Hey, thanks for visiting my blog! My name is Kimberly and I live in the lovely, flat land of Central Illinois. My husband and I have one child named Jasper. I get the lucky job of a stay-at-home mom and own a photography business.
I love photography, a clean house, meeting new people, coffee, paper, my fireplace in the winter, dance parties in my pajamas, all things Christmas, almost every kind of music, my hot husband and amazing kid. I hate squirrels, road trips, not having my cell phone on me, and dead batteries.
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Josh and I got groceries last night and tried out my new Envirosax. I bought them from delight.com. I love them! I wasn’t sure how much they’d hold or what the checkout person would say so I was a little anxious to use them. I got up to the checkout and the Walmart cashier got ready to put our first items in those yucky plastic bags. I stopped her and said that I had actually brought my own bags and was going to use them first. She looked slightly confused and then said, “Oh….oh!” I whipped out my first bag. The cashier would scan the items and just put them on top of the spinning thing that holds the bags. I just kept fitting more stuff into it each one. I’m guessing those five bags held about 16 to 18 plastic bags worth of food. It was crazy! After I paid I told the lady thanks and sorry if I slowed her down. She laughed and said that I was actually pretty good at packing.
I’m pretty excited about using these bags from now on. They roll up to a tiny size so I could even carry one in my purse. It really was so handy to use them…even carrying in our groceries was easier because we had less bags. I love when something that’s good to do is actually less work!
When my parents first got married, they bought matching bikes. Earlier this month they invested in some new bikes and decided to sell the old ones on our garage sale. I couldn’t bare the thought of someone else riding my mom’s old bike so I decided to take it. Last summer I was riding my custom bike that I got for $10. It basically started to fall apart by the end of the summer and we had to get rid of it.
Lately I’ve been really wishing I had a bike. With a husband who is obsessed with cycling, it’s hard for some of that not to rub off. Plus it bothers me to drive my car 7 blocks to and from work everyday when I could save on gas and carbon emissions by riding a bike. So now I’m riding this rockin’ bike!
For as long as I can remember, I have always slept-talk. Not every night and not even that often but I still would sleep talk. When I was younger I usually was looking for my little brother or speaking gibberish. My parents still get a kick about bringing that up when we’re all there. In college I would regularly freak my roommate Jess out by looking under the bed for things and asking her where something was. And now that I’m married I provide Josh with something to laugh at in the middle of the night.
More times than not my sleep talking is just incoherent babble. However I am happy to report that my subconscious is becoming environmentally friendly.
Sometime early Monday morning I informed Josh in my sleep, “This is an eco-friendly shower head”.
Yesterday was Earth Day so I thought I would post some ideas of ways to help our environment.
- Back in October I switched my web hosting service to ThinkHost. They actually just planted a tree for me and all of their other clients. Every hosting plan they offer is covered under their carbon neutral green program.
- Undo your contribution to global warming with TerraPass. You can erase your carbon footprint from your car. When you buy a TerraPass, the money funds renewable energy projects such as wind farms. For Earth Day, Josh and I purchased a TerraPass for my car.
- Last week I also did something that I’ve wanted to do for three years. I started a recycling program at work. With the boss’s permission I purchased recycle bins for everyone’s desk and a large one for cans, plastic and glass. It’s a good feeling to know that instead of throwing away all of that paper we will now be recycling it.
- Pledge to switch to Compact Fluorescent Lights from Incandescent light bulbs. Here’s a test Popular Mechanics did rating the best fluorescent light bulbs.
- Don’t use those annoying plastic bags at Walmart and other places. Take your own tote bags to put your groceries in. We’re trying to use our $.59 IKEA bag or check out Reusable Bags for some nice alternatives.
- Set up a clothes line and line dry your laundry. Our clothes were flapping in the wind for most of Saturday.
Once you start it becomes almost a challenge to find ways to be environmentally friendly. Josh and I are constantly looking at other ways we can make a difference. We’re even hoping to get a hybrid when we’re finally able to replace his car in a year or so. Every little bit helps.
Last week I randomly suggested Josh and I should make a trip to IKEA. Josh was thrilled; you would have thought that I just told him he was getting a brand new bicycle. He was so excited that he spent the next 2 hours scouring the IKEA website. We hadn’t been in forever and after all this talk of redoing our bedroom…well, I decided we should go.
I’m not sure why so many people turn up their noses at IKEA furniture and such. I guess because it’s cheap. I really like the style of a lot of their stuff. I don’t care that it doesn’t cost that much. In fact, that makes me like it even more! Come on, let’s bring style to the masses. It’s like Target doing the designer clothes. “Design for All”…way to go, Target.
We made it in about two hours only going about 5 minutes out of our way after missing the I-355 exit. Watch out for that construction, folks. It was nuts. We arrived so excited to get in there and started! I’m always floored by just how big that place is. And it’s amazing the number of people coming in and out of it…it is so busy.
The first thing we saw when we got there was the Poang chair that Josh has wanted for 3 years. We hadn’t really planned on buying it but it was added to our sheet, just in case. I had brought a list of things I wanted to make sure I looked at, like the nightstands. By the end of the trip, we ended up filling our cart and one of those trolleys.
I was so excited to get these three little vases. They were $1.99 a piece and so very Jonathan Adler, don’t you think?
Got this little teapot for $4.99. So cute and much cheaper than anything I had found around here. It’s perfect for heating water for our French press.
We also got three Malma mirrors for $1.99 each. I got just the naked wood ones so I can paint them white or yellow and put them in our bedroom when it’s done. And a few other things I found:
We did also get our nightstands and Josh’s chair (which he had put together in like 10 minutes because he was so excited about it).
One thing I was very excited about is IKEA’s new “Bag the Plastic Bag” program. For 59 cents you can buy a flippin’ huge reusable bag instead of using plastic bags. The bag filled up the bottom of the cart…it was that big! IKEA is starting to charge five cents for every plastic bag you use. Instead we just bought one of the reusable bags. For the first year of the blue bag program, they are going to donate all proceeds to American Forests. I think I’m going to start taking that bag to Meijer with us and just have them put our groceries or whatever in that. I’m a big fan of IKEA’s position on environmental issues.
It was such a good day and we felt like we really got some cool stuff. I really am a big fan of IKEA. (Few more photos on Flickr.)
I switched hosting service to Thinkhost this past weekend. They are 100% earth friendly, powered by the sun and wind. Their customer service has been awesome so far. (I have contacted them three times already and they have gone above and beyond!)
Everything should be up and going. If you notice anything weird, please let me know! (There have been a few minor quirks…sorry!)
