#projectgreenchallenge

Here are just a few of the things I've become more conscious of or changed throughout my experience during Project Green Challenge. 

I’ve stopped buying conventional clothing – only thrifted clothing, or clothing made through sustainable, ethical practices

I’ve switched out all of my body and face care products for organic alternatives

I’ve stopped drinking conventional teas and only drink fair trade organic teas

I’ve stopped using the drying machines and instead hang dry my clothes

I’ve started eating meat fewer times a week

I’ve started using only reusable cups and mugs

I’ve stopped buying packaged foods

I’ve started trying to “clean my plate” at meals instead of wasting food

I’ve become a more avid recycler

I’ve started trying to use less water for showering and washing my face

I’ve started trying to think more about the sources of everything that I own and/or purchase and how the positive, neutral, or negative impact those have on our environment and global community

I’ve become more conscious of the environmentally exploitative, inhumane practices of conventional meat factory farming

I’ve become more aware of pesticides on produce

I’ve become aware of the environmentally detrimental means by which conventional clothing is produced

I’ve become aware of the dangers, towards the environment and consumers, of conventional face and body products

I’ve become more aware of the severity of water pollution

I’ve become aware of the concept of REFUSE, reduce, reuse, recycle and now understand that no waste is better than recycling when possible

I’ve become conscious about the Fair Trade food movement, which I am now very passionate about

I’ve become passionate about consciousness-raising around environmental issues and the intersectionality of environmental and social issues around the world

I’ve become conscious of Organic certified food and clothing brands, what that certification means and why I should support it

I’ve become conscious of FLOSN when analyzing the environmental and health impacts of my food purchases

I’ve become aware of how awesome hemp is and even sent letters to my representatives asking them to support hemp legislation

I’ve become more aware of what genetically modified organisms are and why we should fight for our right to know whether or not they’re in our foods

I’ve become aware of my carbon footprint, greenhouse gases, and various ways to reduce that footprint

For the next 2 weeks (until October 22nd) I'm going to make 3 zero waste lifestyle changes! Woohoo! Hopefully I'll be able to keep up these changes long after mid-October, but I'm excited to try them out over the next few weeks. Reducing the amount of waste I produce is SO important. I'm trying to take responsibility for my contributions to waste on this planet and lead a sustainable life - better for me and mother nature!

Here are the 3 changes I am committing to over the next 2 weeks - 

1. No plastic or paper cups - my thermos, Nalgene, and mason jars are my new best friends. The Nalgene has been a big part of my life for a while now and I can't remember the last time that I drank out of a plastic water bottle. However, I can't seem to remember to bring my Kleen Kanteen thermos or a mason jar with me when I go get coffee. Especially now that I'm back in school and in frequent need of caffeination, it's time for me to step up and bring reusable drinking containers with me for eco-friendly caffeine on the go.

2. Clean plate club! - over the next two weeks I am vowing to only put as much food as I can eat on my plate. In order to do this I am going to get smaller portions for myself and then if I am still hungry, go back for seconds. The Skidmore dining hall throws out uneaten food from students plates instead of composting. In order to not contribute to that waste each day, I am going to eat what's on my plate so I don't have to throw out food. This is better for the environment and healthier for me - it forces me to eat only when I'm hungry and stop when I'm full instead of trying to eat a huge plate of food and then throwing out the leftovers once I'm stuffed.

3. No packaged food - I am going to stop eating packaged food. This one kind of scares me. It's going to involve some grocery shopping and planning ahead, as I live in a dorm and don't have kitchen access just a meal plan, but I think I can do it if I'm thoughtful and deliberate about my snacking. This will encourage me to snack more healthfully and with a lot less waste!!

Todays Challenge is create my own personal gameplan to find a way to reduce my carbon footprint. I’d like to reduce my Carbon footprint by at least ¼. Instead of taking four planet Earths to satisfy people, we could use at least less than three.

  10 lifestyle changes that could help reduce my Carbon footprint

  Have a Meatless Monday, or even a Meatless Wednesday

Purchase products that are made of 100% post consumer recycled content

Walk once a week to school

Buy Compact fluorescent light bulbs

Turn off Laptop when not in use

Turn off lights every time I leave the room

Eating more local food

Recycling everything, including food scraps

Unplugging chargers and gadgets when not in use

10. Filter my own water instead of using bottled water

    I then made my mom take the carbon footprint quiz. we had similar results. That’s expected, we do live in the same house!

  Now I’ll make a game plan for my mom! We both will be able to support each other to continue these lifestyle changes.

  10 lifestyle changes that could help reduce my mom’s Carbon footprint

  Have a meatless Monday, or even a couple of days

Get rid of paper junk mail

Eat more local food

Switching to green energy/ solar energy

Get a worm bin for compost

Use rechargeable batteries

Use a hybrid car or a fuel efficient one

Eat seasonally

Keep the car tuned up

10. Filter water instead of using bottled water

Today I learned allll about chemicals in body products and was pretty shocked and scared by my findings! This video is crazy informative about everything cosmetic & chemical related - http://storyofstuff.org/movies/story-of-cosmetics/ I highly recommend watching it! Basically, if you're products aren't certified as organic, its likely that they contain high numbers of toxins, carcinogens, allergens, and other harmful ingredients.  Want to know a main ingredient that I found out is in Herbal Essences shampoos? PETROL. As in when you lather up your shampoo, your actually putting fuel on your head, and your skin is your most absorbent organ, so you best believe that stuff is making its way inside your body! Yikes!

