As Earth Week 2022 comes to an end, we’d like to take some time to reflect on all of the wonderful activities and achievements that have taken place this week. First, we partnered with Sea Hugger on our first ever giveaway focused on the next generation – kids! To engage children further, we also posted a list of Earth Day crafts and activities that the whole family will enjoy. We then shared ‘the ultimate zero waste bundle’ giveaway to help spread even more eco-friendly lifestyle tools to our audience. And we closed out Earth Week by sharing a link to a virtual documentary screening! A big shoutout to TRASHY for including us in the doc.
This has been a terrific week, but we’d like to keep the momentum going! While a lot of focus and eco-friendly efforts get put on Earth Day – and April in general – the habits or actions designated for this specific time of year don’t have to be limited to just now. There are tons of small, daily changes we can make to slowly integrate an eco-friendly lifestyle into our everyday routine and help out our planet along the way! Here are 5 actions you can take to Make Every Day Earth Day:
1. Reuse What You Have
- One of the ways you can perpetuate Earth Day is by using what you already have. In most cases, the optimal eco-friendly choice is to extend the life of the items you currently possess. So don’t toss your plastic items – just for being plastic – if they are still capable of being safely used. For instance, if you still have Ziplocks on hand from your pre-plastic-free days, use those disposable baggies until you can’t anymore, and then replace them with plastic free, zero waste alternatives. While some reuse techniques won’t be as obvious as the plastic baggies example, we encourage everyone to take on this ingenious eco-friendly hack and find creative ways of reusing, repurposing, or upcycling items around your house. Need a jump start? Check out our blog post on 6 items that can easily be repurposed.
2. Gear Up with Eco-Friendly Products
- We’ve mentioned it before, but it’s worth saying again, that one of the keys to keeping up the Earth Day mentality – and living an eco-friendly lifestyle – is to be prepared. The best way to do that is to gear up with the eco tools that will help you fight off (figuratively, of course!) plastic waste on a daily basis. These tools can include anything from beeswax wraps (eliminate the need for plastic wrap); to safety razors (eliminate the need for plastic refill cartridges); to glass spray bottles (eliminate the need for plastic bottles). The Albatross Designs team has got you covered with some essential eco-friendly products! Reduce your plastic footprint and save money by transitioning to our zero waste safety razor, or switch up your entire shower routine by checking out one of our shave + shower kits. Snag a set of Take Back Ware, our reusable travel utensils, to always be prepared while on-the-go. You can also combine your eco-friendly lifestyle tools into a toolkit. Check out our blog post on how to make a plastic-free toolkit!
3. Donate Your Time
- If you’re like us, maybe you’ve just celebrated Earth Day by signing up for a beach cleanup or volunteering with a habitat restoration project. A simple way you can extend the sentiment of Earth Day to the rest of the year is by taking more opportunities to donate your time to a good cause! Though, we get it – people are busy! To reduce the time commitment for this suggestion, you could make the simple and easy goal of volunteering just once or twice a year. And this could be including or in addition to any Earth Day volunteering that you may perform. Alternatively, you could use this notion of activation and Earth Day continuation as a catalyst to adopt new practices, like picking up any trash you see while taking strolls through your neighborhood. There are so many ways to get outside and help our planet!
4. Shop for Secondhand Goods
- Along the same lines of reusing what you already have, it’s incredibly eco-friendly to purchase secondhand items instead of buying new, raw materials. There’s a positive environmental benefit to purchasing secondhand items of any kind, but textiles in particular make a significant impact. Each year, 92 million tons of clothing-related waste gets discarded, which is equivalent to a garbage truck full of garments getting incinerated or sent to the landfill every second (source: Earth.Org). This is why it’s so important to prioritize reuse, like secondhand clothing, to ensure items get a second (or third, or even fourth) life instead of ending up in a landfill. So the next time you feel money burning a hole in your pocket, skip the mall and shop at a secondhand or thrift store instead! And while the selection will vary slightly from store-to-store, in general you can find products of equal quality that are both eco-friendly and low cost. Another option for gently used secondhand goods is to check out any garage, yard, or estate sales in your area.
5. Reduce The Meat
- Another action you can take that has widespread eco-friendly benefits is reducing the amount of meat and dairy products that you consume. The resources required to raise cattle for production are quite substantial, and lead to a negative impact on land and water resources, as well as an increase in greenhouse gas emissions that contribute to climate change. The water use, in particular, is alarming. For instance, “a hamburger made with one quarter pound of beef requires 425 gallons of water to produce” (source: Meatless Monday). If you are interested in reducing your meat consumption, it doesn’t have to be an all-or-nothing change. Even just reducing or cutting out meat from your diet one day a week will make a significant difference. Plus, meatless dishes are healthier for you! And with all of the plant-based alternatives that are available, making a dish vegan can be as simple as swapping out cow’s milk with some almond milk, or cheese with some nutritional yeast.
