY with how my hair feels, it's just slightly less 'squeaky'!.  I think I just need to go swimming every so often to strip my hair of its oils and I'll be fine!
Also, they smell AMAZING, lather up well and seem to last FOR AGES!!

The conditioner is also fine.

4.  Deodorant:
Status: swapped

Deodorant bottles are NOTORIOUS for not being recyclable in MOST areas- many councils refuse them so the wretches live in landfill by and large so they were a BIG item I was keen to swap!

Other the years, I have tried more natural solutions to deodorant as I have not been a fan of using harsh antiperspirants with Aluminium in them as I am not sure of the long term effects of rubbing Aluminium into your pits and whether there is any link between breast cancer and the use of them!   I've been using Plastic-free deodorants for almost a year now and largely, I am very happy with them.  They ARE more expensive, but actually, I have been buying more expensive, natural deodorants for a long time so I am already committed to this.

Click HERE for the reviews.

I wrote a Blog  post on my experience of a few brands- Kutis, Your Nature and Earth Conscious HERE if you want to find out more. I've had issues with ALL deodorants not working for me in the past so I am not worried about using an antiperspirant.  I really like Earth Conscious and will continue to use this though Lush does some solid deodorants which I might try next as they have NO packaging at all, not even cardboard!

What about you?  How do you feel about these swaps? Would you give them a try?

xx