Going Green *But Not With Envy* Home Edition
Second in this week’s series On Greening is our home edition. Missed out on reading about Clean Beauty. It’s not too late, here you go. Now onto all things …home.
There are plenty of ways to make your home green if you’re dealing with a renovation or even building your house from scratch. And while we salute anyone who adds solar panels or harnesses their own rainwater using their gutters, we’re trying to be realistic here. There are simple, small changes that anybody can make in their home to be a little kinder to Mama Earth.
The number one way you can go green in the kitchen? Reduce the amount of plastic and waste in your kitchen. If you’re anything like me, that can seem overwhelming. Where do you even start? Reusable bags and product containers. Baggu makes affordable, stylish bags that you can roll up and stuff in your purse so you never have to be bagless. They come in plenty of prints and colors, different sizes, and even netted ones.
And what are you going to put in your brand new reusable grocery bag? Reusable product bags! There are plenty of mesh cotton produce bags that you can clean and reuse, instead of using the plastic ones at the grocery store. This 15-pack from Amazon comes in plenty of different colors and sizes.
And once you have the groceries safely stocked in your fridge, you might as well get rid of all those old, misshapen plastic Tupperware containers. Replace them with these beautiful stainless-steel containers that will make any desk lunch more enjoyable.
It’s an urban myth that organic cleaning products don’t work. In fact, many of the corporate titans of the cleaning industry have recently introduced green versions of their biggest products. Tide has a plant-based detergent that really does work. And brands like Mrs. Meyers and Dr. Bronner’s have found their way into the aisles of Target or your local grocery store.
There are some brands, like the Laundress or Murchison-Hume, that have a higher price point because of their small-batch production and higher quality ingredients. There are even new start-ups like Blueland, which is disrupting the cleaning industry through their subscription-based model of non-toxic, refillable cleaners.
When it comes to cooking your food, you can even get eco-friendly pots and pans. Nonstick cookware is often coated in Teflon, which is technically safe but can break down over time and under extreme heat. When the pans are heated over 500 degrees Fahrenheit, the coating starts to emit toxic fumes. Invest in some cookware that doesn’t have any Teflon in it, so you don’t have to worry about Teflon flu. GreenPan is one of the best eco-friendly options out there, and it has such great thermal conduction that you can cook things at lower temperatures. If you’re counting, that’s another way to save energy.
Finally, there’s one last thing you can do. It’s composting, and it sounds a lot scarier than it actually is. Plus, then you’ll have amazing fertilizer to help your herb gardens make the biggest, freshest produce it ever has. Everyone will be begging you for your secret! For the design-minded out there, Food52 has the prettiest compost bin we’ve ever seen.
Enjoy your greener home.
WANT MORE? And remember, if your goal is to holistically live more GREEN, do take our Clean Beauty #101 Masterclass taught by green beauty expert + founder of the Sacred Beauty Movement, Rebecca Casciano. This class is chock full of valuable content in under 1-hour . It will change your entire beauty routine. #Boom.
**Written by Brianna Porter for Dear Grown Ass Women™
