Grace Marshall

I signed up for renewable electricity this week through Portland General Electric's "Green Future Choice" plan! It costs $0.008/kWh on top of my normal charges, and makes it so that all of the energy I get is renewable. They break it down roughly into 75% wind energy, 20% solar, 3% biomass, 1% geothermal, and 1% low impact hydro. I had to look up what low impact hydro was - basically it's energy generating projects that keep impact to water flow and animals to a minimum. 

This week, since I was too late to join the Detrash Portland event happening at Oaks Bottom Wildlife Refuge this Saturday, I decided to get ahead of them and pick up trash on each of my morning runs around Oaks (3 so far this week). It made the running a bit slower, but I came back will a full paper grocery bag of trash each time. It felt really good to help clean up an area that I use so frequently.

Got my low-flow shower head! This is the model I went with: https://www.waterpik.com/shower-head/products/fixed-mount/ecoflow/VBE-423/. I just unscrewed the old shower head and replaced it with this one, and it was super easy to do myself, and I just needed a wrench and some pliers. I tried it out for the first time today and was super happy with the water pressure - I almost didn't notice a difference, and I'm very excited to watch my water bill go down!

Hey everyone, this week for my Eco Challenge I plan on cooking each dinner with ingredients that I got from the farmers market (the locally sourced foods challenge). Early in the week I made the first recipe for my vegetarian cookbook, sweet potato gnocchi with kale rabe, which was surprisingly good leftover. I made salmon chowder last night that I'm going to eat for the next couple days before freezing the rest, and for my last couple cooks I'm planning on mushroom risotto and ratatouille. It was kind of difficult finding the produce that I needed at the market, as it's still early in the season for a lot of things (especially stuff I needed for the ratatouille) but I made it work, and it sometimes resulted in fun substitutions (like kale rabe instead of broccoli rabe, which I couldn't find). 

This week for my Eco Challenge I decided to take advantage of the beautiful weather we're having and explore a trail I haven't done before (the "Explore my Area" action). This one was perfect for me because I haven't been living in Portland for all that long. I did the Trail of Ten Falls loop today out near Silverton, and it was absolutely gorgeous - the waterfalls were beautiful and there were very few people out on the trail. I love hiking on early weekday mornings because it's so much less crowded, and I can enjoy the sounds of nature and the quiet. 

Hi everyone! This week for my Ecochallenge I volunteered five hours of my time with Portland Animal Welfare Team doing vet tech work. We provide free veterinary care to the pets of people experiencing homelessness. This was my second time volunteering with PAW Team, and it's been so rewarding each time, both because I'm helping animals get the care that they need and because I'm helping people keep their family pets through rough situations.