Tuesday, May 27, 2008

Question of the Week

Do you recycle?

I have to say that I'm better at re-purposing than I am at recycling.

This morning, however, I set up some boxes in the garage for recycling--glass, paper, plastic, aluminum, and cardboard.

My little town doesn't make recycling very easy. They take only paper and plastic bags, but, I just realized that we drive by the BIG recycling center in Colorado Springs every single Sunday on our way to church, so I'm determined to make a trip every couple of weeks throughout the summer.

Our Daisy troop did a study on recycling earlier this month, and in anticipation of the meeting, I saved as much plastic, cardboard, paper, glass, etc, as I could. I was amazed at what my family generated in less than one week. I think that was what got me motivated.

I'm just curious how many of you recycle too.

25 comments:

Deidre said...

I've only been recycling for about a year and still don't do as much as I should. We recycle plastic drink bottles, food containers and detergent bottles along with glass food containers, etc. We don't really have a lot of newspaper around here, but when we do, I recycle that.

I need to research a little and see what more we could do.

Meredith said...

We try a little-mostly the newspaper, milk bottles, laundry bottles and boxes.

Betsy said...

Definitely! We have TWO bins actually.

Kelly said...

I'm ashamed to say that I've never been good at recycling. But our town just made trash so great because they went to a new system where every family gets two huge barrels - one for trash and one for recycling and they have a label on the barrel with everything you can put in there. So since then - I have gotten much better at it. I'm trying to do my little part.......

Gretchen said...

Good for you! We recycle very easily at home (glass, cans, bottles, and all sorts of paper), and when we're at the beach house, if we don't have a "run" for the recycling/dump, we'll just haul it home and put it in the weekly bin.

xxxooogretchen

Anonymous said...

Don't feel bad. There is a reason why recycling is the last in the reduce, reuse, and recycle list. Recycling takes the mst energy. If we all reduce and reused that would be the best.
Blessings

Rae said...

I'm on the East Coast and recycling is a big thing. Our town picks up our recycling curbside. Our bins are overflowing each week. My girls really get into the sorting of paper, plastic, etc.

Holly said...

Nope. Right now, it is just one more thing to juggle :o) But I plan to again in the future!

Holly said...

Oh, but now that I think about it...we do recycle magazines and our milk from the dairy reuses the containers. Yay!

Leigh Ann said...

This subject has totally been on my mind lately. I have got to figure out how my little town does recycling. I am determined to start this summer.

Trish said...

It is strange to hear of a town that does not offer curb-side recycling, I thought every town in America did..........

For as long as I can remember (in my adulthood!)we have had curb-side service for everything.......newpapers, plastic, paper, tin cans, metal cans, oil,......even our yard debris goes to a seperate recycling center and is made into compost.

Although the pacific nw is known to be more environmentally conscious/granola/tree-hugger type I thought everyone just recylced because it was easy to do!

Anonymous said...

Yep, we do here. But our city makes it pretty dog-gone easy. And if you DON'T recycle, your friends give you dirty looks.

:)

Kim Heinecke said...

I'm making baby steps.
As I get older, I'm much more aware of being "responsible" with stuff...

Tami said...

We are a recycling family. My boys like to help me by taking things to our recycle bags.

Elizabeth said...

The town where we live makes it downright difficult to recycle, and they charge you. It stinks, because we use to recycle everything we could. I try to collect things and take them to friends for them to drop off at the recycle station, but it's a pain and I tend to let things pile up so much that we end up throwing them away.

JenB said...

We recycle but we have curbside pick-up so it's super easy. And it's the same day as trash pick-up so it all gets done at the same time.

Jennifer said...

We do here.........newspapers, cans, etc. But we have to take them into the city (45 min. away) to 'turn in'. Unfortunately our town decided that recycling wasn't worth it and eliminated the program. With the price of gas I have to admit that we haven't been doing it as much. The one thing that we can do locally are newspapers because the school has a huge bin for them.

Marc and Charity said...

We have to recycle- we get a fine from the city if we don't! We have big green bags that we have to use and they are picked up curbside every other week.

Jenster said...

Hi Mer! (I see Gretchen is one of your friends, too. :o)

I was never much of a recycler because where we lived in Arkansas didn't make it very easy. But we have recycling pick up every week - glass, plastic, newspaper, cardboard - it's great! So yes, I am a recycler now.

Jenn said...

We have recycled for the past 5 years, but our city makes it VERY easy for us. We have a bin the same size as our trash can and we just dump all things that can be recycled in the bin. At the recycling plant they do all the sorting of paper, plastic, etc.

I am always shocked how our recycle bin is always as full as our trash can!

Karla Porter Archer said...

we used to recycle all the time. But when we moved into our apartment here we stopped because we have to take it over to the place ourselves.

But thanks to pressure from my daughter, we are recycling again.

xo ~K

His Girl said...

I am in the same boat as Jenn... but sometimes when the kids want to make money, I let them keep the cans out & turn them in for cash :)

Brenda said...

I do have a couple of bins for recycling since the city picks it up every week. I think I'm more like you as far as repurposing goes.
God bless,
Brenda :)

Cristina said...

Ok ~ this isn't about recycling. I was wondering if you could tell me about the free movie nights in Castle Rock that I read about on Amy's blog. I can't find anything online. Thanks!

*carrie* said...

Mer,

Recycling is really important to me. We're having to set up a new system now that we're in a new house but we have something going in the meantime.

I'm trying to become better at repurposing. Moving so much stuff has made me even more aware of how much we already have.