Earth Month 2009 Initiatives

We are all aware that Earth Day is on April 22. However, have you heard of Earth Month? Earth Month takes place the entire month of April when people all around the world are out to make the earth a better, cleaner place. You may be wondering what you can do to celebrate this month of earthly cleansing. These are a few of my ideas to help you and me go green without going nuts!

1. During Earth Month, cut down your shower time to save water. This may be hard at first, but the more conscious you become, the better you'll do. Ladies, while shaving, turn off the water. You'd be surprised by how much water you waste while shaving. Also, turn off the water while doing things like brushing your teeth. If you do this for a month, chances are, you'll carry over you new good habit, to the next month.

2. Spend this Earth Month replacing your regular light bulbs with energy-efficient CFL bulbs. You don't have to do them all the same time. Pick one or two rooms a week, and replace the bulbs in any lights there. CLF bulbs tend to be more expensive, but they use less energy, and you have to replace less often.

3. Invest in local produce. Lots of fuel and money is spent delivering food across states, and sometimes, even countries. These are called "food miles." As an alternative, buy whatever is in season, locally. Yes, this may mean that your favorite produce may not be available, but if you are committed to buying locally, it won't matter too much. If you want to go even more locally, plant your own garden with your favorite produce. It'll also be nice to get out in the fresh spring air for Earth Month.

4. Make recycling your Earth Month activity. You don't have to try to tackle recycling everything that can be recycled. Try starting with aluminum cans. Reserve a trash bag, trash can, or recycle bin especially for each recyclable. To ensure you don't get overwhelmed, turn in your recycling once a week. Drop it off at your nearby recycling location. Some rural areas have recycle drop-offs at the local dump. If you live in a city, you may have someone to pick it up every week. If you live in participating states, you can sometimes get money for your recyclables like cans, plastic bottles, and glass bottles.

5. One simple Earth Month initiative is to control your laundry. This entails a lot of things. If you're someone who can stand to wear an outfit, or at least just pants or just shirts more than once, that's good. You won't fill up your hamper as quickly. Try not to do your laundry if your hamper is a half or less full. Try to avoid doing laundry and wasting water, until you have a full load or more. This might mean that you can go from doing laundry once or twice a week, to twice a month. Lastly, if you're still using regular detergent, switch to concentrated detergent and stretch your bottle.

6. As far as easy goes, this last Earth Month initiative is probably the easiest-- turn off your lights. We have a tendencies to leave things on when not in use. When you leave a room, just flip the switch off. It's not that hard to flip it back on. Start with this, and move on to things like cutting off the television and radios, when not in use.

There you have it. Six easy ways to go green for Earth Month this year. Feel free to be creative and find other ways to celebrate.