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Top 10 Not So Frugally Green Confessions

February 14, 2011 By Emily McClements
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Photo by Bruno C.

I know how it might come across sometimes – that I have it all together, I have it all figured out, that my life and my family and my kids are perfect, okay maybe not completely perfect, but at least close.

I know that it can come across this way sometimes because I am am a blog reader, as well as a blog writer.  I read others’ blogs and think – Their house must be perfectly clean and spotless all the time,  Her kids are so well behaved she probably has so much time to get all the stuff done she needs to get done everyday, She eats perfectly all the time, They are the poster green family – reducing, reusing, recycling – living the perfect green life.

I’ve thought those things when I read other blogs, so I’m willing to guess that you’ve probably thought them while reading my blog too (at least I think so, otherwise I’m sounding very arrogant right about now).

Well, I’m hear to tell you today that I am not perfect at any of this all the time ever.  I struggle, and get overwhelmed, and fail just like everybody else.  I am still learning and growing and figuring this whole green and frugal living thing out.

So, in honor of Valentine’s Day (or not), in case you need some more evidence, here are my confessions from recent days.

Top 10 Not So Frugally Green Confessions

1. I have not meal planned in almost a month. It is killing me to not have a plan, but now I’m having a hard time getting back into the habit.

2. Maybe because of the lack of meal planning, and also because of the lack of time, I have not been cooking from scratch as much as I would like. We have many more items of boxed and processed foods in our cupboards right now than I’d like to admit – although I make myself feel better about it by telling myself that they are at least Meijer Naturals and Organic brands so they’re not that bad – right?

3. I have not been using my homemade dishwasher detergent or homemade laundry detergent in quite a while. I still believe in them, and want to get back to using them, but they stopped working for me for some reason, and I haven’t put in the time and energy to trouble shoot what the problem might be.

4. I’ve been cheating and turning my thermostat up because it’s been zero degrees here lately.  (Although it was in the 30’s this weekend which was ironically like a heat wave!)

5. I just had to buy more plastic ziplock baggies because I keep throwing mine away instead of washing and reusing them.

6. The ‘no poo method is seriously not working for me right now.  I am still doing it, but I have nasty hair and am seriously considering going back to regular shampoo if I can’t get it figured out in this next week.

7. Lately, my house has not looked like this, or this, or this one either unless you’re looking at the before picture.

8. Routine – what routine? Life has looked much different since I started working part time and I can’t seem to get back into a regular routine.

9. My son’s bum has been covered in a disposable diaper much more often than a cloth diaper lately. I think I’m seriously pushing the limits of “part-time” cloth diapering.

10. I haven’t even ordered my seeds yet for my garden this summer. Okay, this one is kind of facetious, I needed a #10 to round out my top ten list, but I have been reading posts on other blogs about ordering seeds and starting to plan for this season of gardening, and while I am definitely dreaming of spring – that is one thing I haven’t jumped on yet, but it’s definitely on my list of things to do!

So, there you have it my real-but-so-not-perfect life, that I love and wouldn’t trade for anything, because it’s mine! I am on this journey right along with all of you, I am learning and growing and trying new things all the time, and I love that you have chosen to come along on this journey with me!

Now it’s your turn, give me some of your Not So Frugally Green Confessions in the comments so I know I’m not all alone here!

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19 CommentsFiled Under: Green Living Tagged With: confessions

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Comments

  1. Nicola says

    February 14, 2011 at 9:26 am

    So glad you posted this. It’s so encouraging. I have not menu planned since the beginning of the year (it is so hard to get back into), my daughter is wearing cloth today for the first time in almost 3 weeks, my tumble dryer has pretty much been on constantly for the last week (dd1 has a tummy bug & has been getting sick for a week), my homemade washing powder isn’t working for me at the moment either but I did manage to solve the problem with the diswasher powder. The house in clean though because I had family stay over the weekend.

