Looking for Sustainability ideas

I thought I find a way to keep costs down while still trying to stay eco-friendly. Trying to keep striving for sustainability. This a record of that journey.

Sometimes blunt and straight forward then sometimes sarcastic

This frugal crunchy hipster single momma is doing what she can to save Mother Earth while not breaking the bank!

Saturday, January 29, 2011

Wind burn!

I wonder if it is true that once you get windburn you should be careful you will get it again...  Well that what my grandmother would tell me, that remember that so I would cover up better??? Yea I think that was the reason..... BUT I had the worst windburn, after the windchill of -10.... a couple of weeks ago.

I know it is not wind burn it is my skin being too dry.... maybe it isn't windburn because I didn't get blisters.... but it does look like someone dragged me  for miles.  That rug burn.... the nasty red rash... the burn from hell...  It really hurts.....

I have wind burn on both legs, mostly on the sides.  as well as my arms and lower back..... and to think I was out there scraping off my windows and helped scrape a co-worker windows (older lady who has a heart condition and was having trouble with the wind "taking her breath away"..) with another co-worker... it was one of those nights that it was bitter cold and the wind was going right threw you...

So the shower was a very painfully experience...That is when I found out my condition..  . first thing I thought of was a oatmeal bath.  I use a oatmeal and wheat germ scrub for my face so I just started a bath and dumped some it to the water.

Oh I have been putting coconut oil on my body every chance I get.  I put some in a old make-up container right by the potty.....  I put on some grape seed oil right before I jump in the shower....
It's getting better day by day.... I broke down and got some lotion from the health food section at the store for my hands because  the coconut oil  wasn't lasting very long.  Plus as much as I spend on making my own I could buy their lotion and it lasts longer..... 

ivy

Sunday, January 23, 2011

Puppy Dog tails....

I was suppose to get a dog from a friend of a friend...she was moving cross country and couldn't take her dog.  So I meet with her and the dog is super cool and everything.  I was taken back at the size of this canine.... he was quite big..... but hey no problem I was thinking when petting him.... good guard dog etc.... well I get my schedule for the last week of Jan and see 20 hours??? WTH? I'm not too sure about this....... I can and have lived on 30 dollars a week for food but not with a large dog.... I am kinda strange I don't like feeding the dogs something cheap for most of the time that it messes with them in some way.  Like upset stomachs, vomiting, more gas and more of dog poop in the back yard.. So yea I  worry about the money end.... I hesitated when she asked about the dog, about changing my mind.  I truthfully told I wasn't  a 100% sure........ so she did find another family that wanted him.  Good for the dog!  But I still felt bad for being wishy washy.  I kinda beat myself up for it...

SO when I awoke the other day and found a notice from Vitim Association saying there has been numbers of break in in the area, giving numbers for the police and them for help.... I thought this is the universes way of saying shame on you for going back on your word and now you see why you should have said yea I will take the dog...... Yea I have been around the 2 drama queens too long... but I have been missing them!! Guess it is the cabin fever to the max!

So I am talking to my dad about it.... he told well you were thinking about the dog, first..... And then tell me about his neighbor that has puppies.  I was like I don't have time for house breaking and chewing  up everything..... just toys.... Animal Rights laughs and says they are not puppies then are like what 8 months old... My dad said yea they are almost a year old... and housebroken.... They were puppies in the spring when I first told you about them.... ummmm ok... maybe I will get a smaller dog......... and protection for my house......

Well I have not been to meet the puppy yet.  I know my dad's neighbor... and she knows me.  But of course I pick a bad time -however it can be a good time later... She has just gotten surgery on her knee.  She might not want company too soon.  But a good timing see how we both work retail and to find a time we both are off  (plus she is a mom... whose kids have after school stuff and that type of thing, well you mom's know what I mean!!!)  


Most people believe that the barking dog scares away the would be robber.   The noise is more a deteriorate then the fear of being bit..However as one learned at a friends house sometimes you get both!!
 Yea kick in her door meet her 5 dogs...( She does foster homeless dogs)... . run back out the door.... well at least they closed the door behind them..... the last one didn't and her deaf dog took off after them... took her a couple days to find him!!
 

ivy

Friday, January 21, 2011

Fever!!

Cabin fever is spending like wild fire at work and now gasp to my family........... Snow again with 2-5 inches today, 2-5 more tonight and a wind chill of -2 degrees... oh yea Cabin fever time....

Restlessness, moodiness, cranky and just one big downer lately.  I was talking at work with a couple of the ladies I work with and I replied that I felt like I had PMS multiplied 10 times!!!! Then I heard them go OMG Yes....  wow  gee I am sorry if I have been really cranky... nope, they replied that they felt that way too. like on edge and moody..Like extra strong PMS....

