Maya McGill

This week, I was resourceful and used recycled objects to house my plants. I'm making some propagations off my Pothos plant for a friend, which I haven't done before. The other day, I got these little pudding cups I hadn't tried before from Green Zebra. They were plant based, and came in cute tiny glass jars. Normally I would recycle or throw away the packaging of my food, but the label peeled off from the jar so easily, and gave me the ides to use it for propagations.

Normally I buy my plant pots, but I found one in the "free pile" in my apartment building. I have a small plant that needs a new pot, and it'll be perfect for it. I love that we have the option to share things instead of disposing of them right in my apartment building, and that I can tell people actually leave and take things rather than them just getting thrown away.

Before I wrote about how my roommates are trying to grocery shop together more in order to save money and keep from wasting perishables. But lately, our schedules and appetites have aligned and we've found time to make bigger meals together. Not only is this a great excuse to spend time together, we're saving time, energy, and money by making lots of food at once. When we make our own meals, that's three pans, three plates, three mixing bowls, etc that would need to be washed. This way, we're saving water and saving on packaging when we might otherwise eat out. We also end up having leftovers, so those are meals later which we don't have to cook. It also feels easier to carve out time to cook and feed myself if I have others holding me accountable.

Lately, my roommates and I have had the time to cook more meals together. This has been really nice because we've all saved a little bit of money, but this also means we can use more produce since we're not worried about finishing it. And we're buying packages to share, so we're generating less packaging than if we all bought our own milk, cheese, veggies, etc. Our schedules don't always match up, so we can't always do it, but we take advantage of the opportunity when we can. It's also a good opportunity for us to all spend time together because we don't always have the opportunity.

In week 5 I made a point of taking shorter showers. I'm often groggy in the mornings, so I usually take my time and end up taking really long showers. Especially in the winter, One term I audited my water use for a SINQ class. I measured it for a week, then made a point of taking as short of showers as I could for the following week. I tried to fit my showers under 10 minutes, but found it challenging to even fit my whole shower routine into that time. It took a couple days to get the hang of it, but I calculated a huge difference in my water use even in trying to take shorter showers. 
This time, I made a point of listening to music in the shower to help gauge my time a little better. I wasn't actively timing my showers, but was trying to be mindful of keeping them as short as possible. I could tell it made a big difference for me. I also took more lukewarm showers instead of hot ones, which shocked me awake.

Hey everyone! I went to a concert this week, and my friend and I were hit with an "I have nothing to wear!" crisis. Because my ecochange project is about sustainable clothing consumption, I'm making a point of not buying new clothes at retail price. Some of that Is making do with what I have, but it also means buying clothes secondhand. My friend and I were both thinking browns and greens for the show, so we went to the bins and bought a few things. I've bought things from the bins in passing, but never with a specific intention of what to buy. We found a lot of really cool clothes, and I ended up getting a good amount of clothes I liked for under $5. When clothes end up in the goodwill bins, that is often the last step before they get shipped overseas. Once they're shipped, they may get recycled, but more often than not, they are thrown away or burned.

Of course, there is something to consider about the act of buying new clothes for an event. I probably didn't NEED some of the new clothes I got, but it's still nice to freshen up a wardrobe, and being able to do it sustainably is even better. I always make a point where, even if I buy clothes for one event in mind, I always ensure they're clothes that I'll still wear outside of that context. This way I'm able to be more mindful about my purchases and make sure they're really worth is.

One area in which I feel like I consume a lot of packaging, and a lot of money, is drinks. Whether that's canned energy drinks or boba or Starbucks, I buy way too many individual drinks on a daily basis. Cans are at least recyclable, but much of the packaging from coffee or boba shops is not. One day I caught myself getting boba twice in one day, with two different people, while also buying a bottled juice and a Yerba Mate. I often just impulsively want something sweet to drink, so I challenged myself to take a couple of days where I don't buy any beverages, but rather make them at home. It saved me a little bit of money, and I used a lot of the cabinet full of tea we have in our apartment. We have tons of tea in our kitchen, and we always say we need to drink some of it, but we never do, so this was a good opportunity to make a dent. However, I've also heard the packaging in single tea packets can be unsustainable, so I'll make a point of buying loose leaf teas in order to reduce this waste footprint in the future.

This week I made a point of buying groceries with the least possible packaging, and cooking more food at home. I made a point to bring my own bags to the grocery store, which I normally only do when I remember. When there, I still bought some things I needed that were packaged, but chose the options with recyclable packaging and/or less packaging where I could. However, I've learned that Oregon has little recycling infrastructure, and most recycling just gets thrown away. The produce I bought had no packaging. I found myself having to buy less instant meals because of how much packaging they had. I think a lot of my waste comes from eating out, and I ate out less this week, cooking at home with the groceries I bought instead. Sometimes it feels like a lot to fit cooking into a busy schedule, but it's something that's become easier the more I do it.

This week I'm choosing to watch a documentary titled 8 Billion Angels. It talks about the impact our consumption as people has on our planet and connects it to how high our population is. It takes a look at various parts of the world and gave me fascinating insight!