    Reply
    • Emily says

      February 14, 2011 at 10:55 am

      Thanks Nicola! I’m so glad it was an encouragement to you! I was a little worried that people would think, “What the heck – she writes about this stuff but doesn’t actually do it?” and stop reading! 🙂 It’s all about the season of life that we’re in, isn’t it? Things just change on a day to day basis and sometimes it’s hard to keep up!

      What did you do to fix the problem with your dishwasher powder? Mine worked for over a year and then all our dishes started getting really cloudy and I don’t know why?

      My mission today is to get the house back in order – we have family coming next weekend!
      I hope your daughter feels better soon!
      ~Emily

      Reply
      • Nicola says

        February 16, 2011 at 1:37 pm

        Thanks Emily. We are finally getting to the end of this sickness. She is sick almost 2 weeks so it’s been bad. We went out for a short walk for the first time today.

        Cloudy dishes is a rinse aid issue. Have you been using vinegar as a rinse aid? I must admit we use commercial rinse aid because vinegar really does not work for us because we live in a hard water area.

        Reply
  2. 'Becca says

    February 14, 2011 at 11:18 am

    Thanks for the honesty!

    I have a serious weakness for long, hot showers, which I know I indulge way too much in the winter.

    I was throwing away a moldy plastic bag this morning when I realized that nearly everything in our kitchen trash is plastic packaging of nonrecyclable types. We don’t have much trash, but most of what we do throw away is packaging that was used for only a few weeks (or even hours!), is made from nonrenewable resources, and will never biodegrade.

    As for frugality, our house is very well stocked with food, yet I went to the store yesterday and spent $67 on sale items and even some impulse purchases. We’ll eat it all eventually, but the prices weren’t really so great that I had to buy it now….

    Reply
  3. Elizabeth says

    February 14, 2011 at 11:22 am

    THANK YOU! I really appreciate your reality check. Sometimes I really feel like a failure when I try to measure up to the mommy blogs I read (I’m really new to the frugal/green thing). Good luck to getting back on the meal planning train!

    Reply
    • Emily says

      February 15, 2011 at 4:18 pm

      You’re welcome! I think it’s easy to read others’ blogs and thing that is the whole picture of someone’s life – but of course, most of us only write about the good stuff. I mean who really wants to read the real, honest, mundane day-to-day stuff most of the time. 😉

      Reply
  4. jessica kruse says

    February 14, 2011 at 3:17 pm

    Oh thank you so much for this post! I often feel like a failure every time I allow my kids to eat something they shouldn’t or I buy something for convenience! In lue of Valentines day, I hate feeling like the chocolate nazi! That being said they HAVE eaten more sugar than they should have and I am making sugar cookies! What is wrong with me! 🙂

    Reply
  5. Artemisia says

    February 14, 2011 at 3:39 pm

    Oh, we all have our confessions and contradictions! Give yourself some room – at least you are trying, right?

    I remember you mentioning you live somewhere with hard water. So do I – it is a real pain sometimes! In fact, using baking soda to wash your hair just will not work in hard water. I am always looking for an alternative no-poo solution.

    Reply
    • Emily says

      February 15, 2011 at 4:21 pm

      Hmm, it’s interesting that you say that about the hard water. I’m not sure how hard our water is, but we had been using a water softener, but it stopped working back in November I think – and that’s about the time I started to have issues with my hair. Before I had been using the no ‘poo method with no problems for over a year. I guess I better get on hubs to get our water softener fixed, huh?

      Reply
  6. Anastasia B says

    February 14, 2011 at 6:13 pm

    Thank you for sharing! I should seriously do a similar post on Eco-Babyz, you’ve got me thinking. I do think that just by looking at my blog people might think I am perfect and have perfect kids and a perfect husband and we live in a perfect house. That is simply an impossibility of life! I haven’t done meal planning in a long time too! Everything has been haphazard lately, with the exception of a few coherent moments 🙂

    Reply
  7. Rebekah from Simply Rebekah says

    February 14, 2011 at 10:31 pm

    Ahhh… Someone else who struggles to be green! 🙂 Here is my confession: I RARELY remember to take my cloth bags to the grocery store. RARELY!!!! *sigh*

    Also, I get so frustrated with all the toxins that I’m suppose to be avoiding that sometimes I wish I was ignorant to it all… It just makes me so sad sometimes.

