What luck is it that May 1st is a Saturday, so I get to use today’s anti-consumerist/low-waste lifestyle post to update you on how my Earth Month Bingo Challenge went!
I know the advice I gave all of you was to pick a few, set small goals, but I was ambitious and aimed to do everything I possibly could!
Here is my Final Bingo card:
What I did
If you don’t believe me, here is picture-proof of most of the things I did:
Go one day with no disposables: I already live fairly low-waste, so this was not a huge challenge for me and was rather easy-peasy. I also went a step further, and downloaded an app called My Plastic Diary, which is where you can track every piece of plastic you buy on a daily basis, so you can know what types of plastic you can take steps toward eliminating.
Ask for no receipt: I rarely ever ask for receipts, Only when I need to give them in for work or to someone else, but this month, I made a point to outright reject, to make sure they either don’t get printed, or that they get sent to my email.
Go meatless for a week: I’ve been vegan for several years now, this one was essentially a freebie space for me haha! I have, however, been helping Ruth incorporate more plant-based meals in her diet, here is a fun meal I put together just for her:
Start a garden: I live in an apartment, but I have some space for planters on my windowsill. So I went ahead and got some flower seeds my mom had lying around from last year. I wanted to plant flowers that were easy to take care of and served a purpose, so I made a small pollinator garden with Shasta Daisies, Aquilegia, and Zinnia! There’s not much growing now, but hopefully there will be by the end of the summer.
Repeat an outfit: This one I do on the daily. I work from home and hardly ever go anywhere else, so I tend to wear the same things over and over again. Here is the proof anyway:
Buy your produce package-free: I really only every buy my produce from Second Life where it just just comes in a paper bag, that I then use to put my compost in for pick-up. So no waste there!
Thrift a Spring look: I didn’t go to the thrift store for this one, but I got some hand-me-down clothes from my cousin, which is basically like thrift-shopping without having to pay! Here are some of the outfits I put together with the clothes I got from her.
Visit a local park: I’m a part-time dog walker, so I go to a lot of local parks all the time. For this one, here’s a TikTok of me walking through NDG Park.
Add a new plant friend to your home: People always assume that because I’m really into the environment and sustainability, that I am also a plant person. While I do love plants, if you know me in real life, you know that I am total garbage at remembering to water my plants. As a result, I have very few indoor plants in my apartment. So I made sure that the new plant friend I brought home was going to be one that doesn’t need a while lot of care. I took this little burrow tail plant from my parent’s house, because my mom was looking to pawn them off to people anyway. She is the real plant lover of the family, and has way too many plants!
Ask for no straw: I don’t think I’ve used a disposable straw in years, and in addition to this, I didn’t actually go anywhere to buy a drink of any kind (because we’re in a pandemic) never mind one that would have come in a disposable cup or with a straw, so this was another freebie-space for me. I always have my reusable straws on-hand anyway!
Try a new eco-friendly product: This one was really fun. A switch I’ve been meaning to make a for a while was to eliminate the plastic from my dish soap, as well as the plastic in the sponges we use. So this month, we bought solid dish soap bars, a wooden dish brush, and loofah-plant compostable sponges. This was a really satisfying switch for us and our kitchen, I definitely recommend!
Shop Locally: I got these beautiful sunflowers from a local florist! Sunflower are my absolute favorite flowers ❤
Pick up litter on a walk: This is always really easy since, as a dog walker, I always have (compostable) poop-bag on me, so I spared one to pick up some litter in the park on my walks! We also committed to doing weekly cleanups around the city, so be sure to check out our TikTok for more on that!
Cancel your junk mail: I know that there are services you can pay for to do this for you in the US, but I have no clue what to do in Canada, other than just putting a sticker on my mailbox! I should have been doing this years ago, but I’m glad that this challenge has pushed me to finally implement it!
Donate: I know I only started this challenge in the second week of April, but a few days prior to starting it, I had already donated $50 to the Viva Vallarta Grocery Donation Program, helping provide free groceries to those in need in Puerto Vallarta, a city in Mexico with a large LGBTQ+ population that has been really hit hard with poverty and homelessness. Since the challenge was technically the whole month, I included the donation I made here as part of it. When I donated, they were at less than 1/3 of their goal, but have since exceeded their fundraising goal of $15 000, which warms my heart so so much!
Progress Over Perfection 