Waste-free holiday

I hate to be so bahumbug about one of my and most people’s favorite holiday, but it’s a fact. Christmas is the most wasteful holiday.

According to recycleworks.org, from thanksgiving to new years’, our household waste increases by more than 25 percent. With everything from added food waste, to wrapping, packaging, it adds up to over 1 million tons a week going into a landfill.

Half the paper used in America is used to wrap products. And the 2.65 billion Christmas cards sold in America (so this doesn’t include the cards not sold that are thrown away) could fill a football field for up to 10 stories.

If everyone reused just two feet of holiday ribbon, it would add up to enough to tie a bow around the planet. How’s that for a Christmas present to us and the Earth?

Food waste is also one of the biggest waste contributors. Food waste makes up to a quarter of the garbage thrown away during Thanksgiving and New Year’s. A household of four could save an average $100-$125 by reducing food waste.

The good news is that both of these problems have solutions.

To address our overconsumption of paper:

  1. Save wrapping paper this year to use for next year. It takes a bit of effort and patience from everyone involved because everyone has to wait while you carefully unwrap your presents.
  2. Use recycled paper products. Recycled cards, wrapping paper, bags, etc. And you could always send an e-card, instead of paper. If everyone sent one less card we could save 50,000 cubic yards of paper.
  3. Use alternatives to the conventional wrapping paper. Newspapers, reusable bags (which is a gift in itself and it keeps on giving), use bags or used boxes, paper bags from the store, fabric, (fabric is harder to rip to shred, which makes it easier to reuse) jars or cans (mixes are adorable in jars), I will also tell you, unashamedly, that part of my parents gifts were wrapped in Pringle’s cans. Let your creativity run wild and feel no shame.
  4. Upcycle your paper. Most of these things are super easy. Gifts bags made from newspaper or wrapping paper, bows made from any kind of paper, paper confetti (we used brown packing paper and some used wrapping paper that wasn’t in such good shape and shredded with a paper shredder).
    Step 8

    Bows made from wrapping paper.

    Paper shred/confetti

    Packing confetti made from shipping paper and old wrapping paper

And for our waste of food? Mostly it has to do with planning ahead. Planning portion sizes, what people tend to eat more or less of, how you plan to store it, etc.

  1. This site, love food, hate waste, is site teaching about food waste and how to cut down. The statistics are based from the UK, but the principles can be applied anywhere. It helps with planning portion, storing and recipes so you can use the same ingredients in a different recipe.
  2. You can also donate it. I feel a little iffy about this sometimes, but if you can find a homeless shelter who will take unpackaged food then why not?
  3. Have a potluck. Everyone bring a dish and take home the leftovers.
  4. Embrace the leftovers. I’m not a big fan of leftovers, but some things like pie can never be eaten too many times. I try to just think of everything as leftover pie.
  5. Compost your plain, raw fruits and veggies.

The main thing is to be aware of the waste and take it into a count when planning your holiday festivities. Feel free to leave a comment on how you plan to cut down waste during the holiday season.


Eating Fuel

My last post talked about how to use less gas, which had a link to an article that had a lot of tips, but it forgot to mention one important thing and that was food.

I read a book not that long ago called Animal, Vegetable Miracle about a family who gardened and tried to live local for a year. The following information/numbers I received from that book.

One thing that most people don’t consider when they calculate their gas consumption is their food. Four hundred gallons per citizen in one year goes toward agriculture. That’s a hefty 17 percent. Tractors, combines, harvesters, irrigations, sprayers, tillers, balers and other petroleum ticks are all taken into account for this calculation. Synthetic fertilizers are also petroleum based.

And considering all of that, the growing process only takes one-fifth of that 400 gallons.

The average meal, consisting of only food grown in America, travels over 1,500 miles. This number doesn’t include the energy consumed drying, cutting, sorting, baking, packaging (plastic is a petroleum product) warehousing and refrigeration.

The energy that we actually get from these foods is a far cry from the energy that it took to actually get it to our plates.

If you don’t think just drinking straight gas would be a good solution then I have a proposition. If every U.S. citizen ate just one meal a week composed of locally and organically raised meats and produce, we would reduce our country’s oil consumption by over 1.1 million barrels of oil every week.

There are many arguments against local food systems. One is that we are helping to support third world countries. Who is giving these arguments? It certainly isn’t the farmers from those countries, but those humble, kind, loving, innocent, caring CEO from those loving, do good, multi-billion/million dollar corporations that are known for the money they donate to charities. Developed nations promote domestic overproduction of commodity crops that are sold on the international market at well below market value, weakening those fragile economies. This drives farmers to get a job, decreasing agricultural output of that country, which forces them to end up buying those same commodity crops that put them in that position. They will no longer be farm owners, but will become farm laborers. Not to mention the miles of deforestation that will occur. These countries will now be poorer and will own less giving corporations the muscle to do the dirty work in the poorest conditions; environmental policies and human rights out the window.

What does exporting and importing really accomplish anyway? The U.S. exports 1.1 million pounds of potatoes, but it imports 1.4 million pounds of potatoes!!!! What kind of logic is that?! www.viacampesina.org

At first glance, industrial/unhealthy/processed food seems cheaper than organic/healthy/unprocessed food. But we pay for it and not just in health or environmental ways, but in the pocket book, in taxes. Twenty-two billion dollars in taxes are paid for the agricultural fuel, $3 billion for the farm bill, which goes to corporations and not small farms, $10 billion for food related illnesses, $17 billion in chemical clean-up costs (I don’t even want to know how much we paid for the oil spill clean-up), $8 billion for collateral costs of pesticide use, and last, but not least, $20 billion in nutrients lost in soil erosion. That is $80 billion in subsidies, approximately $725 per household not including the price of our ‘cheap’ food.

