Happy Belated Earth Day!

Isn’t it amazing how quickly things get away from you? I’ve had so much swimming through my head this last couple of weeks that I missed one post, then another and before I knew it an entire week had gone by!

Somewhere in the middle of the day-to-day efforts to do laundry, grocery shop, learn to cook gluten-free, create the illusion of clean children, and get my tired butt to work, I decided to do my best to embrace Earth Day. We’re a pretty environmentally conscious family (and, on that topic, I also learned how to make my own laundry detergent last week, thanks Nicole!) but we don’t always make a conscious effort to celebrate Earth Day. This year though, something made me want to use the day as a “teachable” one – to remind the kids why we recycle, how we can repurpose and what we can do to support the good health of our planet. It turned into a weekend of celebrations – yay!

The Friday before Earth Day was beautiful so my daughter and I spent her day off from school planting seeds in recycled egg cartons, making a bird feeder out of a toilet paper roll and repurposing an ice cream bucket to make a new home for a very overgrown house plant. By Earth Day on Sunday, the weather was turning cold and grey but our little “Earth girl” was determined that she needed to pick up garbage in the neighbourhood to help keep the planet clean. I’m so proud of her persistence! She and her Dad did the majority of the work while my son and I did some shopping at our local bulk store (great gluten-free stuff and buy in bulk so less packaging!) but we managed to get through it fast enough to go help them with the garbage clean-up. All I can say is – all you coffee drinkers out there, recycle your cups AND lids, please don’t toss them on the side of the street!

We had planned to finish off our Earth Day by seeing Disney’s Chimpanzee but it wasn’t playing in our small community. Did any of you see it? What did you think? Will my 5-year-old animal scientist be traumatized or will it renew her love of all animals?

Overall I’m pretty proud of what we accomplished through our Earth Weekend. Everybody was reminded of the little things we could do to help keep our planet clean and beautiful for us and for those who come after us.

Pea seeds planted in a recycled egg carton. Unfortunately, we had some cold, wet weather after planting them so we'll see if they survive. Weird Spring weather!

Bird feeder made from a toilet paper roll, sunflower seed butter and bird seed.

An ice cream tub from our recycling bin was repurposed with fabric scraps and glue to become a new home for an overgrown plant.