Three Gifts Challenge

Lately it seems like all you hear in the news is global warming and carbon footprint, but these issues are so important to the health of the world that they can't be ignored. This weekend my kids and I had a discussion about how much one person (me) can effectively do to help global warming.

Today I found the Three Gifts Challenge through another blog that I read occasionally and thought the idea was great. (It looks like another blog to add. I knew this blog and RSS thing would get out of hand, and it is getting that way quickly. Thank goodness for Google Reader offline)

Information from her blog post that I found interesting were that the US uses 380 billion plastic grocery bags each year, and that the five most environmentally damaging personal waste items are polystyrene foam, AA batteries, cooking oil, disposable diapers, and cigarette butts. See the link above for more details.

Her challenge is to give up or modify three things that damage the environment. So here are my three things to give up.

1. Plastic grocery bags. If I don't take my shopping basket or tote bags, I don't stop at the grocery.
2. Batteries. I do use rechargables, but I also buy batteries pretty regularly if I forget to recharge. From now on no books on tape without rechargables.
3. Plastic water bottles. I don't buy these very often and when I do I recycle. Quitting Pepsi has also cut my use of plastic bottles, but from now on my family (the 'family' part makes it a challenge) will not buy water or soft drinks in plastic bottles.

Now, I'm challenging anyone who reads this to come up with their own challenges. Everyone working together can make a difference.