It's Not Easy Being Green...

Or is it? Our family is about to find out. We've been talking about becoming "greener" for quite awhile now and have made some basic easy changes. We only use recycled paper towels, I try to buy green cleaning products, we use energy efficient bulbs in some of our lights (sorry, but candle bulbs cannot be replaced), and we recycle everything we can. but we'd really like to do more.

We decided we need to take baby steps (drastic changes scare me & I think they just set you up for failure sometimes). And so we begin our "Green Challenge".


I saw on another mom's blog, that they choose one eco-friendly challenge to do each week, in the hopes of becoming greener. Well, I'm not sure we could handle 1 a week right now, so we're going to do one every 2 weeks. If you'd like to join us in this journey to green, feel free to use the "Green Challenge" button on your blog, and then blog about how you do with the challenges. Also, if you have a suggestion for a green challenge, please e-mail it to me (e-mail address in side bar).

Challenge #1 Stand-by Power

Stand-by power is the power that electric devices use while they are not turned on, things like lamps, radios, chargers, toasters, etc... 1 device may not use up a lot of power if left plugged in, but if you have 20 things plugged in when not in use, the electricity starts add up (and so does your electric bill).

Our challenge is to assess every room in our house (including the garage and basement) for stand-by power suckers. Then, we'll decide what things can actually be unplugged and which ones need to stay plugged in (I am so not unplugging our dvr!). I'll let everyone know how we do. Let me know if you take the challenge too!

*If you join the challenge & blog about it, please link back to my challenge post. Thanks!