If you're interested in some of my experience, here's the story of my Greenest challenge for the day...

For this challenge, my friends Morgan, Sarah, and I went on over to CVS in Saratoga Springs, NY to check out the health risks or benefits of our favorite conventional beauty products.

My friend Sarah chose her favorite face sunscreen that she wore a lot this summer while working as a camp counselor, Neutrogena Clear Face Broad Spectrum SPF 30 Sunscreen.

We looked the sunscreen up on the EWG Skin Deep app and discovered that it has a hazard rating of 4- it is a moderately hazardous beauty product. Sarah didn’t seem too surprised. She said that she knew the sunscreen “wasn’t all-natural”. However, one of the ingredients, oxybenzone was rated as an 8- a very high hazard risk. We then researched oxybenzone on the EWG site and found some pretty scary results… Oxybenzone is a sunscreen ingredient that is linked to “biochemical or cellular level changes, endocrine disruption, bioaccumulation, ecotoxicology, and organ system toxicity”. It also banned in some Japanese cosmetics. Sarah was, rightfully, pretty upset by this. She said that she felt “tricked”. She knew that the product wasn’t all natural, it never claimed to be organic or plant-based, but she had no idea that all summer long she’d been putting something on her face that could potentially harm her and even disrupt the functioning of her endocrine system.

Morgan was not so psyched about going next. She had picked out her favorite mascara, Maybelline Mega Plush Volume Express Mascara, and was worried that the results about its ingredients would be similarly unnerving. 

We researched the Maybelline Mega Plush Mascara on the EWG Skin Deep App. The mascara had a hazard rating of 3, moderately hazardous, and had no high hazard ingredients. Morgan was visibly relieved and even smiled at the news. “Yay! No scary ingredient’s like the oxy-thing in Sarah’s sunblock”, she teased. However, I looked at the moderately hazardous ingredients on the ingredient list and realized that I recognized 2 of the mascara’s ingredients from my research for today’s Green challenge, phenoxyethanol and sodium laurel sulfate. So I looked them up again and shared with Morgan my findings from earlier. Phenoxyethanol is a chemical preservative that is used in many skin products. It is a colorless oily liquid that is produced in labs. Continued exposure to phenoxyethanol has been linked to organ toxicity, contact dermatitis, and worsening of eczema (Paiskincare.com). Sodium laurel sulfate is an “elmulsifier and foaming agent commonly used in cosmetic products”. SLS has been linked to cancer, neurotoxicity, organ toxicity, skin irritation, and endocrine disruption (Livestrong.com).

When I shared this information with Morgan, she looked disgusted, to be honest. Her face was scrunched as if she had just smelt something terrible. “Are you serious?” she said, “That’s considered moderately hazardous? It’s linked to cancer?” I showed her the article from LiveStrong.com and she just shook her head, clearly upset that her favorite mascara happened to do more than give her “mega plush” voluminous lashes, it was also exposing her body to a known carcinogen, sodium laurel sulfate.

The three of us were all understandably freaked out by our findings; clearly many of our go-to body products were also go-to’s for toxins to gain easy access to our bodies! What to do?

  Well… Morgan, Sarah, and I are going to try to go green! At some point in the next few days the three of us decided that we’re going to Healthy Living Market in Saratoga Springs to purchase some toxin-free, lovely organic body products! Also, we’re going to pick up some ingredients while we’re there and make ourselves some organic DIY facemasks. Here’s the recipe I found online at beautyhigh.com –

  Banana Face Mask 


Bananas are known for their high levels of potassium, so it makes sense that applying the super fruit to your skin would do nothing but greatness. Vitamins A, B, C and E along with numerous minerals are also found in bananas. Use this mask to moisturize, get rid of dead skin cells and best of all, fight wrinkles.

  Ingredients: 


1/2 banana
2 tablespoons honey
1 tablespoon water (plain water)

  Directions: 
1. Mash banana until there are no clumps.
2. Add in honey and water and blend together.
3. Coat face in mask and let sit for 20-25 minutes.
4. Rinse with warm water and follow with a moisturizer.

I was one of the winners for more challenges! I was a winner for the Packaged Food Greener challenge, which can be viewed at http://goinggreenproject.tumblr.com/post/33469519087/day-12-greener-project and then today I received an email that I was a winner for both the Greener and Greenest challenges for Organic Cotton! Woo! Those posts can be viewed at http://goinggreenproject.tumblr.com/post/34035145637/day-19-greener-project-pick-10-15-cotton-products and http://goinggreenproject.tumblr.com/post/34035670761/day-19-greenest-project-1-find-an-item-in-your .