Everyone is talking about going green and wondering what they can do. One easy transition to a greener home is reducing your energy consumption by changing out your traditional incandescent light bulbs for compact fluorescent ones, or CFLs. CFLs use about a quarter of power to operate. If you have a fixture that you would use a 60w incandescent in you would use a 14w CFL. However, unlike incandescent bulbs that put out a warm color temperature, CFLs come in different temperatures such as daylight, bright white, and soft light. Daylight is similar in color temperature the bright, bluish light that enters your window first thing in the morning. Bright white gives off a clean, crisp illumination ideal for kitchens, bathrooms, reading and working. Soft white gives off a warm full glow ideal for living rooms, dining rooms, bedrooms and recreation rooms.

The impact of this change is huge. If every home in America replaced just a single traditional incandescent bulb for an Energy Star rated CFL, enough energy would be saved to light more than 3 million homes and cut the greenhouse gas emissions as much as 800,000 cars! Some people are concerned with the mercury in CFLs, however no mercury is released with the bulbs are intact or in use, and if recycled properly will not end up in the environment. In addition, because CFLs use less electricity than incandescent ones, and reduce the demand of electricity, it also reduces the amount of mercury emitted into the atmosphere by power plants.

One of the things we don’t talk about much in our society is storing too much because we live in a very consumer driven economy. We tend to do a lot of thing in excess without ever really thinking about the consequences of our actions and thinking down the road. The fact that so many of us have been eating ourselves into a coma for many years without really considering what that is doing to our bodies follows the same principles of spending and borrowing money to purchase everything we think we need without considering what is going to happen down the line.

We store fat around our middles and wear it like a trophy, clothes are stored in air-conditioned warehouses for off season when we know that the next season these same clothes will be “out” and you will be enticed to purchase the latest and greatest fashions and we store away items that never see the light of day in our store rooms and sheds so either someone else will go through once we die or we finally decide that we can part with it as “it really wasn’t that important”. Most of us horde in some form or fashion and the goal is to stop. The only way I have found to make this happen is to think about others over ourselves. When we are able to do this, things tend to fall in line as they should.

I have noticed that many young people are living in a new an interesting way; minimally. They are restoring older and used furniture, lamps, interesting recyclables and rubber tires. They are restoring the furniture or turning it into new wonderful pieces of art as well as accessories of clothing and handbags. I have also noted how many of them live in homes that have very little furniture in them yet they seem to get by very well.

You might think they are the so called “hippy” generation of today but they live in some of the most expensive high rise condos in the downtown districts as well as areas where housing has been restored and renovated as opposed to being torn down and rebuilt. Some have gardens and garden terraces as well as use clothes lines again for drying laundry and many use energy star, solar or thermal in some place in and around their homes. Those of us that have been brought up in the “things” generation might do good to take a look at how the younger generation is living and mimic some of their minimal ways. If we do, together, we might just change the world.

It is amazing to me how many products I have used throughout the years on faith that they were made with good materials and were safe only to find out later that there are potential hazards that no one talked about or even knew about at the time. It’s good to know that these things are slowly coming to the forefront and into the public eye. As we become aware of these types of things we feel it is in our and your best interest to share.

One such piece of information has to do with kitchen cabinets; many contain “added urea formaldehyde” that is classified as a human carcinogen. This means “sufficient evidence of a cause and effect relationship between exposure to the material and cancer in humans. Such determination requires evidence from epidemiologic (demographic and statistical), clinical, and/or tissue/cell studies involving humans who were exposed to the substance in question.” I don’t know about you but I would like to know if my kitchen cabinets have this potential risk or not! You can go to greencabinetsource.org to find cabinets that are formaldehyde free.

We bought our plastic shed about 7 years ago when we moved into our first home. Though we didn’t plan on it, we had a son the very next year and have since added another one. At first we used the storage shed for storing furniture while getting the baby’s room put together and, over time, it has been used to hide Christmas gifts, store bikes, wagons and other kinds of kid’s toys as well as an array of garden tools and equipment. I thought about it the other day and realized I have never had to clean it or do any type of maintenance on this shed since we bought it!

When we had to leave it behind on our move to a larger house, I would have never thought I would grieve, but I did. It was like leaving an old friend behind knowing you won’t ever see them again. Kind of weird but true. However, it didn’t take us long to get a new friend because we needed one. There was no question as to what kind of shed we would be purchasing; a plastic storage shed! It’s just a bit bigger because the family is still growing and we’re going to need all the storage we can get!

