Followup on Homemade Laundry Soap

Well, we've been using the homemade stuff for awhile now and still like it. We've made it easier on ourselves by getting a bigger food processor, one that has the power to take care of the soap. One thing I did start to notice recently was that our towels were starting to smell like mildew. I knew our washing machine had to have the door left open to keep it from smelling that way, but this was getting worse every week, so I had to do some more research to find a solution or else we'd have to replace our towels and likely go back to commercial detergents. Luckily my research gave me something to try and it has worked. The recipe for our detergent is now:


2 cups of grated Fels Naptha soap
1 cup of Borax
1 cup of Washing Soda
1/2 cup of oxygen cleaner (like Oxyclean, but we didn't buy the name brand stuff)

It took probably a good half dozen washes to finally start getting the smell out (it was really set in), but in the end we saved our towels and my nose. :)

Social network? How do you figure?

I just read a comment someone wrote about Facebook. It wasn't long, it just contained a short quip about the user's mom and what she said about it. What she said was that ever since Facebook became popular and everyone started using it she, being one of the few who doesn't use it, has lost track of what is going on with the people she knows. She used to get the occasional e-mail or phone call, but now, nothing. This brought to mind the fact that, though they call it a social network, Facebook is more like a social cop-out. I know some of you will argue this, that it is a great way to be more involved in the life of others, but I am going to post my thoughts on it.

Now, to make sure it is clear, I hardly log in to Facebook, let alone actually use it. Every time I log in to it I see random comments that to understand I would have to read millions of posts from many people to get a somewhat hazy picture of what the poster might actually be talking about, I just don't have the patience to figure out someone else's drama, so I avoid Facebook and if anyone messages me on it I usually don't see it until much later. Anyway, that being said here is why I feel that using a social network to connect with others is really just a way to not do it.

Our communication skills have been getting worse as our technology improves. It used to be you had to travel somewhere to talk to someone and that made it a very special occasion to get to catch up with them. Then at some point we started sending messages, like mail, with someone to be delivered. This made it possible for us to keep up on the more recent events but it was still special to see people, this was actually an improvement. The next thing that happened is we could call someone and talk to them, hearing someone's voice can be very comforting and also gives us a more instant connection to people, talking on the phone can still be quite personal, though a letter is more heartfelt and visiting in person is still the best way to connect with someone. The next things that happened were technology, we started sending e-mails, still something we could personalize, like a letter, except that it arrived nearly instantly. We eventually moved on to paging people or sending text messages, which limited the things we could say which changed our language and degraded our skills in actually writing. Then we continued down this path and eventually arrived with social networks. Now, instead of sending a person a letter, calling someone specifically or using any other of the past points of contact we can just post our thoughts to everyone in general and if we want to connect with someone specifically we "like" their post or say something short and truly pathetic in terms of comfort to what we previously had. So, instead of making single, personal connections that take time out of our lives and let people know we care, we instead can put this little "social" blurbs about what's going on and let people know we saw they wrote something. Don't you feel so much closer now to the person who said, "Yeah, that sucks" to you when you shared your absolutely worst experience ever with them? Yeah, I don't either.

So, to keep with the theme of this blog, your life will be quite a bit greener if you take some time to really connect with others. Give someone a call or write them a letter, it will make them feel better and in turn you'll feel better as well, especially if they take the time to write a letter back.

As a side note, I must add this as well. Social networks aren't all evil, they do have some benefits for people that really don't have much time in the day and need to connect somehow. My wife for example pointed out that it helps her feel less lonely in the day and she doesn't really have the ability to call someone or write a letter when she's watching two young children. So yes, they have their place, but my argument is that they aren't always as social as they are made to be.

Home Solar Followup

What an interesting year it has been for me. Back in February, when I was hoping that the solar install would happen our energy provider decided to stop handing out rebates, which was essential for my lease to work. So I played the waiting game, following up every few weeks with my project manager to see what was going on and finally, after a few more anxious months, my panels were installed in July. Strangely though, the delay was actually a very good thing for us. You see, we got a good hail storm about a month and a half before the panels were installed and my insurance, after taking a look at my roof, bought me a new roof. So the same week we were looking at getting the panels done was the week we ended up getting a new roof and the following week the panels were up. Once they were there it took another couple of weeks before everything could be turned on, once again having to wait on our energy company. However, once it was all done and everything was hooked up I got to turn it on and then followed up on it every day for the first week looking at the numbers. Now, I don't think about it as much, its there and doing what it needs to, I've received two bills that were lower than they normally are, which is good.

One thing that made me a bit sad was that when the panels were installed a new meter was installed as well, a digital one, so I can't actually go watch it spin backwards any more. Oh well, it's not the end of the world, but it still would have been fun to watch. As of this morning my system has generated 855.4kWh of energy, this offsets about 253.9lbs of coal or saves about 3/5 of a tree or about a half a barrel of oil. It doesn't sound like much, but every little bit helps, plus my wallet and budget are a bit happier now and will stay happier longer as energy prices continue to go up.

To finalize my thoughts on it this morning I am still glad I went with this option, Sungevity was great to work with and I am very happy with product they have leased to me. I would definitely recommend anyone who can to check them out, they have been growing a lot lately and if they are in your area they might be able to save you some money in the long run as well. Be sure to use my referral number when you get your quote:


1.) Go to www.Sungevity.com
2.) Enter your address and information. When the site asks "How did you hear about us?" type in my referral code 44120 so you can get the $500 gift card bonus.
3.) In 24 hours, you'll receive your free, no obligation iQuote in your email inbox.

Netflix

After ditching the cable oh so many years ago (has it really been 4 years already?) and going with over the air television for quite a while, I decided, after hearing about their streaming service, to try out Netflix. I have to say, it was great. It was affordable and so long as we watched at least 2 movies a week it paid for itself when compared to Redbox (which is another good option for the occasional movie watcher). However, with recent changes I have rid myself of Netflix's services. The prices have gone up and they separated their DVD and streaming service. I would have kept the streaming except for one thing I heard. They were losing their deal with Starz, which wouldn't have affected most people, but for us it is a real deal killer. You see, the streaming was great for my daughter who loves to have the TV on, not to watch, usually, but to have the noise. With the coming loss of that content our selection would be pitiful and so I had to say fair-well to them. This however gave me a hole in my budget, I already had allocated money for Netflix and so now I could take this money and move it towards buying more DVDs, which I have done. So, with this change and going back to using our local library and Redbox some more, I am probably saving more money than I was spending, just without the convenience. I will still recommend the service as an alternative to cable, but not as a way to get what you weren't getting anyway.

