While reading the online news yesterday, my boyfriend came across WWOOF the World Wide Opportunities on Organic Farms website. For the price of a small registration fee, and the cost of your travel, you can work on an organic farm anywhere in the world, for as long or as short as you wish. What a neat vacation idea! I often wished, growing up, that I lived on a farm, after having such fun each year visiting my aunt and uncle's small farm in the Catskill mountains of New York state. I used to harass my father and say "Dad, why couldn't you have been a farmer? Why did you have to be an engineer?" And then he's ask me if I liked my private school and piano lessons and tell me that if we were farmers we probably wouldn't be able to afford such things. More's the pity, I think. Farmers feed us all, and should be better supported than they are.
Enough with my rant. I'm forging ahead and banking more challenges so that I can have a vacation over the next few days. Tomorrow I'll be posting three changes I've made, and then, gentle readers, you won't hear from me again until August 5.
Today's changes were relatively easy. I bought some new dishtowels, made from bamboo, at Canadian Tire. I skipped right over the Debbie Travis brand, made in China, and went straight to the bamboo towels. I've been needing more towels anyway, since I use them to cover my bread as it rises.
I've stopped using paper gift wrap, and started making my own gift wrapping. Hey, I'm a creative sort. This was no stretch for me. Larely I've been giving away a lot of homemade bread, and it just seems nicer to give it in a reusable cotton drawstring bag that I made myself while the bread was baking. Sometimes I get the bag back, and sometimes not. I like to think that the people I'm giving the bread to are continuing to use the bag for other things.
Since my kitties are already pretty green, I took them one step further by purchasing organic, preservative free cat treats, and organic catnip. Needless to say, they embraced this change fully and with much purring.
Lastly, I wanted to sign up with Green Dimes to reduce the amount of junk paper mail that comes to the condo. Since the publication of Vanessa's book, the company has changed names to Tonic MailStopper and no longer has services for Canadians. If I am wrong, somebody please tell me, beacuse I'd love to cut down on my junk mail.
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3 comments:
I had never heard of WWOOF before, and now I'm glad I read about it in your blog. I'm really thinking about adventuring myself in that volunteer program.
Thanks for the tip, Green Penguin!
Good luck for your vacations!
I found your blog through Crunchy Chicken, and I love it! I'm Canadian, too, and trying to be somewhat green. My family thinks I'm a psycho-enviro-nut, but my truly green friends think I'm a slacker.
One suggestion for your year of changes might be to purchase items second-hand whenever possible. It covers "reduce" and "reuse" at the same time, and saves big bucks. I notice that you've purchased a new coffee thermos, a new water bottle, and new tea towels in the first three weeks of your challenge. Those are the types of things I find easily at Goodwill or Value Village, and they are SO CHEAP. Any type of household item or clothing, I go to Goodwill first, and I usually find what I need.
Just an idea.
I love the idea of your reusable gift bags. Would you be up for a post on how you make them and maybe a few pics?
Keep up the good work!
Jenelle
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