she said he said

This is us in 2006 — Before kids!

Today is the day of love, and also the day of hubs and my first kiss 11 years ago! (Cheesy, I know, but what can you do?) So, in honor of that, we thought we’d share another She Said, He Said post with you!

I talked last month about how this journey that our family is on toward more natural and simple living is not one that my husband probably would have chosen for us. Although I’ve been more of the driving force behind the change, he’s always been a pretty good sport about it. And if you would have told me four years ago that this is what our life would look like today, I probably would have laughed at you, but now that we’re here, I can’t imagine living any other way, and I really love all of the green changes we have made.

Here’s just a few reasons why.

She Said — Why I Love the Green Changes We Have Made

It’s Fun!

I know it probably sounds weird, but I really think that learning more about green and natural living, and trying out new things until I find what works best for me and my family, is fun! I guess it’s mostly because that gives me something new to learn about, and I’ve always loved learning new things. I think life would be boring if I wasn’t always learning and discovering new things, what would I do with myself?

It Makes Me Less Materialistic

I’ve always been one of those people who wanted the next best thing. I used to try to follow trends (quite unsuccessfully!), get the next best beauty product, and generally try to keep up with the Joneses. Living a greener and simpler life has given me freedom from always comparing myself to other people around me (except for those who I think are greener than me!). In some ways I still chase the next best thing – because I’m always trying new green things, or trying to find ways to do things more naturally and simply – but it just looks so much different for me now, and my motivation for doing it is not because I’m trying to keep up with someone else.

It Saves Us Money

I know lots of people have the impression that going green will cost a lot of money, but I’m (obviously) such a firm believer that this does not necessarily have to be true. It really does depend on the choices you make, and I love that the changes we have made have truly saved us lots of money. Now I just wish that we had more of that money to show for it! (Things continue to be tight financially around here for us.) But, I really can’t imagine where we would be, or how we would have made it, without making these changes over the past few years.

When I think about the life that we live now, compared to the life that we were living just a few years ago, it really is amazing to me. And I am so glad, and so thankful, for this journey and all that we have learned along the way.

First Time Daddy - She is the one who started it all!

He Said

Happy valentines day, wife! 11 years ago I worked my mojo and the rest is history. Not sure if that is how it actually happened, but let’s go with it. Little did you know that just a little over a decade later I would have half as much hair, weigh that same amount if you added a toddler to the scale too, and still annoy you with my inability to maintain any sort of schedule. Love is blind to many things. Thankfully, you have hung in there and keep laughing at my stupid jokes, because I am in no shape, and have no desire, to do any of this without you.

So here is my take on your love list for green changes.

It’s Fun!

These changes and experiments you have led the family on make life interesting. Not sure I would always say it’s fun though. I certainly never thought I would need a cloth diaper degree to figure out how to attach all those different sorts of contraptions to the booty of a kid. And it is never a good thing to ask a dad to pin anything to cloth in the vicinity of a young child. It’s just not.

But all in all, being married to a living, breathing, and very sexy (his words!) scientist who likes to experiment with all different kinds of cooking, cleaning, and home based green/natural living projects has been fun and life changing for us all. If this was fourth grade you would get a blue ribbon. Since it is Valentines day I’ll just give you a kiss.

It Makes You Less Materialistic

This has been the coolest part of being on the journey for me. You and I have both been caught up in the ladder climbing envy challenge over the years. By making these changes for reasons you and I both believe in, and can get excited about, has really made the old versions of us look a lot different in retrospect. I guess that’s all part of the general growth in a marriage, or relationship, or life in general.

Being simple, or trying to keep things simple, and basic, and less cluttered has grown us both. I guess next you’ll want to have a baby at home in our room and change forever how I look at our bed…oh wait, that is the plan for this next one isn’t it? Wow, things have changed over the years!

It Saves us Money

I certainly know that the changes made have saved some serious money. But, like everything else there is a learning curve and initial investment required. We now have a library, both in print and digital format, of books and e-books, that could keep a speed reader busy for a few months. We also have some failed experiments that have paved the way to some simple changes made today. And at times you do have a tendency towards biting off a bit more than is humanly possible to chew.