    Reply
    • Emily says

      February 15, 2011 at 4:11 pm

      I know how you feel about just wishing you were ignorant – sometimes it is so overwhelming! And once you know – you can’t just pretend like you don’t – and it changes the way you think about EVERYTHING! Baby steps – that’s why I’m all about baby steps. You can only do what you can do, and you have to let the rest go, right?

      Reply
  8. Michelle says

    February 15, 2011 at 10:18 am

    I have two comments. Been trying to do the no-poo and found if I work the baking soda DRY into my hair before I get in the shower,leave it a few minutes as I prepare for my shower it seems to absorb the oils. Then I comb through my hair with a wide tooth comb in the shower. It seems like the comb helps part the hair allowing the water to wash out the soda and oils. I also use bottled lemon juice instead of vinegar. Vinegar made my hair oily. It seems like it starts to get oily again in 2-3 weeks and I’m wondering if I’ll have to wash with natural shampoo once every few weeks. My thought on that is it’s still better than every day. I’d still save money and my hair would be healthier without as much chemicals.
    In the kitchen…I’ve tried cooking an afternoon and putting extra meals in the freezer and feel like it takes too much time. Instead I’ve started to make a larger amount of the meats and freeze part of it. If I’m making tacos I double the cooked seasoned meat and freeze half. If I’m making chicken nuggets, I double the amount and freeze half. Or slice and freeze half the roast. Stew a whole chicken and freeze half. I can pull out the cooked meat and throw together some veggies and open a jar of applesauce or fresh fruit quickly and have a great meal. Rinse off the dishes and dash out the door. It’s healthier and takes no more time than boxed or eating out. The trick is building up your frozen stockpile. Gotta resist the urge to use it those nights you just feel a little too lazy and want to pull out the easy stuff. But we are all human and maybe that’s the night you really NEED the shortcut.

    Reply
    • Emily says

      February 15, 2011 at 4:42 pm

      Yes, I hear you about trying to do a baking/cooking day or afternoon – I tried it once and it was disastrous! I have definitely been thinking about how I can better utilize my freezers to make homemade “convenience” foods – I need to get better at that! I think as I get back into meal planning I will plan for stuff to put away in the freezer too. Thanks for the encouragement!

      Reply
  9. Melissa says

    February 15, 2011 at 11:34 am

    Great list and kudos to you for being REAL. It’s only natural (pardon the pun) to have an ebb and flow for things. I pretty much gave up on my homemade dishwasher detergent after it got all clumpy all the time and the liquid one overflowed the dishwasher. And while I grind my own wheat, I often forget and then just end up using my store-bought flour. Gotta grind TODAY! (stopping by from ohamanda)

    Reply
    • Emily says

      February 15, 2011 at 4:45 pm

      Thanks so much for stopping by Melissa! I keep telling myself that this is just a season – and a rough one at that as we have been sick, and out of town, and busy, all of the things that just seems to mess up life! 🙂 I know I will get back to many of these things when the time is right!

      Reply

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  2. My Top 10 Not So Frugally Green Confessions says:
    February 20, 2011 at 3:06 am

    My Top 10 Not So Frugally Green Confessions…

    […]I think I’m seriously pushing the limits of “part-time” cloth diapering. 10. I haven’t even ordered my seeds yet for my garden this summer. Okay, this one is kind of facetious, I needed a #10 to round out my top ten list, …. It seems like it s…

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  3. Top 10 Not So Frugally Green Confessions says:
    February 21, 2011 at 2:53 pm

    Top 10 Not So Frugally Green Confessions…

    […]Top 10 Not So Frugally Green Confessions. 1. I have not meal planned in almost a month. It is killing me to not have a plan, but now I’m having a hard time getting back into the habit. 2. Maybe because of the lack of meal planning, …[…]…

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