Last weekend I watched ‘An Inconvenient Truth’.  I have always believed in global warming, but haven’t lived a life geared towards being a good role model for my children and peers.  In the past few months I have felt a looming sense of guilt each time I leave the grocery store with another pile of plastic bags.  This has been bothering me so much that I have been slowly but steadily changing the light bulbs in my house over to ‘green’ bulbs.  I find that the light outside my front door takes some time to brighten up, but it works just as well as the old bulbs I had been using.   I also switched to ‘Seventh Generation’ cleaning products.  I started with their dishwasher pucks and they were great.  Now, most products in my house are from this line.  They don’t cost much more and slowly I am reconditioning myself to purchase products like these.  Steve turned down our hot water tank as well as our furnace.  We are using less energy each day and Emma has less chance of scalding herself when she is playing at the sink. 

Now, each time I go to the grocery store I ask for paper bags.  Not every store has them ready for me, but it doens’t take long to grab some and have my groceries packed up.  I get some odd stares as I am leaving the store but that is okay.  There are a couple of bonuses to using paper over plastic bags.  The first one is that Emma and Mckenzi have brown bags to use for crafts and creating wraping paper.  The other bonus I get from Sobey’s is when I bring my bags back to reuse, I am credited 3 cents for each bag.  It is little, but it all adds up.  Another plus about using paper bags from Sobey’s is they have handles which makes carrying the bags to and from the car alot easier.  I am slowly purchasing cloth bags to use and keep always in my car.  I buy alot of groceries each week and need alot of bags.  It is my goal that by the summer time I will have enough cloth bags to use for all my shopping.

I was have a discussion recently with a family member regarding the environment.  She sounded defeated and unmotivated to make small changes in and around her life.  The conversation didn’t go far, but I think about if often.  I wonder what it will take for each person to start making greener choices in their lives. 

The real motivator for me was Emma and Hannah.  I want them to be civic minded, caring, helping adults and the only way to do this is to lead by example.  I hope that as they are growing up they are watching Steve and I make healthy choices, not just for our bodies and minds, but for our world too.