Meet The Families / The Hardings

I cannot believe how fast the challenge went! I am kind of bummed that it is officially over, but I know I will continue my new habits. I actually thought it became pretty easy to remember my cup and get my Americano to go. A co-worker just brought in an old espresso machine to the office yesterday too so that is going to be great!

After I realized I could do the coffee cup thing without too much stress, I started to focus on the baggie situation that I have. Again, my husband is really good at this, but I was raised with baggies in my house - for everthing. I am trying to use containers for partially used produce to store in the fridge. For my work snacks, I just bring the whole container of things now instead of small bags each day. I have plenty of room in my desk drawer for almonds, pretzels, etc.

It feels like my contribution to the planet was pretty small, but if I think of it beyond just these 30 days, I realize that if I change these habits for life, it really is a great big thing I am doing for myself, my family and especially my kids!

I have had a great time doing this - sorry I didn't get better photos posted. I think I needed 30 days to practice with the photos and now I am ready to be a true blogger! Thank you for this opportunity! I have really enjoyed it.

The photos attached are ones that I had hoped to post earlier. One of my family at Mount St. Helens, one of the coffee cup, keys and cell phone. Once the coffee cup makes it to the sacred place of staying with the keys and cell phone - you know it's for good! And then my sweet boy on the computer with my favorite cup right by him.

Enjoy!

I am not the kind of person that is incredibly chatty with the coffee shop folks, usually I need my coffee before I start chatting. But yesterday the guy commented on my personal cup and said, "wow - that is the cup of the future." I thought that was great and I was so proud of my to go cup that I told him all about the challenge and we got into a big discussion about reusing in general and how many cups they go through in a day, week, etc. I realized that is what the challenge is really all about - telling everyone what I am up to and why. Spreading the word. It's been really exciting to be a part of it and I look forward to continuing and adding other reusable aspects to my life.

I did use another paper cup last weekend though but I comletely justified it. We were spending the night at a friends place after going to the University of Oregon football game. My four year old stayed up until 10:00, and the baby is a baby, so enough said there. The night was terrible, all around - all kids waking up repeatedly and then getting up extremely early. In an attempt not to awaken our hosts, I took my son to safeway to get some breakfast. I hit the starbucks inside and realized I would have to get a paper cup. I almost spent the $6.95 for the clearance to go mug, but I really don't need another one. To make up for it, I used that same cup for a refill at the gas station for our drive back to Portland and I felt a bit better about using it 2 times.

Okay....so I am reluctant to count this, but I did use a paper, disposable cup yesterday. I did great in the morning, brought my cup full of coffee made at home - and then I had a long, kind of boring afternoon training at work and they had coffee. I was so happy to see it - that I quickly grabbed a cup and filled it up. After that I was thinking - what should I do in those situations? I guess I should have had my cup with me at all times, but I was downtown in Portland with enough things to carry from the parking garage, etc.

Unfortunately, this challenge doesn't really effect the whole family as much as I had hoped. It's really about me remembering to bring the cup. I am trying to train my husband to help me get the reusable cups cleaned out each day/night because for some reason he will do a great job cleaning up everything in the whole kitchen, but he will leave my coffee cup. Once we get that settled, I should be good to go!