Monday, April 11, 2011

Pennywise, green, or both?

Regular readers might know I'm on a medical leave of absence. Some might deduce that this means there's less income coming into the home.

Readers, new or regular, know or can guess that I'm a green, eco-conscious type of person. While I deal with fatigue, the unpredictability of my career, and more, I need focus. My focus for the time being will be small changes on the pennywise-frugal and green fronts.

Here's a weekly round-up.

Litter boxes cleaned:
  • Used plastic shopping bags for the garbage (I use my own bags - how did we get this huge crate of plastic?) - frugal and green
  • As always, used biodegradable litter - green, similar cost to other products
  • Found the "lost" litter boxes under a pile of snow - we must have left them out to rinse in the rain when the last snowstorm surprised us. Is this green, frugal, both, or neither?

Home thermostat:
  • Changed heating program by dropping the temps two degrees all day. I'm the only one home most days; I can dress in layers if I feel cold. Both frugal and green.
  • If I open windows, I turn the heat off. This is frugal, but it can backfire; I must remember to turn it back on at night when the temperature drops toward freezing.
Laundry:
  • The heavy items all hang on dryer racks until they're merely damp: jeans, sweats, heavy sweaters use much less energy to dry, but the clothes still come out soft. Frugal, somewhat green.
  • Anti-static dryer balls! I rarely buy fabric softener. The only time I need it is in the sweater load. Frugal - very frugal.
  • Washing everything on warm or cold, never hot, saves shrinkage as well as saving money.
Garden:
  • I put together the Ultimate Greenhouse set of shelving.
  • Now it's time to take inventory of seeds and plan the layout for both plots.
  • Then I can start a few seeds so they're ready for planting when the frost danger is gone.
  • Green? Of course. Frugal? When we're harvesting bunny food and making our own salsa, the grocery bills will go down.

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1 Comments:

Blogger Judy Jeute said...

You know it's sort of funny, I have always been a very frugal person, LONG before the green thing came about, so sometimes it is very hard to tell the difference. They both come naturally and that is what is important...you are doing your very best! They go hand in hand it seems...if you are saving money...somewhere you are saving some form of energy output.

4/11/2011 7:19 AM  

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