Green Your Routine

I was watching the Today show the other morning and they were talking about their "Green Your Routine" campaign. I always try to do my best to be as Green as possible in my routine. There were couple of tips they referred to that I actually had not thought of. They are simple changes we can make in our life that can make a huge impact on our environment.

The first deals with ATM receipts. There are billions of transactions each year. They said that 600 thousand tons of paper is used each year to produce the various receipts we receive for things including those we get from ATMs. That equals millions of trees, enough water to supply 100 homes, and 234 million gallons of oil. That said, please choose not to take your ATM receipt. If you need to check your balance do it online. Several ATMs will even let you check your balance there without generating a receipt. Think about what other receipts you can eliminate because they are unnecessary.

The second point they made was napkins. Most people will grab a lot more napkins than they realistically need or can use. Millions of clean napkins end up in our landfills each year. Taking just one less napkin will keep 150 million from going to a landfill each year. Do not just stop at taking one less napkin though. Start with taking just one or two and get more only if you need them.

These tips really struck home for me. They are small, simple and logical changes we can make to our every day life that can make a huge difference on our environment.

Image above provided by www.greenclipart.com.

Looking for a unique gift?

I have a friend of mine that is difficult to buy gifts for. One year I just could not figure out what to buy him for his birthday. He is very into the environment and doing his part to make this world a better place. I admire him for it because he certainly does more than I do on any given day. So, I started searching online for a unique gift. I came across the perfect idea. The Arbor Day Foundation has a great gift program. You can order trees in celebration of any number of events. Each dollar donated plants a tree in one of America's national forests. They will send out a certificate to the recipient of your gift. My friend loved the gift and I did too. I try to do my best to help make our world a better place to live and this gift made me feel good about that.

Too much junk mail?

All the time we hear about going "Green". There are so many things we can do now to help protect our environment. I am not a super environmentalist but I really try to do my part as best I can.

A long time ago a friend of mine told me about http://www.greendimes.com/. I signed up for this service and it was awesome! When I signed up there was a simple monthly fee. They have since changed the service and have several options available including a FREE option. The Basic (free) option allows you to do a lot of the work yourself with some help from them. The Premium option is for those that want to save time. They do most of the work for you. The best bonuses I found with the Premium service is that you can add other household members and they plant 5 trees on your behalf.

I had to sign up again once I changed my address but I love this site. I used to get literally a ton of junk mail every day. Once I signed up for this there were days when I would not get any mail at all. I recommend definitely recommend it to everyone.