Our Frugal Journey

I happened upon an interesting site the other day…..so cool, in fact, that I decided to share.
Called rubbishfreeyear.co.nz, it chronicles the life of an environmentally conscious New Zealand couple who attempted to cut their personal trash production in 2008 to nothing. Click here to see their photo holding their entire trash output for the year — in a single plastic grocery store bag! Click here to read Waveney and Matthew’s final blog post of the challenge and find out exactly what was inside that lone trash bag.
While I can’t imagine one year’s worth of our family’s trash production ever fitting in a single bag, this site has given me inspiration to work harder to reduce the trash we produce as a suburban family of three plus two college boys who drop in on occasion.
I was further intrigued by Waveney and Matthew’s quest to reduce their trash because I’ve found that often times being green means saving some green.
Here are a few tips for saving green, being green and reducing the trash you are sending to the dump:
*make an announcement to friends and family about your desire to reduce your trash production. So much trash, such as packaging, come from gifts. A Christmas post written by Waveney mentioned that her in-laws sent their gifts using popped popcorn as the packing material. What an ingenious idea.
*shop at thrift stores and garage sales and on craigslist, paying cheaper prices and avoiding all the packaging.
*change your outlook regarding gifts. Instead of rushing out to buy the latest gadgety piece of plastic, consider giving a homemade gift, a consumable gift or an “experience” gift. Waveney mentioned receiving a hand-knit pair of socks from her Mum as a birthday present sent in the mail in brown wrapping tied with string. I love giving consumable gifts as I mentioned in this post about making strawberry jam and giving it to friends and neighbors at Christmas. But my absolute favorite trash-free gift — other than cash, of course — is the “experience” gift. We have been on the giving and receiving end of these gifts many times. One that comes to mind was a “trip to the zoo” coupon my daughter gave to her best pal, Sarah, who has a birthday in sultry August. She redeemed her coupon in October, when the weather had cooled, and we treated her to a day at the North Carolina Zoo. We had a great time seeing the animals, taking photos and making memories, not trash.
*fully participate in your city or town’s recycling program. I have become much better at this in the past year but still have a long way to go. I had mistakenly thought any plastic with a recycling triangle on the bottom could be recycled in my town. After more carefully reading the guidelines posted on the town website, I realized I could only recycle items with the numbers 1 and 2 inside the recycling symbol. I have now vowed to stop purchasing plastic items that can’t be recycled.
*find ways to reuse items that can’t be recycled. I use my bread and newspaper bags as pooper-scooper bags. I wash and reuse large zippered bags unless they have contained meat. I give my cardboard egg cartons to a friend who raises hens and sells their eggs. I give my Styrofoam cartons to a food pantry.
*donate to charity or pass on to friends any items you no longer want or use but still have life in them. I am a frequent donor to a local thrift shop that uses its profits to help feed and clothe struggling families in our county. I also frequently give my daughter’s clothes to a cousin. We, in turn, are on the receiving end of clothes for my daughter from generous friends.
*consider posting items on your local freecycle.org site. I have found freecycling a great way to dispose of items that seem destined for the dump because they are broken or so outdated a thrift shop will not accept them. For example, last year we listed on freecycle our broken gas-powered lawn edger. Within five minutes, I had three men practically begging me to take the edger off my hands. They had the knowledge to repair it and I was thrilled to divert it from the dump.
*use rags rather than paper towels. I’ve only recently adopted this idea but love it. If still alive, my grandfather, who lost his ice and coal business in the Great Depression, would wonder what took me so long on this one. When was it, in American culture, that we stopped reaching for rags and became paper towel users?
*use cloth napkins instead of paper ones. This is on my list of things to do. When I run out of my stockpile of paper napkins — purchased with coupons, of course — we will be making the switch to cloth. I’ll promise to blog about that when we do.
*for those with babies, consider using cloth diapers instead of disposable. I used cloth with one my three kids. After paying the diaper service, I’m not sure I saved much money, but I did feel better about our trash output. And our trashcan sure smelled better.
Through their year of rubbish-free living, Waveney and Matthew discovered and blogged about many other ways to reduce their contributions to the landfill. I’m planning on setting aside a couple of hours to read through the entire blog to see if what worked for “two kiwis” (their words) might work for us.
What other ways have you found to live green and save some green in the process. I’d also love to hear about your motives. Were you seeking to save money and realized the environmental benefits later? Or was it the other way around?