Happy Earth Day - Lessons from my Granny April 22 2013, 0 Comments

I feel a bit helpless sometimes. It really looks like a big job. How can we really even start to tackle the problem of Climate Change? What can I do to help the Polar Bears that are loosing their living environment? What do we do about the little plastic granules from abrasive cleaners that end up in the oceans and become fish food killing the fish? How on Earth can we work this out. We have royally effed up. You and me. Big time. 

My Granny Helka was the biggest environmentalist I have known. She was living the Green Life out of necessity and common sense rather than for saving the planet. Here are some of the things she did: 

Plastic Bags: Helka cut them in strips and crochet or knitted them in to rugs for the hallway floor or utility room floors. Seriously. 

Glass bottles: Helka washed the bottles and used them to store home made berry and fruit cordial for the winter months. The ones with screw tops were used to bring milk in for lunch. 

Food packaging: Helka’s Tips: Butter wrapping (foil): Used as like aluminium foil to cover up cooked food in the fridge or when re heating. Plastic containers with lid, always washed and used for food storage and freezing. Yougurt pots were washed, stored and used for planting in the spring. Bread bags - used as sandwich wrappers.  

She grew vegetables, foraged, fixed and mended old. She is not unique, I am sure your Granny and Grandad had similar tips. We can learn a lot from the previous generations for the benefit of the future generations. 

I am not saying we start crochet our plastic bags, but we can make better choices and feel a bit less helpless facing the Climate Change problem. We can even do it without loosing our love of convenience. 

Here’s to the Earth Day, please comment and share here your Granny’s or Grandad’s tips that we could benefit in our daily life. 

My Granny Helka and me.