Now for my next task in making life convenient for my family, figuring out how to create a digital media center for all those DVDs so I don't have to get up and put them in the tray and then wait for them to load.

Rethink Processes

I was talking to someone I work with yesterday about how difficult it is for them to make meals, not that they didn't have time but that when they finished making them they didn't want to eat them right away, instead they wanted to rest afterwards for a few hours. This got me thinking about how we all have processes and everyone seems to adopt them in the same way that they observed someone else do them. For the most part you can see what works for someone and see if it works for you, but what happens if it doesn't? Do you give up the good thing you could have if you did this process or do you force yourself to do it anyway? The problem with forcing yourself is that you won't really enjoy it and if you give up the good things how will you change? I thought about the problem that was presented to me and gave the coworked a different perspective on it.

What I asked was why dinner had to be prepared before dinner time. I mean, if you eat very late which we all know isn't very good for you because you're spending the time making the meal, is it really worth it? Probably not, you might be negating the benefits of the good food by eating it at a time that your body would rather be settling down for bed. So my suggestion was this: make the meals in advance. Use a slow cooker and have the food cooking while you're at work and in order to save yourself from having to get up so early to prepare it, do all the preparations after you have eaten dinner. That way instead of making dinner before eating you're making it afterwards for the next day which will help you to eat earlier instead of later. This works for other things as well, just because it is normally done one way by most people doesn't mean that's the way you have to do it.

I look at recipes as more a basic set of instructions to be loosely followed. With that kind of mindset I can go from making what it says to creating what I would rather have. I often do this with soups and casseroles because I don't have everything they ask for and normally they turn out pretty good with the changes I make. Some of the processes I change aren't always for the better either, at least not for everyone, but they work better for me and makes it more of my own so that I can actually remember it. I often did this in math class when I was in school, skipping steps or doing two parts of it at once. I did this because I saw it as redundant and it drove my teachers crazy, they would always ask how I got there and tell me to show my work, which I would point out I did but I just cut out the extra steps (and my answer was right, so did it really matter that I did it their way?). There are many processes we follow in life, some are good as they are but others can be changed to accomodate your own lifestyle. Perhaps there is a time that works better for you to do something, it may not be normal, but if it works and doesn't disturb other people's processes I would say go for it, take that task and make it your own.

Homemade Laundry Soap

Recently while trying to figure out more ways to save some money in my monthly budget I came across an article talking about making my own laundry soap. Now, this isn't the first time I heard about it, my wife had mentioned it to me before but as I had not been researching I hadn't listened all that much. After reading the article I did some searching and found several recipes for the soap. At our house we prefer the dry stuff, so that narrowed it down for me which one I might like to try. Then I looked into what was in it and how much work it looked like. In the end, it didn't look too hard and the soap only contains 3 ingredients. To start off I wanted to test it to see if it would even work for us, so the first thing I did was went and bought the cheapest of the ingredients I could get. All these ingredients were found at my local grocery store, they were a box of Borax, a box of Washing Soda and some Ivory soap. I also had to buy a grater because I don't like the idea of using the same grater for soap as I do for my cheese. I then followed the very simply instructions.

Grate 2 cups of soap
Mix with 1 cup of Borax and 1 cup of Washing Soda

That was it, once I had mixed it to my liking we had laundry soap. We tested it out and found that our clothes looked clean and didn't have any smell (it's odd to smell clothes that haven't been perfumed, they don't really smell like anything). We tried it out on a few loads of laundry and found that the fabric didn't quite feel as soft. So after a bit more reading I found out we could use plain white vinegar for a fabric softener. We tried this out and it worked wonderfully, so the next logical step for us was to see what happened if we tried to get rid of the dryer sheet. What we discovered was a lot of static and so I had to do more research and found a few things to try. We tried using tin foil balls, but these did not work for us, so then we went and found those fancy blue dryer balls that they sold on TV, it took some searching but we eventually found them (the store we were shopping at didn't even think they had them). Once we had these and tried them out we found that they helped. They didn't remove all the static, but enough of it to make us happy. So once we finish using up all our name brand stuff I think we're going to be a bit greener for the environment and stop using all these chemicals to clean our clothes.

Oh, and if the environment isn't enough, I found that each load of laundry would save us around 5 cents. If you do 10 loads a week that's 50 cents, which is $2 a month or $24 a year. If that isn't enough, then add in what you save by not buying dryer sheets, I'm guessing for us it comes close to $70 a year and that is an amount I can do something with. Oh, and we have an HE washer, seems to be fine with this homemade stuff, we use about 1/8 cup (2 Tablespoons) of soap per load for our average sized load and it takes 1/4 a cup of plain white vinegar. So, having tried this I am ready to move to the next step and buy the soap they recommend, which is Fels-Naptha. When I have this and try it out I'll probably be writing some more, though from what everyone else says about it this stuff is great. So, though it originally sounded like too much work, it turned out that it was quite easy to make our own laundry soap.

Solio Charger

Sometimes you find things you like, other times you are given things you like. A couple months ago I was given a Solio Classic Solar Charger, I haven't used it as much as I like, but that is mostly because I'm a bit lazy, but thinking about it, this device is great! I have no idea what kind of money I save using it, but I do like the fact that it is doing something for me. This device charges an internal battery using light from the sun, I just stick it in a window and let it sit there when I'm not needing it. Right now, because it is winter, it doesn't charge very fast, it takes a few days to get anything usable for me, so the only thing I charge with it usually is my cell phone. But even one device can make a difference. Each little thing you and everyone else does adds up, we can have a much greener existence if we all do little things. I'm not saying everyone needs to go out and get these little solar devices, but making any little change in your life can make things better for everyone.

