It ain't easy being Green...

Paul and I have been on a quest to reduce and reuse and minimize our carbon foot print as much as we can. We take and use our own bags when doing any sort of shopping. We have our own reusable produce bags we use when getting groceries. We walk, ride our bikes or take public transit, and do not own a vehicle. When we need a car we rent or lately we got Zip Car here in Cham-Bana (Champaign-Urbana, IL) where you book a car for an hour or whatever you need and return it when your done which is really cool, a car without the commitment.

We still have a problem with using paper towels, which we are working on. I went and got these cute little everday cloth napkins to encourage us to stop with the paper towel and paper napkins. Even our cat is as green as we can be. Due to allergies and the hazards of clay litter for both humans and felines, we use recycle pine litter..which if you have a cat is the best stuff ever! Fully biodegradable and it smells like pine. What more can you ask for really.

Of course we do all the other main stuff, recycle, and use re-usable bottles and such, but we still felt like we had a lot of organic waste. Paul has been talking about getting a composter for our yard, but where we rent and have an odd neighbor who claims our yard as his territory we didn't feel he would be okay with this. When our anniversary came around I looked at getting a apartment size composter which you keep inside. They run about 2 to 3 hundred, a bit steep for my budget. Then I came across and book on worm composting. I had a friend who way back had a worm compost in her apartment and she swore by it. To be honest the idea of worms hanging out in my house didn't appeal to me, but I knew Paul would enjoy the book. Next thing I know he found this guy on line Uncle Jim, who sells worms by the pound. Before I knew it, we were at the hardware store buying a home for our future housemates. Well they arrived today..Ladies and Gentlemen, meet the Wormsteins....


Apparently if maintained correctly they will never smell. Tell that to the cat who has her face to the air holes....What do they eat? Well they like all organic material, newspaper, coffee grounds, veggie scraps, no dairy or meat though. So far we have a mutual agreement, they stay in the dark little confines of their home, and keep quiet, and I will let them stay.