Plus it seems that I really have lost my appetite not sure if it is part cold, or my cabin fever or the quit smoking thing.... but I really am having problems with eating to much right now... I eat and feel bloated or things don't taste right.... I still finding my new tastes from the lack of smoking pickling my tonne.... plus trying not to go there.... helps that I banded smoking in my house and tell myself - "You don't want to go outside and freeze!!" when I feel like giving in....... I also found that I am adding more heat to things like tacos, so maybe it is that cold isn't gone 100%......... that is helping make  things tasting bland....


Can the snow and the cold winds bring this horrible fever to the mass of the frozen northeastern Ohio??  Or is this a man made disaster...Or hormonal scramble with the all these females in the same area? Like when our hormones talk to each other and we all get that time of the month together??

I saw get a blog and whine and bitch about it and you will feel a little better.........Oh I just remember I bought some steak at the store...... Maybe a "grilled" steak will help the fever......... yumm with ton of grilled onions... and a baked sweet potato...


ivy

Thursday, January 20, 2011

Ohio Winters are Tough Winters!

Ah the fun of working til late. You walk out at 9PM and your windows are a sheet of ice. The local news had this story. They reported that if you spray the windows with a mix of vinegar and water at night they wouldn't ice up the next morning. They also told us that if you add some rubbing alcohol to the windshield wiper fluid; you could just use your windshield wipers to clear off ice.

SO thinking about this, I don't trust the rubbing alcohol idea at all. Basic Science class teaches us that you add water and cold temperatures= ICE! Add more water or windshield wiper fluid= more ice.  I learned that when I first learned to drive... duh...I really don't think adding 5 tablespoons of rubbing alcohol to your fluid will change the out come that much....  because yes alcohol doesn't freeze but maybe it would clear your windows better...... but hope you never get pulled over.... You might have some problems explaining to the officer doing his job that what he smells is your windshield fluid.... Right!!! LOL Plus I think it would cost more to add enough alcohol to the windshield fluid to make a difference..... just my thoughts.  Plus many companies have a winter mix that is suppose to help!  But rain X didn't work for me, it just smeared my windshield and I couldn't remove it!! It was a clear picture just a little fuzzy, but still bothered me....

So I did a experiments of the 2 part vinegar plus 1 part water, to spray on the windows  I did this one day after I got to work..... they reported that you spray the windows at night and in the morning no ice.  I added the 5 tablespoons of rubbing alcohol to the spray bottle. Guess what I had ice after a 8 hour shift.  I did spray the water on the windshield to just see if the rubbing alcohol would help to remove the ice.... Just for experiential value. Guess what it didn't remove the ice but it didn't ice it up any more..... Didn't help didn't hurt....  But it does give you a shock when your purse falls into it and it sprays while you are driving down the expressway..... Vinegar and rubbing alcohol smells, woke me up......... LOL

Now all I have to do is teach the other drivers that scraping a small hole in the drivers side and not even removing the snow off your car is a dangerous thing to do, but any one that lives up north knows there are many people that still do it......

ivy

Saturday, January 15, 2011

Warming up the Car

It's cold outside and the windows are frosted, do you let your car warm up to clear the windows or do you scrape and go? Which is better for the car?

I set out to find the answer.  I remember the sites on hypermiling, that said anything over 10 minutes idle is wasting gas.  (No I don't turn off my engine at a traffic light- that's over kill in my book)  So I thought no, it must be no.... I googled and read some sites about this.  I even saw a segment on the local news about it....

The truth is that newer cars have a fuel injection that they don't need to warm up.  Where many years ago it was a good idea to warm the car for a few minutes in the cold to help the engine.  that why many of the warm up the car engine people are older.  (Sorry DAD.... but he did see the piece on the local news and said ok..... I don't need a warm up- and then had to tell me that!!)

Most cars don't need that extra couple of minutes to warm up to help the engine. We are talking cars that are 20 years or younger. the older, carbureted cars,a extended warm-up can damage the engine by diluting the oil with excess fuel. That is just wasting gas and Co2.........causing more air population! About the only time you need to warm up is when the weather is in the teens, you can wait a minute or two before driving......... 

But many people believe that warming up the car is faster than driving the car to warm it up... Not really the car get "warmer" faster driving.

But  yea we all have had that kinda night where the inside glass was frosted and you let it run a few minutes while you get the snow off your car......  come to think about it it was those nights it dropped in to the teens... the joy of working second shift!!  I do however watch people that don't want to have to scrap off their cars just sit in their cars to wait for the snow to get melted off by the window defogger...... that is wasting gas and can be damaging to the engine......


ivy

Thursday, January 13, 2011

Real Beauty.........