My journey with solar is just beginning, since entering into a lease with Sungevity I have been looking more and more into what I can do. I am looking forward to the warm season because I have many things I want to work on, one of the biggest being the yard. My yard is currently a haven for weeds, I plan to change that this year. But I also have a shed that needs some work and my plan is to eventually get a solar powered light in there as well and turn the shed into a workspace for me. I'm looking forward to planting the garden, it uses the sun too. I have ideas and plans and things to try, I'll only get to do a few of them, but I wish I could do more of them. One of the things that I love about this little device I was given is the fact that I, being lazy, have unplugged the charger for my cell phone from the wall. Yeah, that should have been something I normally did, but I didn't. Having unplugged it I know I am saving more energy, those things draw power just by being plugged in, they don't have to be charging anything to cost you money. If I can keep that unplugged and charge my phone only using the solar charger I will be thrilled.

For me, this is more than just a choice, it is a challenge. I want to take some more time this year improving my life, greening it up in ways that I dream of but have not implemented yet and to find new dreams to pursue as well. I don't want to get my solar panels and say, "Great, I've done my part." I want to say, "Wow, look at that, what a great start. Now, what's next on my list?" This solar charger is more than just a neat device to me, it is a challenge to change, to make a difference with my life by making good choices and finding ways to improve it. Oh, how I love finding passion for things, now to fight to keep that passion going.

Computers

Most computers are given a life of about 3 to 6 years, at least that's what most companies want you to believe. 4 years is probably the longest warranty I see most companies offer, but 3 is a bit more common. Now, if you get a warranty or not is up to you and you can decide what it is worth to ensure the computer keeps running, for me it is more of a question of how much I just spent and would I be very upset to have it break in that time and not have it under warranty. That being said, I am not advising for or against warranties. What I do want to note is that a warranty shows you roughly how long they expect your computer to last before you replace it. You see, after the warranty period is when they would expect it to start failing, though from what I've seen, if its made it that far without problem it might make it quite a bit farther. The real issue comes though in people's perceived notion that when it is out of warranty it is no longer any good. Granted it is old as far as technology goes, but chances are that the computer can still give you quite a few more years without having to put much money into it. I myself have bought 3 new computers in my life, all laptops. Each one I bought was because I didn't know better than to buy them. Now, after learning a few things, I would probably not buy any new computers unless I had a very specific reason for needing them (such as, I can't build/find/refurbish one that has the specs I need).

So what do I do? I get used computers, this is a double green for me, it is good for my budget and it is good for the environment, reuse is always better than any other choice when it comes to going green for the planet. Where do these computers come from? Well, there are plenty of businesses who get rid of old equipment and lots of home users who just recycle them through the company they just bought the new one from. I am willing to bet you might be able to talk them out of one of the computers or at least get one for pretty cheap if you're on good terms with them. Then you can rebuild it to suit your needs. Here are the most common things that need to be done to computers to bring them up to a good, working condition.

First, I verify the computer has enough RAM, I would say about a Gig at least for what I'm using, for those of you married to Microsoft you will need at least 2 Gigs. And, if you are needing Microsoft products, I need to ask, why? The OS is what slows down your computer so much, it isn't written well and has bugs and costs you more money in the long run. Anyway, short rant over. The next thing I ask myself is, do I trust this hard drive (HDD for short). If I can trust the HDD or know I won't be putting data on it that I would cry over losing I'll make sure it is big enough for my needs, if so, I keep the drive and work with it. I'll run diagnostics, most computers have this, check that it has all the screws/parts it needs to stay together and that it is in a generally good, working condition (scratches do not affect performance) and make sure the screen works. You're going to laugh at this one, but I also check the smell of the laptop too, I do not want a laptop that a former smoker used or someone spilt something on for two reasons, first, it smells horrible and second, it is more likely to break. If I decided I need more RAM or a new HDD I'll order it and wait a week for it to arrive, I have patience and don't need the computer up and running tomorrow, I'll also buy online so I can save some money.

Once I have my parts I will put them in the computer and begin my build process. The biggest decision you'll need to make is what you install on it, I highly recomming Linux as you will get more life out of your used computer with it than if you went with a commercial alternative (Microsoft Windows, see reason above). I also like that it's free and the software on it is free too, also it is well supported by a community of people (I fixed the computer, I have to support it and I am not paying someone to do it, I learned to Google my problems and figure them out) and the version I use has an easy way to upgrade (which is free). A short while later, probably about a half hour to two hours depending on what I'm doing with it, the computer is done and I'm doing what I want to do with it. That's all, some time, a little effort and I have a perfectly good computer. Now, if you have access to multiple computers that are the same model, you can take these computers and swap parts between them to get a working one, I've done that a few times. Because of what I do I end up with a new, used computer about once a year. I will always upgrade my own first and then fix up the one I was using for someone else, it's just always nice to have something nice for you when you do all this work anyway.

For those of you who don't have access to some cheap/free computers, I recommend you think twice when you are about to retire yours, you may actually be able to get more life out of it by spending some time fixing it up. If you really must have the new computer, consider how much computer you actually need, a lot of computers out there that people get the best parts in are only used for e-mail and web surfing, from what I can tell most electronics can do that now and aren't near as powerful as the computer you just bought, so why do you need to get all those fancy upgrades into a computer that you will be using less than I use my free ones? Oh, and if you can't fix one up yourself, you might be able to find someone who will help you, just remember though, if they're helping you it is because they are being nice, don't get picky or demanding with them because then they won't want to help you again or anyone else for that matter. In other words, be nice to your friendly geek, we like to keep them friendly so they keep helping others.

Phones

I spent a lot of time working on my budget, I made sure I knew where the money was going and if it was a good thing that it went towards. One of the biggest drains I found on my budget was my cell phone service. The first thing I did with it was get rid of the data plan, I didn't really need it anyway, I had internet access almost anywhere I stopped anyway and because my e-mail service was accessible via a web browser there really was no purpose, that one change saved us probably about $60 a month, for others it will probably save more. However, this wasn't enough for me, I wanted to make my money go farther.

The next step in this phone process was looking at my home phone service, I knew this had a lot of potential to save me money because a home service can provide cheaper unlimited calling compared to what cell phones offered (and at this time there wasn't even unlimited available). I had service currently through my cable provider, it was expensive. Someone at my church introduced me to a VOIP provider who offered unlimited service for $200 for the year, it didn't take much number crunching to realize this was a fairly good deal compared to what I had (a savings of about $23 a month). So I went with this and was happy enough for a year, then it came time to renew and I did and another year passed. During the following year the company was closing its doors and I had to find someone else, there were others who offered something similar and I checked them out, however their service was crappy and support was unhelpful and slow, so I tried another company. Their service wasn't very good either and eventually I went with a more familiar, but more expensive service. At first I went with their 500 minute plan, but I didn't like having to keep track of the minutes and worry about it, I already worried about my cell phones, it was just too much stress, so I went with their unlimited plan.

