by Helen Goldberg

I was quite taken aback when I read about a mass of plastic garbage that sits in the ocean and is the size of a continent. It made me think about how much plastic my family uses. Then we had a family meeting and came up with a few ways to at least lessen our contribution to this terrible problem.

1. Zip lock bags don’t have to be thrown away. We use them then wash them and let them dry then reuse them. It’s amazing to think we ever threw these away after one use! Now that my family washes and reuses the zip lock bags I rarely have to buy new ones at the store. Plus, many of the foods we buy come in their own zip lock bags. We wash and reuse these as well.

2. Use your own grocery bags. This is something many people have been doing for years and now my family is thrilled with the idea. Most stores across the country are phasing out plastic bags, but the paper ones are responsible for killing trees unnecessarily. We have about ten permanent bags of cloth and nylon and take them with us to the grocery store.

3. No more paper napkins. I can’t believe we didn’t think of this 30 years ago!! We don’t have any more paper napkins at home. I won’t buy them any more. I went to Target and bought a bunch of cloth napkins. We only use these then throw them in with the wash. It’s a no brainer. When people come over they say we have fancy napkins. Maybe if you compare them to napkins, but the real idea is that they save a ton of money. Plus we’re not wasting trees.

4. Use the toaster oven. I’ve discovered that it makes more sense in most cases to use the toaster oven rather than the big oven. The big oven heats up the whole kitchen (not so good in the summer) and uses a lot more energy.

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