Itty Bitty Impact

Today is about reflecting on 2009 and being thankful about all that has happened in the year. It was an eventful year for us here at Itty Bitty…for starters, the blog was born!!

I can’t tell you how excited I am to grow this blog. My hope is that it will be a place for readers to see that we’re not alone in the struggle to reduce our impact, while still maintaining a normal life, holding down a job, and providing for a family. I know better than anyone that it’s nearly impossible to exclaim “I’m never driving my car anywhere ever again!” and POOF, you’re suddenly the green-queen-supreme in your neighborhood. We need bite-sized, practical ways to cut back on our consumption and waste…and that is exactly what Itty Bitty will focus on: the small things that add up and make a difference.

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Do you know what the ingredients are in your household cleaning supplies? Probably not, because manufacturers are not required to list their ingredients on their bottles. Some {like Febreze and Dawn} only list certain ingredients on the bottle, and conceal others. And if you did know what was in them, you wouldn’t be happy, and you certainly wouldn’t be wiping your counters down with them. It’s time to do an itty-bit! Mike and I set out to rid our home of toxic cleaning supplies. We did our research and we’ve found a brand that we can use with peace of mind!

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About a year ago, we resolved to never throw away a plastic bag until it had been used so many times it had holes in it. We started washing out the baggies and sticking them right back into the “bag drawer” to be reused. The result has been amazing– I can’t even remember the last time I’ve had to put “Ziploc” on my shopping list. I feel really, really good about the fact that we’ve pretty much eliminated the unnecessary waste of baggies from our lives, just by changing one itty-bitty behavior.

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My long two-pointed ladder’s sticking through a tree
Toward heaven still,
And there’s a barrel that I didn’t fill
Beside it, and there may be two or three
Apples I didn’t pick upon some bough.
But I am done with apple-picking now.
Essence of winter sleep is on the night,
The scent of apples: I am drowsing off.”
-An excerpt from Robert Frost’s poem “After Apple Picking”

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Mike and I planted a little garden in our backyard last spring, and our tiny patch of dirt exploded with peppers, peas, lettuce, herbs, rhubarb, and more.

But the arrival of cold weather meant we had to watch our beautiful crops whither away. We had eaten almost everything, except for the herbs. Large patches of basil and parsley still remained, and we wondered how we could preserve these plants for cooking with all winter long. My mom came up with this great way to preserve herbs.

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Today, in preparation for another long winter, Tonia and I brought a large stack of seasoned firewood inside the house, so that any remaining water will dry out before we use it. I also needed to clean the chimney to rid it of any creosote that built up last winter. Creosote is what causes chimney-fires to ignite…and we’re really not interested in having that happen! After much deliberation, I figured out an easy way to clean the chimney without making an enormous mess.

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It is common to use plastic bags full of leaves to insulate flower beds for winter, but I didn’t like that idea {not only because it is not biodegradable, but also because plastic can suffocate the plants.} Burlap is inexpensive and easy to work with, so I chose to use it as a barrier between my plants and the leaves.

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