Time passed and I looked at my budget again, I had been trimming a lot of fat in a lot of different areas, but the phone situation still bothered me. I kept looking for better deals on cell phone service, but couldn't find any that I liked. Eventually I decided to look at the pay-as-you-go plans, I crunched the numbers, figured out how much my minutes were costing me and realized that if I made the right changes I could save quite a bit of money. So when we could we switched to a pay-as-you-go service and cut back a lot of our monthly bill, but this wasn't enough, my home phone service was costing me a lot too and we didn't use a ton of minutes. As I continued researching I found many options out there, compared to a cell phone plan it was still a good deal but we weren't using it enough to make it worth the money. I finally found some tricks I could do and informed my wife that we would try them out, if they didn't work it didn't matter because we would just use our cell phones instead. So, after a bit of investing the money I have a small balance due to my savings from my phone budget, but I got my phone budget down to $30 a month right now and it could probably go lower once the balance is paid off. To put it in perspective, when I started off making a budget I was spending somewhere around $160-180 a month and now, after some years of research and making small changes, I'm down to likely less than $30 a month! That's a very major change for us, we can do a lot with $130 more per month!

So what do I want to impart in my story? Well, I want you to think about how much you spend on your phones, they're expensive and you should probably be asking yourself, do I really need all that I'm paying for? Do you really have to have the data plan? Do you absolutely need the home phone service? Is it saving you money? Crunch some numbers, find out how much you're paying per minute. Are there more savings to be had? It's possible that you can go with fewer minutes on your cell phone by using a home phone service and realize some savings. Take a look at it, see what's available, you could be surprised how much of your budget you can free up by asking some of these questions to the things you spend your money on.

What's For Lunch?

Lunch, it's that tiny meal in the middle of your day. For some people this is an important meal, it means you get to take a break and eat something good that will help you get through the day. For others, well, it's optional and often skipped, kind of like breakfast. The only problem is, breakfast is important too, you really should be eating both.

If I skip these meals in the day it adds unneeded difficulty to it. I'm irritable and can't think. I also feel lazier as the day drags on, I don't want to move from my desk despite the fact that I know I would feel better doing it and I end up watching the clock slowly tick by. I just have no energy or ambition, I also find it hard to focus and think my way through the problems of the day. And though it makes my work day difficult, it makes the moments when I get home much worse than that.

On days that I don't eat properly I am very hungry when I get home, my first goal when I get home is to find food and find it fast. This often leads me to eat the wrong things, cookies and cake and anything else that is already done. For us this is not usually leftovers, those have already been eaten. So I eat all this stuff that, in the end, doesn't really make me feel better either physically or mentally, it just fills my stomach, plus, I didn't enjoy it and I love to enjoy the good things like cake. The next problem with this is that I eat all this food and when dinner is done I don't eat as much of it, but it was by far a much healthier thing to eat, so in the end I went hungry, had a rough, grumpy day and then starved my body of the proper nutrition it needs to keep me going. Oh, and for those parents out there, this also means your kids see you gorging yourself on junk, what do you think they'll be doing when they get older?

So what do I recommend? Take time to eat something, make sure you have breakfast and lunch. It doesn't take long, sometimes only about 5 minutes to eat the food you brought with you, but it gives your body something to work with and keeps you healthier. As far as what to eat? Honestly, try to bring your lunch, the things you buy from a fast food place are terrible for you and won't give you the boost of energy you need to function properly or for very long. Also, I would recommend avoiding sandwiches, especially if you buy your bread pre-made. There isn't a lot of body to sandwiches (unless you make super sandwiches that are loaded with everything) and so they only fill your tummy for a little while, though they are better than nothing. I would say your best bet is to plan dinner with tomorrow's lunch in mind. Make extra of your dinner and bring it with you, at least then you have something good and probably somewhat healthy, plus a hot meal always seems better to me than something cold. Oh, and if your excuse is still that you don't have time, I highly recommend you rethink that. There is almost always time to find a few minutes to do something good for yourself, and you'll probably make up for that lost time by working smarter because you can actually think straight.

I Don't Have Time

How often is it that we won't make a change or try something new in our lives because we simply think we don't have time? The fact of the matter is, I'm betting we do have time, we just choose to use it for something else, and often I remember my time being used on pointless things, like video games and television shows. Now, I do still enjoy some time with these, but I also enjoy the time I take to do something good in my life too. It isn't anything life changing I do, sometimes I simply go help make dinner or do a few dishes, it makes the biggest difference to my wife, but I also feel a sense of accomplishment with my evening as well, and I usually still have time to watch a show or play a game afterwards anyway. The funny thing about not having time for something is that when you say you don't have time for it you are really saying that it isn't that important to you. If it were important you would make time, how many people will make sure they're at home to watch a football game or have time to go to a bar with their friends? But they don't have time to make their life better? Any change you make or anything new you try takes some time, you have to learn how to do it, but after a few tries you eventually find that it isn't that hard and the time you spent is worth it in the end.

For us changing our diet was hard, but once we got used to it we found that it was much easier and was worth it. Getting rid of cable was hard, we went stir crazy for a while trying to figure out what to do with our time, but we adjusted to it, we found some new shows to watch when we needed to watch something and we also began to find the joy in watching shows online. Recently we discovered the joy of Netflix and instant streaming of content, now we don't need cable, why would we? We have access to just about anything we would like to watch and everything else is just a matter of time and patience to get access to. These shows aren't so important to us that we must see them right now, we can wait, there are more important things in life to enjoy, such as our time together as a family. If you find that you use this excuse of not having time to improve your life, you might want to ask yourself if that's true and if you really do care about it enough to make time for it. Going green isn't always easy, but it is time well spent, for you, your family and all the other people that share this world with you.

