Eco Friendly House And Garden

Using aprons and covers for furniture isn't just something nans and great aunties do – it's eco thinking!

We all know that the key to eco friendly living is making good things last longer – rather than throwing away cheap items and buying new ones instead.

And what better way to protect something valuable or just something that you don't want to have to replace that often, than using a protective cover when necessary.

I don't mean covering your carpet in plastic sheeting all year and not letting anyone sit on your furniture – I am just thinking of the simple ways to make your household items last that little bit longer - by reducing waste, and saving you some money in the long run too.

Protect Your Belongings.

Needless to say that when you go out in the mud and rain – you don't put on your Sunday best!  When painting your home I'm sure there won't be a silk blouse or sparkly evening dress anywhere in sight.

It's because you don't want to ruin something unnecessarily when you could have worn something less valuable – or something already dirty instead.  

So why, when you cook your favourite Mexican or Italian dish, don't you protect your everyday clothes?  No doubt you are entertaining friends or have just got in from work – so why aren't your 'nice' clothes worth protecting to?

photo credit: Leszek.Leszczynski

A simple apron – whether practical or indeed comical – could stop fat, dressings and sauces splashing onto your everyday clothes.  You might even make it into 'your thing' – like 'Sarah always has some comedy apron on' – no doubt leading up to whole host of crazy birthday presents from your friends and guests! 

You might be thinking – "but I can just wash the food off" and you are completely right – but at what cost?

Wash, Scrub & Tumble:

Most outer clothes can be washed less frequently than other garments – for example how many times do your socks get washed in relation to your overcoat?

But washing comes at an environmental cost, as do the washing chemicals for heavy staining, the hot water and the subsequent spinning and drying.  So why would you want to create more work for your household appliances and add to your growing budget?

An apron can be used day after day without excessive washing – basically you expect to have a dirty apron – that's what they are for!

And you clothes stay cleaner for longer, can be worn more than just the once in most instances and you will use less energy and resources per cooking experience.

And it's not just aprons that protect your clothes of course; so raincoats, Wellington boots, coveralls, and well worn clothing that you kept hold of over the years can all be used when things are going to get dirty fast!

Protect Your Home:

And it's not just your clothes that need protecting – your furniture and fittings could do with a little help too.

Rather than replace the whole entrance carpet due to the patch of muddy wetness near the door – why not buy a nice rug that covers that area and create a shoe storage area that will keep the mess contained.  That way you only need clean, wash or replace that rug instead of the whole downstairs!

Similarly, make a cover for the footstool that can be cleaned seperately, use a table cloth, tea and plate coasters as well as investing in a pair of slippers or house shoes for everyone to keep the whole place in perfect condition.

Other kitchen tips might include things to reduce the amount of cleaning you need to do and so reduce the chemicals needed.  For example invest in proper microwave containers to prevent explosive splashes up the interior and buy smaller oven trays as and when so that you don't have to clean a whole tray to cook 3 sausages or a few leeks!

And when you choose replacement fittings, appliances and paints, etc – look for the one you like that might last a bit longer depending on your families needs.  For example, darker wall colors in homes where hallways are narrow, so that things that bang against the walls don't leave obvious marks, and coarser darker carpets and rugs in home with back gardens that lead straight indoors – especially where dogs and cats are involved, as I know they don't wipe their feet!

Even internal doorways can become worn down through repeated use, so maybe consider rugs there too, and moving the furniture around always keeps the carpets fresh in a room where a 'pathway' seems to form – like around your bed or along the hallway between dining room and kitchen or wherever.

By protecting the small part of the whole item that will bear the brunt of your actions – you can make the whole item last longer, and you will soon see the eco (and financial) gains from your actions.

Not only will a working smoke alarm save your your life – it will save natural materials!

Imagine the total and utter devastation of a burned-out home.  Imagine all your possessions – gone!

Now think about the tiny little battery that could help prevent that – and all you need to do is press the little ‘TEST’ button every week or so to prevent this waste.

Now let’s not even think about the really personal possessions that will be lost – let’s just think about the rest as well: the sofa, the curtains, kitchen units, beds, wardrobes, carpets, tables, electrical goods, pictures, toys, and everything else you adorn your home – and your life – with.

