Easy Changes To Save The Planet | Earth Day

Happy almost Earth Day to you all!! I remember as a child not fully understanding the point of Earth Day, but now as an adult I feel like it is the one day a year where people from all over the world stop and think about how amazing our lives are. How is it even possible that we exist, for me this is the day that we honor the ultimate mother; Mother Earth.  Today I'm going to share a few easy changes you can make to your day to day life that will lessen your carbon foot print, and give Mother Earth a bit of a break.

1. Look into the recycling industry in your area, and see if it actually is sustainable. 

I live on a small island in the middle of the pacific ocean, our recyclables would be loaded onto a ship and travel over 2500 miles to the Los Angeles area, where it would then be trucked to an even further away recycle station.

Thats my friends is not earth friendly and our government realized that, so when a man came to them and said rather than burning oil for electricity (which is shocking that anyone still does that let alone a US state), you can actually burn all that garbage and recyclables, and it would a very small carbon foot print in comparison to the oil burning and shipping of trash. So they did it, and now we have a much smaller carbon foot. 

I realize this won't be the case in every area, but look into yours and make sure recycling is the best choice. 

2. Stop drinking bottled water!

My husband and I were massive bottled water drinkers when the 2010 water studies came out showing Hawaii had the worst drinking water in the country. After feeling guilty about that we did some research and found that switching our refrigerator filter to a Pharmaceutical grade filter and then running it through the Brita pitcher, we will then be getting the exact same water that we get from the grocery store. The pharmaceutical grade filter was only about $10 more than the normal one, and now we don't have to worry about any of the medications flushed down the toilets (which you should never do, keep it out of the water system!).

3. Buy Local.

I love going to my local farmers market, there is always a band playing, kids laughing, food being sold, and it just feels fun! So look into finding one near you, if you don't have one start one!

While we are on the topic of food, try and buy non-gmo as the gmo seeds can destroy local farms. Also look at eating less meat or no meat at all. If you do feel like you would like to consume meat but you want a sustainable choice go with Free Range Organic Chicken. Our oceans are massively over fished, the beef industry is one of the worst offenders on our planet, but chickens are a safer bet.

4. Turn Your Lawn Into A Garden.

This is my favorite one right here, and its actually happening in almost every city in the US. What is the point of having a nice green lawn? Does it feed your family? No! It actually is depleting the water resources of this planet, in fact a California study found that it's actually better to have pool in your backyard than a lawn. So switch your lawn for a garden, grow all of your favorite fruits and vegetables, and teach your children all about where their food comes from along the way. 

Those are just a small amount of things you can change to help your pocketbook and the planet. 

If you have any other ideas please share them in the comments so we can all start to implement them.

You can also watch the video for this post here, and the daily vlog here.