Going Solar with Sungevity

Back in October while I was working on my fictional blog I saw an ad talking about getting solar panels for no money down. My first thought, "Too good to be true, ignore it." However I was curious and wrote down the company name. I would have just clicked on the ad but that is forbidden, I am not supposed to click my own ads. Anyway, the company leases solar panels, which is how the no money thing works. More specifically, they give you a quote based on the information you provide and how your roof looks that would save you more money per month than the lease would cost. Essentially giving you a discount on your monthly bill without having to put any money forward. Now, the lease is for 20 years, so you have to think about how long you intend to be in your current house, however if you do move you can work it out with the next owner to take over the lease or you can pay it off in advance and then try to work it out in the price of the house so that you don't lose any money, so I think it is definitely worth a look if you want to save a bit on your energy bill.

For us, the panels have not yet been installed, there is a lot of time involved in getting everything ready, but I'm hoping that next month will be when the install is, though we will have to wait and see. I am anxious about it, I've been wanting to get solar but never could figure out how I'd save enough money to get it and this company provided me with a better solution, not only will I now have solar but I didn't have to spend a lot to get it and I will have someone else to maintain it for me if it were to break, so it's a win/win in my book. If you are interested in getting solar and you live in Colorado, Arizona or California check this company out, and be sure that when you get a quote from them to include the below code to use me as your reference, that way if you go with a system from them you will get a $500 Visa gift card when the system is installed. Here are the steps:

1.) Go to www.Sungevity.com
2.) Enter your address and information. When the site asks "How did you hear about us?" type in my referral code 44120 so you can get the $500 gift card bonus.
3.) In 24 hours, you'll receive your free, no obligation iQuote in your email inbox.

When my panels do get installed I will definitely give an update here, I look forward to being able to go out and watch my meter spin backwards and will be so excited that I won't be able to contain it. Anyway, if you live in other areas you might be able to find a company that will do the same type of lease for you, but if you're in the areas that Sungevity services then I would highly recommend them, they were knowledgable and were able to answer any questions I had.

Lighting

So, one of the first things I did when I wanted to start making my life greener after getting a house was to replace the light bulbs. I went with the fluorescent bulbs, but did some research first. I wanted to be able to get the right ones without making it pointless to spend more. In my research I found that there are a couple different types of them, there are your normal ones and then there are the instant on type. The major differences between the two was the maximum life and how they were intented to be used. I saw that, though they had the lower life on them, that the instant on type were what I would need more of. We don't like leaving all the lights on in the house and with standard fluorescent bulbs you need to leave them on to warm up because a lot of on/off will eventually make them only last as long as standard bulbs, but the instant on could handle it a little better without losing so much life. So I went and got these. The power output is much greater than traditional bulbs, and if you want to stick with something close to what the traditional bulbs gave you then you would want the yellow light (not yellow bulb, that's for a different use) variety. I mixed it up a bit and chose different types for the different rooms. For the kitchen and dining area I wanted a bright, clean light so that I could see what I was doing a bit better and for the downstairs area where the TV was I wanted something a little more subtle and chose the ones that give a more yellow light instead of the bright white. Now, I didn't personally notice a major difference in my energy bill, this is mostly because I hadn't lived in the house long enough to get a feel for it before making this change, I just knew I wanted to consume less energy in the long run, so for me this was more of an environmental green choice, but it was very nice to have some good light in the areas that I wanted it most.

For the future in lighting I have been hoping to see more LED lights, I want to see what they bring to the table as far as energy savings is concerned but they are not very high in availability and so I'll wait a bit longer. Another thing I was looking at was into solar lighting, there are plenty of outdoor lights that use solar and I will probably have a good collection of them as I make my yard something I'd be more proud of, but I also saw some solar lights that I could install in my shed to get some light in there without having to run some conduit and power out to it, these lights I definitely plan to get as I get to work fixing up the shed. Anyway, I know this is a very well advertised thing, but I figured I'd give my thumbs up on it too, get those CFL bulbs and save some energy and go greener in your life, just also make sure you read up on how to dispose of them properly too, we don't need more mercury in our landfills either.

"Cream" of Mushroom Soup

My daughter, poor little thing, cannot have dairy. At least not right now, we're hoping she grows out of it. Anyway, as such it was at first very difficult to figure out how to make some of the foods we commonly enjoy in a way that she can actually eat. One of the biggest were casseroles, most of the ones we made required some sort of creamed soup in it to give it the gravy that made it taste better. So, in order to overcome this problem, I created a "cream" of mushroom soup without using any dairy, and, to save some money I didn't use soy milk either.

Ingredients:
Mushrooms (sliced)
Onions (chopped)
Garlic (minced)
Flour
Oil
Chicken Broth (for us, this is made using chicken bouillon)
Seasonings (your choice, salt and pepper for me)

Directions:
To start off I created a rue, the amount was dependant on how much soup I was making, as this would be a large batch I did about 1/2 cup flour with 1/2 cup oil, the ratio is 1:1, stir this until combined, it doesn't require any heat. My batch used 6 cups of broth, I combined the 6 cups of water with the needed amount of bouillon (follow the package directions) and spices I chose, I put this mixture on medium-high heat, stirring frequently to make sure everything combined properly. Meanwhile in a skillet I cooked the mushrooms, onions and garlic in oil until they were tender. I set these aside in a bowl and then took some of the broth I had been heating up and put it in the skillet. I stirred this until all the little bits that were stuck on the bottom of the skillet were picked up and poured this back into the rest of my broth. I kept the heat high as the broth began to boil and added the mushrooms, etc. to it when it had cooked down about a third of the way. I then allowed this to continue boiling until it was down to about half of what I started with, by this time it was thick like a cream soup should be, I took this and after allowing it to cool I divided it into several containers and froze it. I use this soup instead of the canned Cream of Mushroom soup in the recipes that ask for it (including green bean casserole).

So, you might ask, why is this green? Well, simply because I can make it and control what ingredients I use. There are many types of oil out there, some healthier than others. And I can get reduced sodium chicken broth or make it myself by cooking a chicken (which would be a very fine meal in and of itself). I also get to save some money doing this because I don't have to get anything super special to make it and can wait until mushrooms are on sale to further bring the price down. This whole process didn't take long and I was very happy to have come up with a cheap solution to our daughter's dietary needs.

