Tonight, my daughter asked me what she should do with a plastic water container she replaced with a glass container for school. She wanted to know if she should recycle it or donate it. She said she was trying to cut down on her plastic use and wanted to do the right thing with the plastic bottle. I'm thankful that she is becoming more aware of her plastic consumption and how she can repurpose and recycle the things she is not using. But I think as a family, I'd like to see us move further toward a lifestyle of intentional minimalism. One where we choose to consume less stuff so we eventually have fewer things we even have to give away. I'd like to recommend the book More Of Less by Joshua Becker as a thought provoking  resource to begin exploring a lifestyle of minimalism and simple living. 

I purchase my deodorant from Native.  They only use all natural, cruelty free, and edible (but not recommended) ingredients!  They have transitioned over the past few years to offering plastic-free deodorant!!!  Unfortunately, not all scents are available in plastic-free, but many are!  I even got my daughter to switch to using their plastic-free options!  They have body soap, toothpaste and body wash for men and women.  You can earn free travel size deodorants (which are great for traveling!) I am signed up for the subscription plan to save $, and can adjust my refill shipment date as far out as I need!  They also offer season scents throughout the year!  I find that the deodorant sticks last about 3 months, and instead of smiling sweaty, I get occasional whiffs of flower bouquets or fresh cotton!  This is deodorant and not antiperspirant.  (Read the reviews, as there is commonly a slight adjustment period for your body to adjust away from the aluminum products).   Link to page:  http://rwrd.io/idicnnj?c 

By doing this challenge I know that I have become more cognizant of plastic and waste. I know I will continue to do so. My backhall used to hold our recycling bin. ( We live in the country and recycling isn't offered; so we make a monthly trip to the landfill). No more empty plastic gallon milk jugs, Gatorade bottles, and plastic coffee containers. No more plastic Tide bottles or plastic packs. Hallway looks much better. I'm going to keep learning and make efforts to improve on this lifestyle. 

We did it y'all! Another month of opportunities to learn and make positive changes.  I know my family and I have adopted a few new habits and I'm grateful to everyone who has shared tips and encouragement.  Enjoy the rest of your summer :)

Years ago, my mom ordered some fold up reusable grocery bags from the Greater Good. It's a wonderful website that you can go to and purchase products that benefit different charitable  programs such as animal rescue, diabetes research, mammogram funding, autism programs, etc. You can sign up to receive a reminder email to click on different charitable programs to raise money for them. One of the programs is Free The Ocean, which you can click on to help remove plastic from the ocean.  It has you play a trivia game every day and it doesn't matter if you answer the question correctly or not, you remove one piece of plastic from the ocean (courtesy of the sponsors I'm guessing). 

We did school shopping today and had our own bags. All of the places we went used our reuseable bags, however one seemed a bit annoyed as I had to keep reminding her to use my bag (Dollar Tree). When we would head into another store, we would empty out an extra bag filling up our previously used bags so we maximized the use of our bags. Unfortunately, it looks like Target didn’t give us our discount for bringing our own bags, and we had 4 transactions!  ☹️

I have returned to using powdered laundry detergent again. I'm not ready to make my own yet as I have used Tide all my life but at least it's less plastic.

Finally made it to Life Unplastic today. I had only made online purchases before today. I highly recommend a visit. The girl there was helpful and so very nice. Got a few goodies :)