BYOB

BYOB, aka 'Bring Your Own Bag'. This is a really simple way to incorporate sustainable principles into your own life. Next time you go to the grocery store, grab a couple canvas bags, or even the plastic bags you brought home with you last time. If you drive to the grocery store, keep some spare bags in the car so they're on hand if you make an impromptu grocery run.

Here are a few statistics to really get you motivated (from idealbite.com):
- In the U.S. 12 million barrels of oil go to producing plastic bags and 14 million trees go to producing paper bags.
- Some stores will give you a 5 cent discount if you bring your own bags (thats 5 cents per bag, it could add up... eventually).
- Plastic bags often escape the trash and become a nuisance to marine life. They are one of the most commonly found items in coastal cleanups. If you do end up bringing home plastic bags, try and find somewhere to recycle them (Whole Foods stores usually have a bin for those), or if you toss them tie them so they can't catch air and fly out of the land fill and into the ocean.

To get resusable bags, pick some up at the grocery store, or you can check out one of these links to buy some online:
http://www.reusablebags.com/store/plastic-bags-blow-tote-reusable-shopping-p-523.html
http://www.biobags.com
http://www.chicobag.com
http://www.wolavers.com/home/merchandise.html
http://www.bluelotusblankets.com/products/bags/
http://www.cafepress.com/ecoresponsible.59429148
http://www.reusablebags.com/store/shopping-bags-c-2.html

Or, make your own! Check out these links for directions on how to knit sturdy bags (or other things) out of your old plastic grocery bags:
http://www.knitting.about.com/gi/dynamic/offsite.htm?site=http://oma57.tripod.com/cleobag.html
http://www.homesteadweaver.com/plasticbagrugs.htm

A Sand County Almanac

To start off this blog, I'd like to introduce everyone to a book that inspired me. A Sand County Almanac by Aldo Leopold is a collection of short stories written by an amazing writer and naturalist. He was a great man with a long career in land management and was even an advisor on conservation to the United Nations. Pick up this book (try and find it used) and I promise you will not be disappointed.

"Like winds and sunsets, wild things were taken for granted until progress began to do away with them. Now we face the question whether a still higher 'standard of living' is worth its cost in things natural, wild, and free. For us of the minority, the opportunity to see geese is more important than television, and the chance to find a pasque-flower is a right as inalienable as free speech." -from the foreward