Just a few things that most of us can do to:

• reduce plastic use and purchasing of plastic
• use less energy
• use old technology
• eat more healthy food
• give back to local farmers
• give back to Mother Earth and use toilet paper and paper products that are NOT tree-sourced

Under the rubric of reducing plastic use and purchase

Make your own yogurt.

I am completely jazzed about my new Yogurt Maker: NO Electricity required, NO plastic components, plus simple and straightforward production of yogurt; more or less old style making. The first batch came out excellent and tasted like whipped cream without any sweetener. The second batch came out just as excellent. No more plastic yogurt containers for this human being! Fresh made and pure, rich in probiotics, and made with local, fresh milk from cows that have never had corn. (The local cows and cattle are fed alfalfa and hay during winter while still free-ranging or winter grazing the alfalfa fields.)

The yogurt maker is from Country Trading, Co. Here is the link for the yogurt maker.

The quality of milk used to make the yogurt is vital to the resultant yogurt. But, almost everywhere in the U.S., and I would think in the world, fresh farm-raised, free ranging cows are delivering up their milk while also suckling their calves. A happy cow, not bred only for her milk, but whose milk is shared between her calf and people, gives delicious milk. You can find it! Ask around. The fat content of this yogurt stayed on my lips and tongue for some time, to the point where my palate and body did not request food for hours.

My last intended purchase of yogurt from a store, thus in plastic, was the small container of organic plain yogurt bought for starter culture. Now, like sourdough bread, my homemade yogurt is the starter culture for all batches to come.

Not need to purchase yogurt again makes me so happy because:

• • all yogurt in stores in packaged in plastic containers, most of which are not recyclable.
  • local is the best – whether it is eggs, cow milk, goat milk, or produce. Local is a negligible carbon foot print, supports the local economy, and promotes stewardship of the local land.
  • And, you get to know your neighbors – even those 10 miles away. We all smile with the joy of discovering another person living simply, living in harmony with animals and land, and living with less because more is not needed.

Glass storage containers

Recycle your old plastic storage containers and use jars or Pyrex storage containers. Jars from jelly and jam, from coconut oil, from pickles or sauerkraut make excellent storage containers for soup, broths, milk or juice from a bigger source-container. Please look for your favorite juices in glass bottles, rather than plastic; and write a note/comment to the manufacturer that until their juice is sold in glass that you will not purchase it anymore. Let us all put Mother Earth ahead of our desires.  Additionally, though they have plastic lids, a set of Pyrex bowls or rectangular storage containers serve so well for dinner leftovers. Your local GoodWill or thrift store will have a waiting supply of Mason Jars and Pyrex containers.

*The plastic greens container in these photos is four years old and holds this year’s garden carrots. Otherwise pictured is homemade yogurt, garden kabocha squash and coconut milk soup, among other yummies.

Grow your greens all year long

Rather than a weekly purchase of greens in a plastic container, grow salad greens or microgreens. It’s not difficult.

A kitchen window that gets sun at least 4 hours a day or a dedicated LED lightbulb of at least 1200 lumens and 100 watts will take care of the “sunlight” required. A window box style planter, rocks on the bottom since the planter on a window sill cannot have holes for drainage of water, starter mix potting soil, and a package of mixed green seeds for salads are what is needed. Within one month, you should have baby greens. The initial purchases will outlive you; so give it a try!

Once early Spring comes around, lettuce can be seeded outside in a location that receives at least 4 hours of sun most days. Water adequately, but do not over water. Plant a second row or second location two weeks later, and a third row or location two weeks after that. As each row grows to the size or maturity you like to eat, cut the leaves from the outside of the plant, not the base. The lettuce plant will continue to produce fresh new leaves for months.

Compost non-meat kitchen waste

Human beings have been composting since taking up agriculture; so that’s at least ten thousand years. And, for the most part, composting has consisted of a pile that, more or less, is layered, kept somewhat moist, and turned maybe three times in 5 months. So, unless your neighborhood trash cans are ravaged nightly by skunks or bears, give this a try!

As a single person, due to composting, only one big bag of dry trash is produced monthly. And, that one bag has no smell, nor goopy stuff oozing, and usually no maggots in the summer. Why? Because all vegetable and fruit waste, all egg shells, left-over beans (single person, remember), end-of-bag tortillas or bread heels, and anything non-meat or fish goes to the compost pile. Tea bags or leaf tea, coffee grounds, the majority of my toilet paper (which is bamboo), all of it goes to the compost pile. Pee paper constitutes as a dry or “brown” layer in the compost pile since most of my garden is chop and drop.

Compost can be started in a plain, brown cardboard box as first pile. No expensive or fancy equipment, no need to build a bin, just give it a try. So, let’s layer this out, so that if you want, you could start this week! Use a brown cardboard box.

• • Put the box outside where it is convenient for you to twice a week empty out your non-meat kitchen waste – and in a location that you will have a compost pile when the box is decomposed.
  • The layers are: green/then brown/then dirt. Add some water and walk away. Green is fresh matter and if molding in your kitchen compost container, all the better. Brown is garden trimmings, raked leaves, toilet paper, cut up brown cardboard, pieces of newspaper – but not much of that due to inks, old flower stalks and the like. Dirt: not much is needed but it is needed. Dirt can be dried, old manure if you have access – which like the fresh milk- is probably easy to find. Do Not Use Horse Manure. Goat, sheep, llama, or cow manure from animals raised kindly and, preferably, without antibiotics is all good. Or get one large bag of coconut coir and use it slowly. Then add enough water so that any paper doesn’t blow away (making a mess). Dirt, whatever source, including just yard dirt, is not needed with every addition of kitchen waste. Nor is a brown layer. But, don’t let the wet/fresh matter get too thick without complementing with other two.
  • Amalio turns my pile when it’s about 2 ft thick. By then, the bottom is clearly composting well, self-heating, and almost done; the middle needs aeration, and the top is fresh and needs bacteria from within the pile.My compost bin is simple, has two sections: one that is active and one that is finished and for garden use. Amalio built it out of scrap materials five years ago. It will outlast my body’s ability to walk.

We do not have raccoons here; and that is a deterring factor for many who would love to compost.

Use of Old Technology

When my electric tea kettle kicks the bucket, a pot on the stove or a metal tea kettle from GoodWill will address my daily tea needs.

Additionally, for those whose legs still work: use them! Bike, walk, saunter to anywhere that you can rather than using the car. Take a bus, if that is available. Support local transit and local forms of transportation as much as possible. Use this body for its own well-being and that of the Planet.

Bamboo Toilet Paper and paper products

As mentioned in previous posts, bamboo toilet paper is an amazing, straightforward replacement for tree-sourced toilet paper. Over the five years, I have given Who Gives a Crap brand bamboo toilet paper to several people for them to try. Every one of them switched to it! To me, that indicates the quality of this product.

Bamboo is renewable – literally. As a member of the grass family, it regrows – like your lawn- after being cut; and bamboo can grow more than a foot a day. A few friends and I share cases of bamboo toilet paper, bamboo tissues, and recycled paper paper towels all from Who Gives a Crap. This company, in particular, puts 50% of its profits toward sanitary projects around the world, as well. I highly recommend this product, and receive nothing for that recommendation other than knowing that someone else has chosen that “not one tree will be cut down for my bum!”

Just a few ideas. Happy New Year, everyone!