The tagline on my blog (Preparing my small human for the apocalypse one reusable nappy at a time) was a joke…until it wasn’t.
Of course, when I started my blog I was thinking of the zombie apocalypse, not a man made climate change driven mass extinction event.
Like many people I really wanted to believe that the apocalypse-like effects of climate change and pollution were centuries, if not millennia away. But that is just not the case.
As research by the WWF, reported in the Guardian recently, emphasizes we have to act now to prevent vast swathes of our planet becoming completely uninhabitable – possibly within our lifetime and definitely within the lifetime of our children.
Why are we not more terrified by this?
I suppose it’s easy to dismiss claims about the end of the world from our cosy British corner of the planet. It’s hard to imagine that my beautiful, green Devon could ever be anything other than just that.
It’s also so easy to feel crushed by the weight of the task ahead of us. Especially when the driving force behind ending our toxic habits and plastic pollution needs to come from government and big business. It is demoralising to think about what little difference we are making by going plastic free when there is so much being mass produced every single day in a seemingly never ending tide of waste.
I’m also aware that being more eco friendly can appear to be a very middle class thing. I’m lucky enough to be a stay at home mum with the time and the means to invest in many homemade eco alternatives but not everyone is in that position. It’s not realistic to expect working parents to be whipping up their own toilet cleaner. Being eco friendly has to be accessible to everyone, and that’s other change that needs to be driven from the top.
But there is light at the end of the tunnel. Sainsbury’s have become the first supermarket to get rid of plastic bags for fruit, vegetables and bakery items. Surely, everyone else will follow suit? More and more towns are also getting their own waste free shops giving me hope that one day this will become the norm.
If you read my blog regularly you will know that last year I aimed to only use cruelty free products in my home and this year my new challenge has been to reduce our plastic consumption. It hasn’t been easy, but I am making progress.
It has been slow progress. Partly because I’m a bit of a prepper at heart, and with the Brexit apocalypse looming I had stocked up on lots of my favourite cosmetic and cleaning products. As I work through my stash it has given me time to do lots of research, and experiment with my own alternatives to lots of products.
These are some of the eco switches I’ve made this year so far:
- Milk in glass jars from the Milk and More
- Smol dishwasher tabs
- Eco Egg
- Shampoo and Conditioner bars
- Homemade Coconut Oil and Epsom Salt Body Scrub
- Cutting our meat consumption
- Organic local Rocks squash in a glass bottle
- Eco Coconut Scrubber for dishes
- Crocheted face scrubbies, and dishcloths
- Solid soap
- Homemade anti scratch cat spray
- Unpaper Towels
- Trying to only buy preloved furniture and clothes when possible
- Homemade All Purpose Cleaner
- Homemade Toilet Bombs and Powder
- Condiments like Ketchup and Golden Syrup in glass jars/tins
- Homemade Whipped Coconut Oil Body Lotion
- Home Compost Bin
- Second water butt
- Growing tomatoes, peas, radishes, spring onions, potatoes and chili peppers
I’ll be writing some detailed reviews, and posting my perfected recipes over the next few weeks.
It’s not perfect but at least I can tell my daughter that we tried.
diaryofazombiemum 
I really love your last line – I used to find being more eco friendly so daunting to even try. I would watch videos of people only making a glass jar full of rubbish and think, “I could never do that” and feel so overwhelmed, but then realised that any small changes we can make is better than nothing. I will still never only make a glass jar full of rubbish, but that’s okay. I also never want my children to look back and feel disappointed in me, by not at least trying to help the planet for them.
I also love our Eco Egg and more natural cleaning products, we have a compost heap in the garden, are enjoying growing herbs and vegetables with our daughter, and are now trialing bamboo toothbrushes to see if we like them. I didn’t realise that news about Sainsbury’s either, that’s wonderful news! I’m looking forward to reading more of your posts.
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Same 😊 You’ve got to start somewhere with small steps and gradually make changes as it can be quite expensive. I’m freaky enjoying the journey but I don’t think we’ll ever down to a jar of waste…unless companies really change the game!
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You’ve made a really impressive number of changes here- you’re certainly doing your bit and it’s cool that your daughter will grow up in such an eco-conscious household. I find the accessibility of a low-waste lifestyle an issue, too; we have to find ways to push it beyond the middle classes who have time and money to spare, and make it easily adoptable for everyone. Essentially, we have to make sustainability the convenient option, somehow! As you said, supermarkets making those changes is a good first step. Keep doing the work you’re doing for the planet- there’s hope for us yet ♥︎
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Exactly! My working friends just look at me like I’m crazy when I say I’m making my own products! And I end up doing some shop in loads of different places to avoid plastic which not everyone has time for.
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Hehe, I bet! We can only keep pondering how to change things, I suppose, because something has to shift for sure 😌
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