All gone.

photo credit: Timitrius

Now, think about all those materials that have been needlessly wasted – and which now need to be replaced,  Possibly even your entire house itself is destroyed completely – and maybe even parts of a neighbouring home too.

Yes, if you are insured, the financial costs of replacing it all will be low – but that isn’t what eco friendly living is all about, is it? 

Why Bother Then?
And, I’m not trying to say here that these material things are more important than human lives – but it is yet another reason to check (or buy) a decent smoke alarm for your home!

And yes, I am well aware that a smoke alarm might not be able to save everything in your home – but it gives you the chance to save most of it.

It is really time that we started to value our possessions as more longer term investments., rather than just acting like they are ‘fashion accesories’ that can be replaced whenever we want.

Value Isn’t Always In Money!
We need to start valuing our homes and their contents as though they are as valuable as the natural resources we are plundering to make them.  Your curtains could be made from materials that were grown in a hillside farm in Asia, your table from a forest in South America and your electrical goods from a mine in Africa.

You wouldn’t be so quick to replace them if you could see where they came from, the things that were done to retrieve them and all the natural materials used to get them to you in the first place.

Furniture and the like should be valued at their entire cost – from source to your home – not just their financial cost from the store.

I bet a table made by your grandfather and given to you for nothing would be far more valuable to you than a table you paid £1000 for from a store!  Even though someone elses family has made it for you instead!

We need to start thinking about everything as more valuable these days – and you can start by checking your smoke alarm!

You may well be on your way to having an eco friendly house and garden – but what about having an eco friendly pony too?

In this article, I have just put together 10 easy tips for making your stable more eco friendly, and to make sure that you now only save money and time, but also preserve existing materials and reduce your waste.

Share tips with other people at your yard and get tips from them – as some things are best done by everyone anyway – like worming together. 

If only one of you ‘worms’ your pony – then you have wasted your money, as everyone else’s ponies will still be leaving worm eggs all over the fields for your pony to digest again!  What a waste of time (yours for dosing), food (as the worms eat it) and veterinary money (as your pony will still have worms and need working again!)  And think of the poor ponies too!

Anyway, on to these 10 great horsey tips for you to experiment with and improve on:

1) Clean your horse rugs regularly to extend their lifespan – and when they are past their best, use all the available parts for spares – like the buckles, straps and edging.  You never know when it might come in handy.

2) Cod Liver Oil and other liquid products are cheaper when brought in bulk, so make sure you get your friends chip in for the biggest container between you all – and then decant into your own reused containers (keeping a note of the expiry date).

3) Rather than keep buying or carrying about shovels and forks, why not invest in 2 small ‘sheets’ of board from around the yard and use them to pick up droppings or piles of waste. Less metal used for new tools and less trips to the store!

4)  And to reduce the amount of bedding thrown away when mucking out – use an old wire basket to sieve it first.  Once the solid waste is in the basket, give it a good shake and let the clean bedding fall back to the ground.

5)  Natural sheepskin numnahs can have their life extended by shaking a small amount of talcum powder on them after each use as this will help t absorb some of the sweat and dirt from the pony’s back and keep them usable for much longer.

6)  Use some old baler twine plaited together and strung across the tack room or elsewhere to hang up wet rugs after use.

7)  A great use of an old car tyre (which seem to build up all over the place) is as a secure holder for your horses food bucket.  Some ponies love to kick their food bowl around – wasting food in the process!

8.) Wash your tack using hot water and eco friendly washing up liquid, and soap well afterwards.  Not only will this keep your leather nice a supple for the pony, but will also extend it’s lifespan.

9) Buy really brightly coloured brushes, hoof-picks and lead ropes, etc, to reduce the likelihood that you will lose them in bedding or grass.  If you lose your equipment, you are as good as throwing it away – then you will have to consume more!

10) And the best till last - save up all your well rotted manure for paying gardeners and allotment holders!  Not only are you helping to keep their plots organic and local – but you will stop them buying artificial manures or unsustainable fertilisers and peats for their plants! 

Hope these are of use to you and maybe even inspire you to try some of your own ideas at the yard!

I’m not a fashion follower and I don’t buy the latest models of everything the minute it changes, but I am planning on buying myself a new laptop.