I can specifically point to some knitting books, and “project” tools, hidden in closets that have been rather lonely since making an appearance in our house. We’ll count those as investments into the future. When the kids are in high school you can embarrass them with Christmas sweaters knit from the fur taken from the Alpacas you got us to raise in the yard or something. If you already knit them stuff now, it wouldn’t be as funny then.

Love you, wife!

Do you see why I love this man? I must say I’m a pretty lucky girl! Love you too, hubs!

Why do you love the green changes you’ve made in your home and family life? How does your spouse feel about them?

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If you’d like to learn more about living green and living frugally I’d love to have you as a Live Renewed reader! You can subscribe, either by email or in a reader, to get the latest posts, ideas and inspiration for living frugally green. You can also connect with me on Twitter and Facebook!

You guys, I am so excited to begin this new feature here on Live Renewed! I hope it’s something that you enjoy reading as much as we enjoy writing it.

Actually, this was all my wonderful hubby’s idea. We were talking about ideas for my blog one day and he suggested that maybe we should do a “He said, She said” article featuring our different sides or views on certain topics related to green living.

This may come as a surprise to some of you – maybe not those of you who know us in real life – but my hubs, as wonderful as he is, does not always share my same passion for green and natural living.

In some ways, I can’t blame him. I’m sure there are times that he looks at me and thinks, “Who are you and what did you do with the woman I married?!” Although I think we all change and evolve and grow as people over time, and we really can’t predict the person we will be five or ten or twenty years from now, I know that the changes that have occurred in me, and that I’ve carried over into our family’s life, have hit my husband like a ton of bricks at times. I know that this lifestyle change that we have been going through is not something that was ever on his personal radar.

But, he loves me, and he’s a good guy (a really good guy), so he puts up with me and my craziness – at least most of the time. There are definitely things that he resists me on (real food, anyone?), and other things that he just absolutely puts his foot down (family cloth in the bathroom), and even though getting him to change can sometimes be a slow process, for the most part, he usually comes around.

I’ve asked my hubs before to write a guest post for my blog, because he is a really great writer (I’m actually a little nervous to be writing with him – he’s much better than me!), and for one reason or another, it just never happened. So, this is our alternative, that hopefully each month we’ll write a “She Said, He Said” post for your reading pleasure.

So, I came up with some Green Goals that I have for myself and the family this year and I shared them with him to see what he thought. Here are my green goals, and his response to them!

Source: adelightfulhome.com via Emily on Pinterest

She Said: My Green Goals for 2012

As I looked over my list from last year, I’m happy to report that I’ve done almost all of them. We still haven’t installed a low-flow shower head (shame on us, I know!), and I think I’m going to pass that one on to hubs this year – because that’s really more of his deal than it is mine. The other ones I didn’t get to were removing plastics from our kitchen, and making sourdough starter, so I’ll add those to my list this year, along with my new goals.

1. Natural and Herbal Remedies

This is one that I’ve wanted to do for a while, but for one reason or another, just haven’t really gotten around to. We’ve been pretty lucky that we haven’t been too sick yet this season. But the cold and flu season is far from over, and I’d like to make sure we have more natural and herbal remedies on hand for when the sickies do strike, because we know they will, sometime.

2. More Real Food

Oh, for some reason this change has been one of the hardest ones for me over the past year or so. The thing is, I know a lot about what our family should be eating, but actually eating that way the majority of the time is still a challenge for us (maybe part of that is because hubs isn’t totally on board – what say you, hubs?) So, this year I’d like to take the leap from knowledge to action when it comes to our family’s food.

3. Declutter, Simplify, Organize

I think I mentioned before how much I am feeling the need to declutter and simplify our family’s stuff, and get it all organized and get our house finally “finished”. We’ve lived in our home for almost three years, and while I love our house and definitely feel settled, there are still parts of it that still haven’t been set up and organized for the best use of the space, and it definitely causes our family, and me, some major stress at times.

4. More Homemade Products – Beauty & Cleaning

I love making things myself at home, but I didn’t really tackle too many new homemade products this past year for some reason. So I’d really like to get back into that, and I’m especially excited to try my hand at more homemade beauty products. There are so many great recipes out there — Pinterest is a great source of inspiration and ideas!

