How Mommas Can Help Save the Whales
By Kerry on August 4, 2018
Quote of the Week
“Once you need less, you will have more.”
SAVE THE WHALES
If I have to watch one more whale dying from plastic consumption I’m going to walk away from the internet and never return. It’s been BRUTAL!
On the flip side, we’re starting to see some real change emerge. There’s a company that produced a buoy system that collects plastic from the sea and plans to reduce HALF of the the trash in the Pacific ocean in the next five years. Thank fc. Yay for there being a company able to produce something that will save so many animals and yay for real hopeful news being shared at a time when the world is being set on fire or flooded.
YAY!
WHAT CAN WE DO?
WHATEVER WE CAN
Every little helps.
There are 85 MILLION MOMMAS just in the United States. That’s 47% of the US population between the ages of 18 - 65. By making a few shifts in our everyday behavior, collectively we can make a real impact.
REDUCE, REUSE, RECYCLE
REDUCE
This means to look around and make conscious decisions to use less and waste less - use less plastic, throw less food away… which, for the second part, is damn near impossible with kids. Yesterday they would only each chicken nuggets, today they want nothing to do with them. While I found an awesome recycling program for food pouches (See under recycle), I decided to reduce my carbon footprint, by making their favorites myself - which is mostly a whole lotta apple sauce using reusable pouches.
REUSE
For me this is things I use everyday that was disposable that I replaced, like my Starbucks coffee cup to a reusable one or bringing reusable bags with me to the grocery store, also saves me five cents per bag these days as my grocery store now charges for these things, the European way. Blessing/Curse.
RECYCLE
I recently learned that my county does not recycle plastic bags - not just the flimsy crappy grocery bags, but ANY plastic bags, like the ones pretty much all food comes in these days. While it hurts me to my core to have to throw these away, it’s better to follow county protocol then not because if we recycle incorrectly then nothing gets recycled correctly Needless to say, I don’t buy snacks for my kids any more that are little individually snack bags. I buy a big box then put them in little containers - it’s also more cost effective.
The other super handy kid friendly thing is pouches. Friendly for the kids, not so friendly for the environment. This company is doing a program with GoGo Squeeze where they give you a shipping label and you send 7+ pounds of empty pouches. It’s about 300 empty pouches. I collect a few friend’s as well to help me reach the minimum. So far I’ve recycled over 900 pouches.
PAY IT FORWARD
There is an awesome Facebook group I’m part of called Buy Nothing [Name of Town]. This place is great for handing down clothes, toys, diapers, and unused/barely used products. Things I post here are items that don’t have resell value or I think someone else would have better use for. I’ve given second life to kids mattresses, sheets, diapers they grew out of, very loved toys, and well worn clothes.
I’ve also been super fortunate to know a few friends who have older children and so I’ve had to buy very little in terms of clothes and because my daughter grows like a weed I’ve been able to continue the hand me down love and pay them forward to friends who have younger kids. Also, we received some toy favorites as well, like that box my kids are playing with in the hero image.
Hand it down!
SELL IT
There are easy ways and hard ways. Easy ways will make you a few bucks. Hard ways will have a bigger pay off, but costs time.
Thread Up
This is a gamble. It depends on the brands, what they need, and what sells. They do all the work. Order a FREE clean out bag, fill it, send it. They sort it, photograph it, post it, and give you money for it. I’ve had payouts from $8 to $30. I made a COLOSSAL mistake and sent all my jackets in at the beginning of summer so they only took two, and only one sold. I also tried baby clothes and this didn’t really do me any favors either. It’s got to be good brands and the right season and this could be a nice little income.
Poshmark
Here you do all the work, photograph, post, negotiate, sell, package, ship. I’ve sold a few things this way and it’s a much bigger pay out, but it’s a lot more work. Especially the negotiation piece - lots of back and forth.
FIND YOUR HAPPY MEDIUM
Remember, this is about find what works for you and your family. Every little helps. Could be just doing one of these things. Break it down into parts. Pick one. Maybe just go to your county’s website and look at what can be recycled and stick to that list. Print it out and put it on the fridge for your whole family to see.