Sleep is Important

This may not be a surprise to most of you, but sleep is very important. In living a greener life you should make sure to get consistent, adequate sleep. When I say adequate, it means what your body needs, enough to be rested and not to run out of energy at the end of the day because you are tired. Consistency is important too in this statement, if you are always changing the time you go to bed you will find that you are tired more often, at least that has been my experience. By going to sleep at a normal, consistent time and getting the sleep that you actually need (and I can hear the people bragging about only needing 2-4 hours of sleep already, however I think they're kidding themselves in the long run) you will find that you are better rested (obviously), more alert and healthier. Sleep gives the body time to do the things it cannot do when you are active and awake, when you have a good nights sleep then the chances that you will be healthier are higher. I've found that with a consistent sleep schedule, mixed with a good diet, I have been much healthier now than I did a few years ago. When you are healthy and alert you make better life decisions. My worst choices come when I am so tired and worn out, I just want easy things, things that will make me happy and that's when I will fail the most in my endevours to be more green in all aspects of my life. In the end, these choices to make myself happy end up making me miserable and I regret wasting my time, energy and finances on them.

One of the things that can help sleep come is to take some time at the end of the day to settle down, this doesn't mean just to plop yourself in front of the TV because that can make some people's sleep suffer, but find an activity that is calming, requires a little less thought and helps you ease into a state of mind that in conductive to sleep. It doesn't need to be a lot of time, a half hour can make a major difference, but so can simply 10 minutes of reading a good book. There can also be too much time spent in this activity as well. If you take hours to wind down I think you are doing the wrong activity, it should not take half your night watching the television to relax. Personally, I don't care much for the television, it makes people slothful, they sit there in front of it for hours and do nothing (which can be good for settling down, but not good for going green), my particular area where this can happen is in playing games, so I have to watch out for the same thing as well. You see, if you end up wasting all your time relaxing you won't accomplish the tasks that you desire to do to make your life better, and this practice also negatively affects your health. So, what I suggest is, take a moment when you get home, get your brain together, collect your thoughts, but don't stop for the day yet. Make dinner, do what you need to do, then spend some time working on your greening project, it could be finding a way to trim your budget, balance things out, make some healthy foods, do some research on going environmentally greener, then when you have done something productive you can go to your favorite activities, spend a little time there, enjoy your time a bit, and then get to bed at a reasonable time so you can have a wonderful sleep and be well rested and alert tomorrow.

Tortilla Shells

To complement today's post, here is the recipe I came up with for tortilla shells, this recipe will work for whole wheat (preferred) or white. I find that the white is best for doing a sweat treat, I'll put the treat at the end of the recipe.

Ingredients:
1 Cup Flour (Whole Wheat is best IMHO)
1/2 teaspoon Baking Powder
1/4 teaspoon Salt
4.5 teaspoons Oil (Equivalent to 1.5 Tablespoons, I use Canola oil)
1/2 cup flour
Up to about 2 Tablespoons extra flour to remove stickyness of dough

Instructions:
Put a skillet on the stove and turn the heat to medium. Mix the dry ingredients together, the better you mix them the better the shells turn out, I like to use our stand mixer to make these. Add your oil and mix, you will have flour and oil chunks in your mixture, you don't have to break them up a lot but try your best to get them spread throughout. Add the water and continue mixing/stirring until all the flour is into the dough. At this point you can handle the dough by hand, though it might stick a bit, I put some flour down on my work surface and kneed it in until the dough stops sticking so much. The dough should be light, similar in feel to Playdough though it won't keep its shape if you form it. Separate the dough into 4 equal pieces and shape into tortillas, some people say never use a rolling pin, however this is the easiest way I've found and produces nice, even shells. Roll it out into the desired thickness and shape. Cook shells about 30-60 seconds per side on the hot skillet, you will have to experiment with cooking time for your stove and desired doneness of the shells. That's it! You should have 4 medium sized tortilla shells, if you want more you can double, triple, etc the batch. My biggest batch was 4x, any more than this and I start to ache from standing and rolling the shells out.

Other Uses:
Dessert:
You will need a pie pan instead of the skillet, instead of cooking on the stove you will cook it in the oven, 350 degrees for about 15 minutes. Use white flour, make your dough, spray the pie pan to keep the dessert from sticking. Spread the dough in the pan as evenly as you can, brush with melted butter and sprinkle with sugar and cinnamon. Cook for 15 minutes or so and that's it, you'll have a sweet treat that's good for dessert.

Whole Wheat Tortilla Chips:
These things are fantastic, my newest addiction for chips and with so much less salt! Follow the above directions for making tortilla shells except this time after you split the dough into 4 pieces you will need to split each piece into 4 more pieces, roll out these 16 pieces of dough into very small tortilla shells and cook them like you should the normal shells. When they are all cooked preheat your oven to 350 degrees. Cut your mini shells into quarters and spread out on a pan, I use a cookie sheet. Bake in the oven for 15 minutes, chips should just start to brown and should be crispy, let them cool on the pan (this will help finish the cooking process without burning them), when they are done cooling you can store them or enjoy them right away. I have no idea how long they'll store, so just keep your eye on them and don't keep them for too long.

Instant Gratification

We are raised in a world where if we do not get things when we want them then we are being wronged. It is so hard to do shopping online because once we place the order we must wait at least one day for it to arrive, or if we choose to save some more money we must wait a few days for it to get to our door. This is hard, especially when you want something. Unfortunately this is the direction that things have gone, our time and energy was spent in making things this way so that there is no point in waiting, I think few of us understand how to properly wait. I know for me it was a hard thing growing a garden, planting those seeds and then having to see if anything came from them. It took weeks for the little plants to break through the ground and each day I waited I was wondering if it would happen at all. But, they did come as they were supposed to, eventually. The unfortunate thing is, once they came, then they had to grow, and once they grew then they had to flower, and once they flowered they then had to produce their fruit. All of this took so long, but you know what? It was so worth the wait! Our garden didn't do very well this year, what do you expect though? It was our first try. We did however get to enjoy a few squash, zuchinni, tomatoes and lettuce which was nice. Things seem to taste better when you grow them, but you have to fight this desire for instant gratification to do it, wouldn't it just be easier to buy fresh stuff from the store? Well, yes, it would, but you would be paying a bit more for it.

