How We're Becoming More Financially Fit and Environmentally Aware

It happened almost by accident a few years ago, right after my Megan was born. I used to say that I cared about the earth. I recycled pop cans (10¢ per can is very motivating) , made my deposit in the Paper Gator at church, didn't litter. I KNEW I wasn't frugal. I also KNEW that my wonderful husband and I needed to change our spending habits if we were ever going to be able to survive on one income.

We started making some small changes, but I didn't really know what to do that would have the most impact on our budget.  Then I read 2 books about frugality: Miserly Moms, which is pretty good; and The Complete Tightwad Gazette, which is a little old (pretty much ignore anything she says about computers, the rest is like gold), but VERY good. That's when I started to realize how I wasteful I really was. I realized that anything that you use only once - dryer sheets, napkins, paper plates and cups, plastic silverware, paper towels, diapers, wipes, etc. - and throw away is like throwing away money. It is also SO bad for the environment. These things are taking up space in landfills and they take so many natural resources to produce:

• The average family washes about 8 loads of laundry per week. Dryer sheets cost $3 per box of 80, average. Yeah, that's only $14 per year, but chances are, you'll be doing laundry for the better part of at least 50 years. That's $700 that you're throwing away in your adult lifetime!
• The average family uses about 40 paper napkins per week. Napkins cost $3 per pack of 120, average. Yeah, that's only $50 per year, but chances are, you'll be eating for the better part of at least 50 years. That's $2,500 that you're throwing away in your adult lifetime!
• The average baby uses about 6,000 disposable diapers from birth to age 3. Disposables cost 32¢ per diaper, average. That's $1,920 in diapers for 1 kid! You can get into cloth diapers and wipes for $300, for the basics, to $800, for all the cutsies and extras. I spent $500 to get my baby into cloth and my toddler into trainers.

It is cheaper and healthier to make almost any convenience food that you can find:

• Love those baby-cut carrots and other pre-cut veggies and fruits? They cost 1.5 to 2 times as much (or more!) than if you buy them and cut them yourself!
• Lunchable can be as cheap as $2. You can make your own for less than half the cost. You can also control the quality and nutrition when you make your own.
• Baby food is another convenience food trap. You think that you NEED it to feed your baby. Doesn't it make you a little nervous that baby food has a 2 year shelf life?
• What about all the extra packaging that you are paying for and using when you buy those 100 calorie packs? Pre-made baby bottles? Individual pudding, applesauce and jello? Water bottles? Where does that go?
• Dinner-in-a-box meals are typically very high in sodium and preservatives.  Plus they usually need some tweaking so they don't taste like cardboard anyways.
• Like boxed dessert mixes?  You only have to put an average of 2 more ingredients in when you're baking from scratch than when you bake from the box.  Baking from scratch tastes so much better!

The thing we all need to realize is what and where 'away' is. When we throw stuff 'away' it doesn't just disappear. It goes to the landfills, and .those landfills are getting full. I watched the Bonnie Hunt Show this week with 2 guys who made a raft from 15,000 plastic water bottles and sailed from California to Hawaii to raise awareness about the harm plastic is causing in our environment. Check out this website and see what you can do to reduce or eliminate the amount of plastics YOU use.

"The earth is our ship, an ark for everything that lives. It is the only vessel available to carry humans through the ocean of space, and it is rapidly becoming unseaworthy." ~ Serve God, Save the Planet, J. Matthew Sleeth, MD