The model Isabella Caro dies at the age of 28.  She was the model for the ad in the No Anorexia campaign, showing her skeleton shaped body for all of Paris to see.  She also wrote a book to help with insight to her eating  disease.  
 It was titled _The Little Girl that didn't want to get Fat_  I believe is the title...
With more and more people mostly women being treated for eating disorders it seems that we should be doing something more!  Please the youngest girl to be treated for anorexia on record is 4! 4 Years old and she is worried about her weight........... this subject makes me crazy.... that the fact that many beauitful people don't see the beauty in themselves and find the need to hurt themselves........






But can we blame the fashion industry?  Marketing companies?

Just thinking out loud...

ivy

Wednesday, January 5, 2011

Wow more dead birds!

More animals are dying in mass numbers... seems so spooky...

After the birds in Arkansas now it is 500 dead blackbirds in Louisiana, yesterday. Today brought 50 dead birds in Sweden....
The study done on the birds from Arkansas showed signs of stress, meaning they think it was the firecrackers from the fireworks... which hummm a hour before the new year the birds just knew that there where going to be fireworks so they just dropped out of the sky stressing.... But add more birds falling from the sky....

And then if that isn't too weird, there has been more reports of fish floating to shore............ First was the 83,000 dead drum fish in Arkansas......... they believe it was because there was a bloom in population of this type of fish so they didn't have the ability to fight infections..... now there are reports of millions of fish floating to the shores of the Chesapeake Bay, that they blame cold water stress.... (but can't say climate change??? Really with warming come ice melting on Greenland icebergs...) Monday reports of tons of fish (sardine, croaker and catfish) have turned up dead since last Thursday off the coast of Parana. Today it is in New Zealand, 100's of snapper fish are floating to shore without eyes..........

SO is it climate change? Or over population of the air and sea? The signs to end of the world? Biblical? Mayan calender? Ok so I really don't usually follow the conspiracy theories... but you have say wow this is getting weird....  Hey if there are massive deaths of mammals I will really freak out! 


ivy

DIY Pore Strips For Less

DIY Pore Strips For Less Very cool recipe for making your own pore strips. Save money! Less toxic!

ivy

Tuesday, January 4, 2011

Now it is Fish!!

OMG now I see that fish in Arkansas is dying. After 5,000 blackbirds fell out of the sky we have 100,000 fish floating up to shore...... They don't think it is a poison because more than just one type of fish would have floated to shore...



Monday, January 3, 2011

What is happening in Arkansas??

Happy New Year!  Ok I am late but I hope it was good....

Wow it was not for the black birds in Arkansas. Where depending on what report you hear or read over 1,000 blackbirds fell from the sky.  The New York Post reports that they don't believe that the birds where poisoned.  Yahoo who I will not post a link to had a racist sound to the news blaming the fireworks of the Mexican population.... wow there is still some real problems that people can't get along!!!  

You might notice that many people are blaming the green house effect or better wording for the nay saysers of how can it be globial warming if I got snow in Atlanta????  would be climate change.


We wait for the reports from the National Wildlife Health Center for answers on this strange omen from Arkansas............ 


ivy

Sunday, January 2, 2011

Healthy Junk food!!

SO just so you know I love oxymorons!!  Healthy what??? Healthy food dressed up as Junk food is more like the truth!

Have you seen the new ad program for Baby Carrots? Where they have some very overt sexual innuendos and the fact is that is said during the video..... Don't watch around young ones:

Baby Carrots | Eat 'Em Like Junk Food | Indulge


But they have some cool new Junk food package that you can download and place your "boring" carrots into to get your young one to eat... Like Junk food....

So will changing the outer package to a junk food looking package make kids want it more?  Using stupid stints help sell the food? Or insulting the mother of little ones by using very overt sexual innuendos in a commercial help sell carrots??? Oh yes .... baby carrots....

Last I heard about baby carrots there was a group that wanted the labeling off baby carrots to be stopped for the fact was they are not baby carrots.  They used to be the carrots that where too short, crooked or broken carrots....... so a smart farmer decided to peel them down to a uniform smaller size.  OK so there is no truth to the rumor that they are soaked in chlorine.  Check out Snopes!

BUT the truth is now they are breed for the sweetness and size that kids love!! So the group trying to get the name changed was a mood point I believe cause they can be "baby" as in size.  Yea some of us farmers know the spring weeding vegetables are young and tender.  That is what they believe is baby carrots.  I say hey my girls love those carrots as young one so I love those carrots!! I used to tell her dad that hey it worth the extra money cause she eats the baby carrots but not the regular carrots! And still does!!  I thought that it had to be a mother trying to get her children interested in good food.... you know like the fact that pizza was a invention to get the kids lunch and use up the bread from the night before.

 So now we have a company or is that a group well they call themselves :a bunch of carrot farmers... really more like a very creative marketing person!! But hey I think that this might take off! Junk food packaging on healthy food?  Hey they started with cheese and drink boxes...  What can they do that to next???  What would you love if they junk food-ised packaging for? 

ivy

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