My current laptop is getting rather tired, and I know that buying new technology can be a waste of resources but I am in a dilemma. I have been using the same piece of equipment for several years now, it is very slow and sometimes doesn’t start up at all! It’s also getting a bit tricky to keep on top of things as often as I’d like.

I don’t want to buy a PC as I don’t really have room for the whole unit and I want flexibility to use it wherever I am – also a PC uses more energy than a laptop AND laptops are designed to run cooler so no need for the great big energy-sapping fans found in desktops.

To send and receive emails, write new articles and research projects and everything else – I need access to the Internet and my current laptop is a bit behind the times. It doesn’t have WiFi, so to become ‘connected’ outside of my home, I would need to buy a 3G stick to replace the cable to my broadband server.

If I use someone elses laptop or PC (and security is not an issue – which it usually is) I already need to use a flash drive (USB stick) to transfer the data back onto mine. My laptop is now so old that it won’t run at all unless it is plugged into the mains, so I am really in the laptop ‘dark ages’.

And working online is always going to require certain technologies and securities, so it’s not like I just want a laptop to mess about on occasionally or to show off to my friends – it is part of my life.

So, What Are My Options?
A) Change the way my life is going and try to live a technology-reduced life. This would result in a complete turn-around for my laptop needs (so I wouldn’t rely on the Internet for day to day things) and the old one will be fine.  Although I might aim for this in the future, I’m not really in a position to do so now.

B) Stick with what I have and just put up with everything taking longer and hope that it doesn’t break down and lose all my important data. This means I will need to buy other smaller additions to make up for it’s age and to keep up with the times! However, if I buy upgrades and other USB attachments and it ‘stops working in the next 6 months or so – then I will have to buy another old one (see C), or a new one anyway – and have to sell all the now unnecessary attachments!

C) Buy a reconditioned laptop and hope that it has been completely cleared so no sensitive data or damaging viruses are on it. Also without really knowing how much better than mine it is and for how long it will last is this even a very good option?

D) Buy a brand new netpad – a tiny laptop that only runs programs that I use. It comes with guarantee from the manufacturer that they will recycle it when I no longer need it, removing all the toxic materials before disposal and they will reuse any parts they can. Obviously that won’t be anytime soon, but at least the manufacturers now-a-days have to be more responsible!

So, Where Am I?
I’ve been checking out the options for new laptops, and here are some of the things I will be looking out for:

Efficient Running:
I need the technology to determine when my laptop needs to use less energy. Ideally as a result of this, it will adjust the flow into the machine saving my battery and extending it’s running time and reducing my drain on my electricity supply.

Many machines lose energy as heat when being used and this new technology (already in some laptops) claims to make them more than 96% power efficient.

Reduced Chemicals:
There are many hazardous chemicals currently used in laptop technology. Many companies claims to have removed up to 37 hazardous chemicals – including both lead and mercury – from their products. The current WEEE directives only ask for 6 to be removed.

This step would also make sure that discarded computers would pollute less. And of course that their factories are free of these chemicals too – perfect for retaining the health and safety of their employees!

Eco Friendly:
Ideally the company and their suppliers are sticking to green methods as well. I need to know that the long list of components and added ‘ingredients’ used for new technologies and equipment is not harming others along the way to their finished products. Also that foreign companies are not exploiting the environment or the communities that they rely on for raw materials.

Recycling:
I would like to be reassured that manufacturers are designing their products with their dismantling in mind, so that the components can be reused, recycled or discarded individually (rather than the whole lot just being thrown away).

I have also heard of several companies including Asus who have already collected over 5500 unwanted pc’s from their customers and have been reusing the parts where possible and reclaiming the precious metals and technology from machines that cannot be repaired.

They also claim to have donated over 1000 usable computers to local schools in disadvantaged communities as part of their ‘recycling’ package.

The Results:
I know that shoppers need to talk with their money, so I intend to do just that. If I make sure that I buy from a company that is heading in the best direction – this is not just true for laptops and other technologies, but for kitchen appliances, food, clothes and cars to name a few – then I know I am part of the change.

The more people like us that support the efforts of those companies that are trying to make a difference – the more of an impact they can make. If other companies start to see their designs out-sold by such ‘eco-friendly’ companies – they may well start to be more responsible too and clean their own acts up.

If we keep buying products because of the brand rather than the good they do, we can never expect any changes to take place.

So do your bit next time you buy!