5. More Handmade and DIY projects

Although I’m not the most crafty and creative mama on the block, I do really enjoy creating stuff with my hands, so I’d like to do more knitting and sewing projects this year – maybe even attempting to give mostly handmade gifts this year. And I’d also like to try more DIY projects around the house, with hubby’s help of course! Again, Pinterest is such a great inspiration for both of these things!

And now it’s his turn!

Source: keeperofthehome.org via Emily on Pinterest

He Said: Her Green Goals for 2012

So since I really have no reader fans out there I will not bore you with a list of 5 green goals that some guy you don’t know anything about has. Instead, I think I will talk a bit about what I think of the wife’s goals I just found about about three minutes ago. That’s more fun anyway. I’m sure many of you wonder what the other side of the equation thinks on some of these semi crazy ideas my wife has.

To be clear, I love my wife more than words, even words in a blog post, can express. However, the last four years have been a bit of a roller coaster of new experiences in our house. Every few days Em comes up with some new thing she wants us to embrace with the fervor of a woman in labor (if you haven’t been there, trust me, don’t look directly into their eyes…you will be blamed for things they wanted you to do).

Occasionally, I look at said ideas as those of a crazy mad woman, but would certainly never say that. I tell her that sounds “interesting” (crazy), or that I will “look into it” (run far away from it or look far away from it hoping she will forget it), or, occasionally, that I will try it (reluctantly “try it” because I love her).

The crazy part of it all for me is that, like everything in the life of a husband, it takes me a while to figure out that she did, in fact, go ahead and install this idea into our family matrix without my knowing. One day I go to get a paper towel and they no longer exist in our world. Or I go to try and get some cleaner and am bombarded with some kind of tea tree oil based cleaner thingy. Changes work best when they already happened. Just deal with it, man!

So here’s my quick take on the goals the love of my life has decided we need to do.

1. Natural and Herbal Remedies

Cold and flu season is upon us. That now means that Em will come up with some concoction that contains garlic and some kind of oil while also magically being in a paste like structure. This product will then be applied to feet and other areas to somehow heal us from the sickness. That might sound crazy, but it works. I saw it happen last year. Plus, vampires stay away from us. Last thing I need is some sexy vampire taking my wife away. Go for it, Em!

2. More Real Food

I like food. The only problem is that I am not a rabbit. If I was a rabbit, I would be the largest one in the world. So some of the ideas the wife shares in regards to food are unappealing to me. I am open to eating better, and have been a champ at times when it comes to changes, but some of this stuff she shows me recipes for makes me want to fast for a long time. That might not be a bad thing. I am coming around on a lot of this food stuff. So go ahead and get your cook on.

3. Declutter

I am all for the declutter part. If I was forced to find a certain document in the house I may need to hire a few assistants and a search and rescue crew to accomodate the request. We both suck at this. But things have drastically changed with how we view our “stuff” and what we need. So let’s get the clutter handled. And I assume this means you want me to actually finish the projects I started. That’s a tricky way to do it, wife. I applaud your craftiness!

4. More homemade products.

I’m in. Just don’t try and make me deodorant that makes me smell like a coconut. We live in Indiana, not Maui.

5. More projects

Go for it! The good Lord knows we have the supplies needed to make these projects a reality. As the creative one in the relationship I value and support this. I have this pair of pants that really need to be hemmed, by the way. And if you get this urge to knit me an ascot, go ahead and let that pass. I do draw certain lines. And if you see a closet on Pinterest that someone turned into a scene from the Chronicles of Narnia that can hold clothes and act as a kitchen/play area for the kids, lets just tone that down a bit and do some baby steps.

Love you, wife! You know I adore you and your quest for positive changes. Let’s do it!

Thanks hubs! Love you too!

What green goals or changes have you committed your husband and family to this new year?

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If you’d like to learn more about living green and living frugally I’d love to have you as a Live Renewed reader! You can subscribe, either by email or in a reader, to get the latest posts, ideas and inspiration for living frugally green. You can also connect with me on Twitter and Facebook!