Here are the top 5 reasons you should pay all your bills through your bank online.

1)      The #1 place ID Thefts happen is at your mailbox. If you receive and send sensitive mail (financial) electronically, it never hits your mailbox.

2)      Save paper thus help save the plant! It’s amazing how much paper is saved through electronic delivery. Just think if you never had to get another bill stuffed with all the other offers…

3)      Save yourself a bunch of time by setting up your bills ahead of time and never having to write check again; a lifesaver at our house!

4)      Never miss a payment due date. You can set up your bills to be paid for the entire month ahead of time and never worry about them not being sent out.

5)      Access your bills from anywhere in the world. No matter where you are (unless maybe the Amazon or Artic Circle) you can access your bills to get them paid. Now you have no excuse to travel the world over.

So it’s easy, safe, secure and accessible. So why aren’t you paying your bills online again? You may want to rethink your position and talk to your banker as it will save you time and money - and just maybe your identity.

I hate to admit it but I find that no matter how much I try to keep all the stuff I store up to date, I fail every year. Sometimes I fail because I cannot stand the thought of giving away something that was given to me by someone I no longer have ties with but don’t want to loose even though I have it placed in a box stowed away in a closet! I fail because I don’t want to throw away that old blue shirt even though I know it doesn’t have any buttons; I’ve just had it sine the sixth grade.

The rule of thumb is to give away or toss anything that you have not touched within the past year and while I do pretty well, there are certain things that are hard to part with. So I understand to some extent how people become hoarders in their homes and businesses either attached to or afraid to part with items they deem valuable, whether anyone else does or not. These are emotional ties that bind you to the past or to a feeling that is either familiar or comforting. But the truth is; it is important to move on and live in the present with what I have everyday. So good -bye blue shirt and good-bye sand from a trip from long since past; I am moving on.

Last year my office looked like a storage room, not an office were work could be done easily. I had a very large corner desk that was piled high with files not filed because the way my filing cabinet was sitting it took and act of God to get to it. I also had a small bookcase that was littered with books of all kinds and a few pictures of kids, etc. that I never looked at since it was behind me and was somewhere I just never saw. After one day of moving things around I thought, enough is enough, I have got to get this place organized!

I sold the large desk and made a simple one out of galvanized pipe and an old door and glass. I repositioned the filing cabinet for easy access as well as replace the old bookshelf with a fresh large utility shelf that ran the length of one wall. I also hung up a pegboard just like the one I have in my shop to hang up all the things that were lying around. Just a few of those items are rulers, t-squares, scissors, headphones and assorted wires and numerous things that are now organized and out of the way. A year later, everything is still in its place and I have a great office and place to work!

I just read where a University of British Columbia neuroscientists study found out that there is a lot of activity going on for those of us who daydream. This activity is in the gray matter that is dedicated to high level thought and complex problem solving. As a dedicated daydreamer who has wondered off into the world of daydreams for years, this was some good news! I remembered teachers tapping me on the head and saying, “come back to reality and pay attention!” Now I know I was giving my gray matter a work out.

It seems that most of us spend some time daydreaming and some of us spend as much as a third of our waking time out in naw-naw land but we are accomplishing something. According to the study; while we may seem like we are not paying attention in class, in meetings and such, we are really addressing many other things in our life that are important to our lives and sometimes our very survival. So if you see me looking off into the wild blue yonder, just let me be. I’ll be back with you shortly after I figure out how to save the world, or a little piece of mine.

I have just got to share his quick and easy fresh recipe with you. Our spinach is coming up really well right now, and I was looking for a way to eat them that was not really a salad, but wasn’t exactly cooked, either. So a friend suggested that I try “wilting” it. Here’s what you do:

Take a BUNCH of fresh washed and dried spinach. keep it ready to go, because everything happens really quick.

In a large soup pot over medium heat, heat up some butter and olive oil, about 2 Tablespoons of each. Mince up a clove of fresh garlic and toss it in. Stir and immediately take the pan off the heat. Throw in your spinach, add a dash of salt and some fresh ground pepper, and toss your spinach just until everything is coated.

The spinach is wilted, not completely cooked, and it still has the pleasant texture; of fresh, but is warm and loaded with lots of additional flavor! Go ahead and plate it up, and squeeze fesh lemon juice over it at the table. Yum!