Karlee Boon

This week I really wanted to focus on supporting local businesses and preparing for the upcoming holiday season. Since I travel home to Arizona for Christmas every year, it's usually hard for me to resist ordering gifts for my family online so I can avoid having to lug a ton of packages onto a plane. However, this year, I really want to make a point to purchase entirely from local and small businesses in Portland and Phoenix. So this week, I worked on a huge list of my favorite local shops and devised a sustainable, ethical holiday shopping gameplan. 

Since I've been avoiding taking public transportation during COVID, my boyfriend and I decided to invest in road bikes this summer to help decrease our carbon footprint. It has been so handy being able to ride to nearby shops and restaurants, and I've even bike commuted a few times across the bridge to my job in NW Portland - riding across the Broadway bridge is so beautiful! My tire went flat a few weeks ago so I finally got around to fixing it up with my boyfriend yesterday. Now all I have to do is buy some rain gear to brave this freezing Portland winter and I'll be ready to get back on the road!

There are a few different communities within Portland that I identify with - my work community, my film community, and the community within my household (aka my roommates). One way I decided to build more community this week was by organizing a meeting/hangout at my job after hours. My coworkers and I all met up at the coffee shop we work at, had some drinks, and got to just chat like we did in the good ol days pre-COVID. Since most of us don’t do much outside of working & sitting at home, it was a nice way to get some safe socialization in while also allowing us to further connect with each other as coworkers & friends. Having a support system is SO important right now and I’m glad that my job has become a source of that for everyone employed there. 

(From 10/22): This week I wanted to focus on my own food consumption habits and identify areas where I can further reduce waste (both plastic and food waste). One thing I’ve begun doing when I go grocery shopping in order to combat food waste is purchasing my bread off of the discount rack at Fred Meyer. I always feel like I’m doing something positive when I purchase these items because I know that unless these items are sold, they will be tossed directly in the garbage (not even unwrapped & composted, which would be infinitely more environmentally friendly). I have also been trying to wean myself off of the few items in plastic that I buy on a regular basis; for example: oat milk is a big thing in my household but I have recently started purchasing oats in bulk and making my own instead. I’ve found that, over time, habits like buying in bulk and bringing reusable produce/linen bags become second nature - all you have to do is start. 

For my ecochallenge this week, I decided to focus on consumption, specifically within the fashion industry. Especially when the weather starts to cool down, I always begin feeling the need to refresh my wardrobe for the new season. This week, to combat these urges, I decided to watch The True Cost (2015), a documentary focusing on the global fashion industry. Did you know that the fashion industry is the world's second-largest polluter? Neither did I before I watched this documentary! If you are someone interested in simplifying your wardrobe OR you're someone desperately trying to wean off of fast fashion like H&M or F21, I highly recommend this doc! There's so many options to buy clothes outside of fast fashion now (thrifting, Poshmark & Depop are all great resources) - take advantage of them! Refresh your fall wardrobe and reduce your carbon footprint at the same time. 

I spent the weekend with my parents who were visiting from Phoenix, AZ, during which we patronized many local businesses in Portland and throughout the Oregon Coast. Some of my favorite places we visited were Tin Shed on Alberta (they have great vegan options!) and the Pumpkin Patch on Sauvie Island. I always make an effort to prioritize patronizing local businesses over franchises/large corporations because I believe it's vastly more important to support our own community and keep money within the local economy. Coming from another big urban city like Phoenix, it's almost shocking how different Portland is from the flurry of chain restaurants and corporate grocery stores that I grew up around in the Southwest. I feel very lucky to live in a city that is founded upon small, locally-owned businesses, knowing exactly where my products are from and who made this.