This Week's Waste Diary

Yes, it's a pretty boring image....let's face it, it's a pretty boring list, and hasn't told me much that I didn't know.

And the week has been quite stressful, considering all the things that will need to change to reduce the plastic!  But the lovely thing is other people's interest in the journey and their ideas/thoughts/research/help in finding solutions. 

The other stressful thing has been research.  As soon as you google anything, you get conflicting reports and research on just about everything.  And the reality is that I generally like to keep things simple, and life is too short for me to analyse the carbon footprint of every different variable in the packagings journey.  So I guess my main principles are that as little involvement with plastic that can't be used a lot of times is best for our future, our children, the air, the oceans..,..  And if I can find a way to reduce it from our lives, I'll attempt to give it a go.  (I've heard 'Reduce, Reuse, Recycle so much in my lifetime, I'd pretty much forgotten the importance of the order of the words.  It's so often the logo on recycling things that it is the last word that my brain seems to have fixed on, but actually that's really the last resort....we should be looking to reduce, and reuse way before we give in to recycling.)

So back to the list.  Below I've typed it out, and in brackets I've put my initial thoughts on things I might explore/attempt in the year ahead.  My desire is to go full gusto and get it all done tomorrow, but that's not reality....so let's see what energy levels I can keep up on the journey and have changed by the end.

(The list is just what went into our black sack, and helpfully my 5 year old decided to start her own list of things going into our green bin (recycling) and nursery's junk modelling bag...so I'll also include those at the end.)

THE LIST!

• The black sack itself x 1 (not bother with a black sack, just put out a dustbin each week, and take the time to wash the bin each week)
• Tissues x too many to mention (go back to the old fashioned world of hankerchiefs, and try to make them out of some old bed linen I have stored for a rainy day)
• Chocolate biscuit wrappers x 5 (stop buying them, and make cakes, biscuits and flapjack for snacks at work)
• Cereal inner packets x 2 (try and find a local weigh and save? bulk buy, to at least minimise?)
• Napkins x 3 (don't give them to guests....use our fabric ones we got when we got married)
• Crisp packets x 4, plus outer large bag (stop buying them, attempt to make our own?)
• Kitchen paper sheets x 3 (just use cloths that we can wash...get a stash of them)
• Margarine cover x 1, plus there will be the tubs in future (?????)
• Pie packaging x 4 (don't buy them...make them)
• Cucumber wrap x 1 (find somewhere that sells them without, that are organic)
• Horlicks pot x 1 (had been in the cupboard unused for 6 months and gone rock solid anyway, so just don't bother buying again)
• Small bag from sweets x1 (given in a party bag, so can't change what people give us, but do need to think about homemade sweets/treats for the kids and their friends)
• CD wrapper x1 (ever possible to buy without them?  Just use downloads in future?)
• IKEA Shelf system packaging x lots (make own shelves in future?)
• Pasta packet (source pasta in bulk to minimise?)
• Screw packets x 2 (see if possible to buy them without packaging, although certainly our small DIY local store where I got them from don't sell them that way, and I'm sure the big boys don't either)
• Pop corn bag x 1 (leftover from Christmas...should source popping corn in future, and see if we can get in paper or at a weigh and save type place, or in bulk and share with others, or just live without)
• Risotto rice box window x 1 (the box was card, but had a tiny plastic window...try and source in just card and ideally larger)
• Frozen pea packet x 1 (I think we're going to have to eliminate freezer food, and we don't have much, peas, sweet corn, chips and ice cream....have to see if it's possible to get in another way, or just not have it?)
• Cling film x 1 (bits left from wrapping half an orange in daughter's school lunch...not sure of the solution as think the little compartments will leak in her existing lunchbox)
• Tea bag packaging x 1 (see if our local tea company will sell to me in bulk and directly into my tea caddy....or even an old biscuit tin, so it's a bigger stash?)
• Envelope windows x 3 (mail that I've been sent, and had to remove the window before putting the paper in recycling....could reuse the envelopes by sticking a label on top of the window....however, don't use that many envelopes personally...share them with anyone else?  And try and get removed from as many mailing companies as possible to stem the flow.) 
• Disposable nappies x 7 (since just having nappies at night I got lazy and changed from terry nappies to disposables, but at the end of this pack, I'll dig out the terry nappies from the loft and do one wash load a week...might even spur him out of nappies at night :-)
• Washing ball wraps x 3 (have bought the ecozone bales that do 1000 washes....they are made of plastic, but you can refill them, so in theory should last my lifetime and be passed onto my children's children...will be testing them out and feeding back in a later post)
  
  

So obviously that's just one week's worth and other weeks' items would add to the list, but gives an idea of the types of things I'm up against.

Other than paper and tins, we also put milk packaging into the recycling bin, and as of tomorrow we're changing to our local milk man (literally our neighbour) and organic milk in 1 pint glass bottles.  http://www.dairycrest.co.uk/  And we've also put a large Yeo Valley Organic Yoghurt pot in the junk modelling bag...so I'm going to attempt to make my own and get the kids to love it?!?!?!

It's exhausting just thinking about it all, let alone finding the time and money to change it all...but here goes!