Mother's going GREEN Day 77 - Light Shade of Green Vacation

Well our family is back safe and sound from our vacation. Very tiring but very enjoyable at the same time. A nice break.

Attempted as much as possible to stay on my green track but I will admit being on a vacation away from home does present many challenges. I am sad to admit that I did succumb to many of the not so green activities.....

I did pick up a plastic bag or 2 - those Disney bags - I felt I needed one as a souvenir - why I am not sure.

Although we took our Klean Kanteen water bottles with us we still used some plastic bottles - boy is it ever hot in California, and we needed lots of cool drinking water. We purchased some cold bottles of water the first day but did reuse them (not recommended because of the plastic) but it was only for a few days... I came up with a great way to keep the refilled bottles cooled - I packed them into a soft sided cooler - filled it with ice and kept it in the bottom of the stroller - we had cold water all day. The melted ice (water) I then sprinkled in one of the many flower beds thus reusing the water.

Food was another source of a challenge of staying green. We did pack several organic snacks from home which we ate as snacks and for breakfast had cereal which we purchased there but for lunch and dinner we had fast food or either ate at restaurants. But I can say at least we put in the effort.

Staying in the hotel room was the easiest - I managed to do everything I set out to do in an earlier blog - so that's one good green thing.

Souvenirs - now that was a real challenge especially for the kids - so many toys and paraphernalia with lots of packaging but we did let them get a couple of things. For myself I managed to pick up a 100% cotton dress and a beautiful paper sun hat. It says it is paper but it looks like a straw hat. Both natural and zero packaging. The biggest souvenir will be all the pictures we took and ticket stubs, maps etc. I will be making each of my kids a "memory" book of their vacation.

Lessons learned: It is tough to maintain your green status on a holiday, especially when you are fairly new to the green thing. But we learn from experience and next time I know I will be better prepared especially when it comes to the food - I would say that was our biggest downfall.

Mother's going GREEN - Day 65 to Day 76 - On Vacation

VACATION To all my blog readers - I am now on vacation. Started a little earlier than expected as there was a very large "rock slide" blocking our quick way out to the airport. We now have to take a 10 hour detour to get to the city and our trip. With 3 kids we will probably need to make several stops on the way so we will be leaving a day earlier to compensate for this. An unexpected road trip (not great for the environment and not at all good for my one tank of gas a month challenge - to my friends at Our Green Year - does this constitute as an emergency?)

The rockslide has closed the road for approximately 5 days they (the news) is saying. It is believed that no one has been injured or killed - thank goodness. It did happen late at night.

I will blog as soon as I return (Sunday August 10, 2008) with some more tips on green travelling and to report on how we 'greened' our vacation.....

Mother's going GREEN Day 64 - Cloth Diapers and Vacation

As those of you already know from reading my blog on a regular basis, I use cloth diapers on my baby and love them. Deciding to go on vacation brought on a challenge of keeping the cloth diapers clean. Although I probably could find a laundromat near the hotel I am staying in - did I really want to spend every second evening washing diapers after a fun filled day which would probably leave me exhausted? What about the film of 'bad' detergent left behind in those washers and driers? And I do not think I could trust the hotel laundry service to use a natural detergent. You see one of the things with cloth diapers is you do need to wash them with care and with a natural detergent in order for them to retain their absorbency...

Hence, for our vacation I opted to go with a disposable diaper. Now not any disposable diaper would do. My babies bum has been chemical free for sometime now and I hated the thought of placing a 'disposable diaper' on her bottom. My search began for a 'natural disposable' diaper. I did find a few out there Seventh Generation and Nature Babycare to name a couple. I choose to go with Nature Babycare. The packaging is 100% biodegradable. The diaper is too. Now I know that is not 100% accurate of anything as it still finds its way into a landfill where the conditions are not quite right for it to degrade as it should, but at least it is a possibility and made from all natural ingredients and is cholrine free.

To read more on this diaper and the company behind it, visit: http://www.naty.com/.

Okay, so I am cheating on my cloth diapers but only for a few days..... I will be back to them as soon as I get home.