The poison of instant gratification hits so many areas of your life, it can be a major hinderance to taking on any type of greening task. A lot of us will buy services to cater to our need for instant gratification. We will order movies through Pay-Per-View because we can't wait until the video is returned to the store or available through our movie service. Want to see a new release? Ha! Good luck with that, the movie industry has been making it difficult to get a new release unless you buy it or pay a premium to get it. This goes farther than entertainment though, we also want instant gratification in our personal care. For example, we want to eat something, so we use the microwave to heat up a pre-prepared meal, it takes an agonizing 5 minutes or so to do this, all the while we are withering away from hunger. Once it is done, we eat it, this might take us all of 10 minutes to do, assuming it isn't so hot that it could burn off our flesh. Well, maybe these numbers are exaggerated a bit, though they're pretty close for me when I used to eat this stuff. So, what's wrong with this practice? Well, for starters, these meals aren't that good for you. Most of them don't have much to offer for nutrition and if that isn't enough what they do give you is an overabundance of salt. Have you ever looked at the salt content of the things you eat? My wife and I started doing this probably about 2 years ago and what we saw was that we probably were consuming some 300-500% of our daily requirement every day because everything we made contained so much salt! In order to get away from this I made the decision to start making more of my own things, my wife didn't join me in this right away and so I had to work on it first. I started with our bread products, it wasn't the biggest contributor but it was probably the thing that would be easiest. I had started with making my own pizza dough, I had always wanted to but buying those packages where you add water and mix was so much easier I thought. Well, at the time, they were easier. My first crust came out, well, not so great. It was thick and chewy, not at all like what I wanted to eat consistently, though the flavor was a bit of an improvement. I tried again a few weeks later, it came out a little better but still too thick. I found that each time I tried making it the process got easier, though it will always be easier to add water I found that the flavor of the homemade stuff was worth the extra few minutes.

By this time our health wasn't that great, we were overly tired from working strange shifts and eating foods that were bad for us. I wanted to do more whole grain foods, but buying the premade stuff was out of the question, I didn't have it in our budget to double our food costs. So I kept working at finding a way to make something good, the next thing I chose to do was tortilla shells. We liked to eat burritos and the white shells were, well, bland to be honest, though we didn't know any better. So, I got to work making my first batch of tortilla shells, they weren't bad, but my wife said they weren't fluffy and so I had to keep trying. I tried another recipe and thought it was the most horrendous tortilla I had ever eaten. Frustrated that the recipes didn't produce what I wanted I began researching many recipes, finding common themes and trying to figure out what should go into a tortilla shell. What I came up with was an experiment, a set of basic measurements to make a small batch of shells. The first ones were flat and not fluffy enough, the second were too crispy, but by the third or fourth I was getting the hang of it and had made a recipe I could easily follow. It took time to make a batch of shells at first, but now I can have 4 shells done in about 10 minutes, the time it takes to start cooking the frozen meat we'd be using for the dish. To top it all off, the shells actually taste good and I learned a lot about how certain ingredients work and what dough should feel like.

After this I went back to pizza dough, I now knew what dough needed to feel like and found that when I made it this time I used almost 2 cups less flour than the recipe called for. The dough came out much better, it was fluffier and had a wonderful taste to it. After a few more successes I had a feel for pizza dough and then started to experiment, I added some garlic powder and Italian seasoning to the mix. Due to all this work we now, unfortunately, are pizza snobs. We'll eat the easy, frozen stuff or what is ordered, but it doesn't compare anymore. The pizza we make is always so much better, tastes wonderful, and the crust actually has some nutrition to it, it's a whole wheat, absolutely no white flour, crust! We use the freshest ingredients we can afford, the only thing coming from a can being the sauce (did I mention our garden didn't do as well as we hoped?) and we use, if we're lucky and it's on sale, 4 types of cheese and it is the most heavenly tasting pizza to me, so fantastic, oh, the thought of it makes me drool even right now and it isn't even lunch time yet.

So, what did all of this teach us? That instant gratification is so not worth it, by taking the time to fight against it we found that making things from scratch isn't really that hard once you've done it a few times and the results are so much more worth it. This also goes for buying things too, saving up to buy the thing you want is much better than buying the cheap knockoff that doesn't work, though there are times where the cheap stuff is as good as the original, but you have to spend some time researching it. Now, I'm not saying we never fill our need for instant gratification, it's just now we try our best to not fall for its ploys of being what we want. We hardly eat at fast food restaurants, which is good on our budget and on our health. Now these foods make my wife feel sick, which goes to show that you only realize it's bad for you when you give it up. Also, because we gave up a lot of this need, at least in food, we feel healthier, we have more energy and, this one being a bit sadder, we now can tell when the chef at a restaurant doesn't know how to cook. Salt stands out a lot in a recipe when you don't overuse it in your own. Well, I know this turned out to be more about food than anything else, but hopefully you can see the importance of fighting against the need of instant gratification. This fight should carry over into a lot of aspects of your life, you just need to learn to use the weapon to fight against it, and that is patience.

It's Just...

Two dangerous little words. "It's just..." can lead you to buy many things. So can the words "it's only". You have to pay attention to your language when you go out shopping. These words will quickly help you use up or go over on your budget. When I hear these words I like to repeat them back to the person, even if I'm the one who said them, reminding them that these are dangerous words. They had no intention of buying the additional item, they saw it and wanted it then and there. Now I must admit, there are times when it is good to buy items that you didn't plan on buying, for example, you might find a great deal on some fruit or juice, but you always need to ask yourself if your budget can handle the added expense, if so, by all means get the good thing that you would have wanted if it weren't for the excessive normal cost of it. In particular we like to get blueberries, blackberries and strawberries, normally they cost so much that we never plan on buying them and they are a treat when we find a deal on them. These end up being good extras for us, but we still need to be careful what extras we add into our shopping trip.

In order for us to not spend too much on things we make a list. Often the only list we need is a grocery list, however we find that we do better by making other lists, particularly when we plan to buy multiple items. For me, I get so distracted that I forget what I was after and see something else I want instead, then when I get home I remember what I forgot and have to go back, wasting time, money and gas. By making a list and trying your best to stick to it you keep yourself in check and your budget healthy. This means that instead of looking at your budget every month and saying, "Man, I really overspent," you get to look at it and say, "Alright! We actually made it a month on our budget." You'd be surprised how hard it is to keep to a budget, even more so when you get a tight one with very little wiggle room. This is the type of budget we have and it's sad how often I have to look to see where I can squeeze some funds to pay for what we needed to get, and most of the time it is needs, not careless spending on our desires.

