A Deeper Green

Many times when people are faced with buying organic produce they may ask if it’s worth spending the extra money that organic products command. Now the Environmental Working Group (EWG) has made that decision easier for all of us.

They have put together a great printable cheat sheet. You can download the PDF of it here.

The great part about this cheat sheet is that it lists the 12 foods that you should typically look for the organic version of, and also gives you several foods that carry lower pesticide loads and can be bought conventionally. I really like this guide because it takes the guess work out of buying produce.

Take a minute and download it, print it out, and take it to the store with you next time. Your body will thank you

So, we’ve all made it to 2010. Yay!

I spent the last couple weeks running around like a crazy person, visiting with all of my family and all of my boyfriend’s family.  I love the holidays, but they can be pretty stressful.

In similar news, project “Make Christmas” was a resounding success. Everyone seemed to like their baked goods and I’ve only heard good things about my mix CDs. The one think I will probably change for next year is to spread out the baking. I fit all of my baking into one 24 hour period, and it was pretty crazy.  I think making Christmas is an idea that will work well for every year from now on though

Now with that recap of the year in place I would like to get to the meat of this post. I recently became aware of this great blog, Green Mama’s Pad. Some of the most recent posts are looking back on green goals for 2009 and creating new goals for 2010. As the whole point of this blog is to illustrate my journey to a greener lifestyle, I thought that maybe setting some green goals for 2010 here in this blog might be a good idea. I also encourage you, my readers, to make a green goal or two for yourself this year or to put a link in the comments about green goals you’ve made and worked for in the past.

So without further ado, my green goals for 2010:

~ Shop the farmer’s market, co-op and organic delivery first. I’ve been doing pretty well with this lately, but want to make more of an effort.

~ In line with that, try to phase out some of the prepackaged frozen foods that me and my boyfriend rely on so much for lunches and quick meals. We love those Amy’s frozen burritos; why not make more of our own!

~ Do better at food preservation. Freezing was fine for last year, but this year I am canning, no excuses.

~ To expand my small and successful container gardening operation to include actual vegetables, not just herbs and flowers. (I’m thinking peppers and tomatoes!)

~ And lastly, to do a better job documenting my efforts here. Last year was my best year yet with this blog and I want to keep pushing upward!

Share your green goals with me in the comments! I’d love to know what others are interested in and maybe even try to help