I just got finished emptying the dehumidifier in my basement. It’s been so humid around here lately that dumping it has becoming a daily task. But instead of just pouring the water down the drain, I use it to water my plants. My thirsty hibiscus has been very happy about this. In my old house, [...]
I was recently chatting with some friends about little things we’re all doing to go green and save money in the process. One of my friends mentioned the raging controversy over bottled water and its negative effect on the environment. We talked about the number of water bottles that end up in landfills and how [...]
You know that old saying that goes something like, “I put my arm in my sweater, and my mother’s hand came out?” Yeah, well, it’s happening more and more these days. I started sounding like my mother when I began insisting that my children write their own handwritten thank-you notes after Christmas and birthdays. They’re [...]
I was getting ready to prep a couple of day’s worth of meals when it dawned on me how easy it is to be wasteful in the kitchen and create tons of trash. For example, I had just finished de-fatting the chicken breasts and was planning on marinating them in a zipper-top plastic bag, in [...]
Our school district recently published the upcoming lunch menu for September, when school starts, including the price for lunch–nearly $3. A carton of chocolate milk? 75 cents. I know that I’m dating myself when I say this, but I can remember spending 75 cents for an entire hot lunch meal and 25 cents for a [...]
If you’ve been reading this blog, you know how important it is to me to be able to recycle as much as possible at home. Ideally, I would like to be able to recycle when I’m on the road, too–which I am a lot, either traveling with my family or doing media tours to promote [...]
When my first book came out, I learned something that many authors, in the throes of writing their terrific tome, don’t consider: when it comes time to get the word out about your book, it’s up to you, the author, to do as much promotion as you can. Once I discovered that my publisher’s publicity [...]
The lists arrived via email the other day–what my children needed to buy to go back to school next month. There was the usual suspects on the list–spiral notebooks, multi-subject binders, pencils–which I could probably find in my sleep at my local office supply store. This year, though, there were some new and different requirements [...]
I’ve known for years about Freecycle and what it had to offer folks who wanted to get rid of stuff without throwing it out. I’d even written about it in my magazine articles and books. But I’ll admit that all of my Freecycle knowledge came from being a casual observed until yesterday, when I actually [...]
For as long as I’ve known him, my husband, Bill, has been a pack rat–and proud of it. Perhaps it’s because when he went away to college, his mother had a yard sale and sold off all of his childhood possessions, without him knowing. He arrived home on break one year, looking to take a [...]
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