So I am not proclaiming that I do any of this perfectly, but I do keep it all in mind when I go shopping. With just one child my budget can quickly go from on-track to way off, it's as simple as the words, "We need more diapers." We do our best to compensate for it, adjust a few shopping trips to a couple of the stores in order to come in pretty close to what we anticipate, but there are times where it just goes horribly wrong and we end up paying for our mistakes. However, our budget for most of the time works very well for us. The areas that I have to watch out for the type of language I mentioned is in my own personal monthly spending, it isn't much and if I use this language it will be gone before I get what I actually wanted that month. Often times food, quick, fast food meals, are the biggest waste of money for me. I don't always enjoy the food I ate and it wasn't very good for me anyway, had I taken the time to make it myself I would have been better off. The other thing I have to keep in mind when I'm watching my language is my long term goals, it is easy to bring a short term goal up to the top because you have money to do it now and that "it's just" makes it easy to finish that minor goal and neglect your major goal. Hopefully this all made sense to you and will help you as well. I recommend you pay very close attention to what you say or how you think about items, it could very well be your language usage leads you to saving more money and accomplishing more goals in the long run.

Setting Up a Budget

One of the most important things you can do to start the process of going green in all aspects of your life is to set up a budget. If you are not managing your money properly then any steps you would desire to take to improve your life would most likely be unsuccessful or not as beneficial as they should be. For me, setting up a budget involved creating a spreadsheet to write down my income and expenses into. I needed to be able to share this budget with my wife and so I created it in Google Docs. This has been very beneficial to us and as I've improved it we've learned a lot about where our money goes and how much we spend on things, it also helped us identify problem areas in our spending. You can create the budget in any way you'd like, be it spreadsheet or on a piece of paper.

The things you want to do when you consider a budget is plan out your average monthly income and expenses and mark it off, that way you can see how accurate you are in your planning. For income I always round down so that I have a few cents more per month than what I plan. I also figure out all the places my money typically goes, consistent monthly bills. For these bills I figure the most I typically spend on them and then round up, usually making a nice round dollar number unless the bill is exactly the same every month. The reason I do this is that then I am over planning which will give me some wiggle room if things don't go exactly as planned. Once you have the layout of your budget, the income and the necessary monthly expenses, it is time to plan for your not so consistent expenses.

Non-consistent expenses would include spending, date, medical and gift money. For me I planned out different spending expenses for my wife, my daughter and myself. By planning these out I allow us to go get things we want without damaging our planned budget. Plus, by having a limit we then have to plan how we want to use the money we are allowed. At times this is difficult but you learn to live with it eventually. The date money is important, you need to be able to go out and spend time with your significant other if you have one. The gift money is calculated by figuring out the typical presents and amount you would want to spend on them for a year, normally birthdays and Christmas, I then add more in for the weddings, baby showers, etc. All this money you need for the year is then divided by 12 to figure out how much you have to set aside each month in order to be able to buy all those presents. The same is done for medical, you try to figure out how much you'll need to set aside so that you can spread it out through the year instead of scrambling to find funds when you have a sudden medical bill.

One of the last things, but one of the more important things you need to do with your budget is plan on saving some money. For me, through my bank, they have a savings account that has no charges if you meet certain requirements, one of them being to transfer a consistent amount of money every month to the account. This is what determined how much I send to savings, I eventually want to send more, however we have a very tight budget.

After creating the budget, and trying to make goals for it over the years that we have been married, we found out what some things were costing us and determined if they were really that important. One of our goals was when we had children we wanted my wife to be able to stay home and take care of them, so we had to cut back on some things and really reign in anything that wasn't well planned for. We were successful in this goal and she now stays home with our daughter. We found that we can comfortable live on about $75/week for food between 3 people, it took some time to find all the right places to go, but now most of our food on this budget is unprepared, meaning we make a lot of things from scratch, but this was a change I wanted to make anyway. We have found the food we buy and eat makes us feel better as well as being kind to our budget. Some of the things we found we didn't need were cable and formal home phone service. Being a bit technical I found ways to get home phones without the costs associated with it, and for the rest of it we use a pay-as-you-go plan that had some good rates. To make up for the lack of cable we eventually went with Netflix, their ability to stream to our Wii means we actually get our money's worth, which we calculate by figuring out how many movies we would have to watch from the dollar kiosks to meet or exceed the monthly fee. The only thing we didn't give up, because it provides so much entertainment for us is the internet, we can give it up if we have to but I do my best to make sure we have room for it as long as we can.

I do plan on posting my budget, but I need to make a copy and clean it up, putting relevant information in it. When I do you are free to copy it, distribute it, do whatever you want with it, I hope it will help quite a few people to see it. I don't claim it to be perfect but it does what we need it to. I hope you all understand a little bit better now the importance of making a budget when you plan to make your life a little greener.

Purpose for Writing

The purpose of this blog is for me to share my activities in going "green". There are various ways that I choose to go green, the first is that it is good for me, meaning it improves my health or makes me feel better personally. The next way I look at going green is for my wallet, the choices I make should not cost me an arm and a leg and I want my funds to go as far as I can make them. The last way I look at going green is for the environment, yes, I know, I probably should have had this sooner but I would be lying if I said this was my first thought when I'm trying to make a life changing decision.

There are many things out there, lots of information on ways to go green. Honestly, if you look at it all you will choose to not do it. There is just far too much time and money involved in making your life greener. So, you may wonder, if it's such a pain, why even try? Well, I'll tell you this, the more you do the better you feel, and here's my trick to actually doing it: choose just one thing to do and do that one first, then figure out your next move.

Primarily what I'll be writing here are things I actually do, though I may choose to write a few things that I haven't done but look like a good idea. What I would advise to you is this: just because I did it this way doesn't mean you should, it may not fit your life style or even fit your goals, but I recommend reading it anyway and see if perhaps there is an idea in it you can take to improve your life. That's what I really want, to help people improve their lives, not make them like me. The next post I'll write is part of my foundation, without this foundation nothing I try will or would have worked. Hopefully it will help you out too.