1/27/11

Many of us will take on easy home repair projects, like re-grouting tile in the bathroom or using spray foam to insulate a crack in the wall. Often, we'll have leftover material that will dry out if stored, so it ends up in the trash. Offer the leftover home repair supplies to friends or neighbors, or post it on your local FreeCycle page to see if someone can use the rest of it.

1/26/11

Phone books to many people are obsolete and out of date. If you want to avoid the vicious cycle of receiving phone books, simply call the phone book company and ask them to be "opted out" in receiving them. Old phone books, by the way, can be recycled with regular office paper or in one of the many free Paper Retriever collection boxes seen at many public schools.

1/25/11

Keep a stock of plastic bottled water on hand for emergency situations at home, like a power outage, and mark the outside of the bottles with a permanent marker reading "emergency use only." This example will be a real life lesson to children that bottled water isn't for everyday use and they'll learn that drinking water is perfectly safe coming from the tap. Green habits started young can stick for a lifetime of use.