Organic practices build the soil using manure and cover crops, eliminate herbicides and pesticides by using biological pest controls. Not to mention true organic farms use less packaging and distribute closer to their farms. In Oklahoma we don’t even have to pay tax for food that was sold on the same farm that it was grown.

So, how can we buy food with less gas?

Become a locavore. Like I mentioned earlier, if every family in America ate one local meal a week (food made within 100 miles) then we could save 1.1 million gallons of gas. If this isn’t possible then start as close as you can and work your way out. Check the Community Supported Agriculture site and check for co-ops in your area. Farmer’s Markets are also a great place to find local food.

The Eat Well Guide is also a great site to help find local food from farms, restaurants, CSAs and more.

Gardening is probably the most gas efficient thing you can do. If done right, it doesn’t take any pesticides, fertilizers or gasoline to grow your own food. If you don’t have enough space, community gardens are a great alternative.

If neither of those things are options, then eating seasonally is the next best option. When we eat out of season foods, we are eating foods that have been shipped thousands of miles because they’re coming from places with different climates. These foods are often processed to keep them from going bad on the ride. They’re not as fresh and have lost much of the nutrients on the car ride. If nothing else, when that particular food you can’t give up is in season, make sure you buy it local instead of buying the same food from 3000 miles away.

GMO Kick: Part 3- Solutions



In order to avoid GMOs, try to do the following:









Here’s a handy free shopping guide to help you maneuver food aisles without buying GMOs (http://www.nongmoshoppingguide.com/download.html).’





We are actually overproducing food. The world produces enough grain to feed every person at least 3,500 calories a day. http://iml.jou.ufl.edu/projects/spring01/denlinger/problems.html  Some say more than 40 percent of food produced in America isn’t eaten, which makes that about 29 million tons of food waste and that they say can fill the Rose Bowl every three days. Food scraps make up 17 percent of our waste in landfills. It seems to me that if we really cared about those hungry people we would at least stop taking more than our fair share and throwing it away.








As far as what real food is, as simply as I can put it is fruits and vegetables. That’s my definition, but here’s a better one. http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/28/magazine/28nutritionism.t.html?_r=1&scp=2&sq=pollan+happy+meals



Getting Connected 2: Producers














Corn. When we think of corn, we usually think of corn on the Cobb or kernels. It’s usually white or yellow, sweet and delicious. That’s what I think of when I think about corn, but the reality is that vision is long gone and is a very old-fashioned way of thinking of corn.

Believe it or not, corn is in virtually everything. It makes up about 90 percent of our diets.

High fructose corn syrup? Made from corn.

Beef, chicken, pig, every meat you can imagine? Fed with corn. (Unless you get grass-fed. )

Sweetener in soda? Made from corn.

Corn starch? Made from corn.

Favorite French fries from McDonalds? Fried in corn oil.

Sauces? The thickening agents found in sauces are Dextrin and Maltodextrin. They  are also found in dressing, frozen veggies and ice cream. Made from corn.

Decyl Glucoside – used in personal care products such as shampoo.

Gas used to ship all this stuff all over the country? Comprised with ethanol, which is made from corn.

This isn’t even half of it. The list goes on and on and on and on.

Why is it in everything? Because it’s cheap. Because there is an over-production of it. Why? Because the government subsidizes it. The government has given over $77 billion in corn subsidies from 1995 to 2010. It’s why junk food is so much cheaper than real food.

Why are they doing this? Federal support for agriculture, begun in earnest during the Great Depression, was originally intended as a temporary lifeline to farmers, paying them extra when crop prices were low.

What has kept the cash flow coming? “Big Ag”. Industrial farmers, which are not to be confused with small farmers, have been lobbying congress ever since. Industrial farms grow huge amounts of corn. This not only contributes to the problem of corn overproduction, but it also is bad for the land because crop rotations helps keep nutrients in the soil. Growing huge amounts of corn over and over will cause the nutrients to dry up and then what? Small farms are now switching to this corn business because they aren’t making enough money growing other fruits and vegetables.

What people don’t realize is that food is supposed to cost something. It costs something to produce it. The government pays to make corn cheaper, but the cost comes from somewhere else. And the low prices doesn’t help pay for labor, so the people growing the food get paid and treated like crap. Not only that, but when America produces a certain kind of food like rice or corn and ships it to a poorer country that mainly grows that crop as an income for their own farmers and we sell it to them for cheaper than they can grow it themselves then that puts their own farmers out of business and ruins their economy.

I’m sure you’ve heard about the drought and food prices will soar. I don’t know about you, but anytime I heard about the soaring food prices they show rows and rows of corn and then they talk about corn. Corn, COrn, CORN!!!! I’ve shifted through article after article and the most I’ve got is that it’s affecting subsidized crops like corn, soy, wheat, mostly what is grown in the mid –U.S., which will in turn affect the meat industry. What, are apples, peaches, oranges, strawberries, blueberries, squash, cucumbers, tomatoes, not food? They never mention that the reason ‘food’ prices will raise is because corn is in EVERYTHING! It’s a bit interesting that they say ‘food’ and then they only mention those kinds of crops and fail to mention why that should affect processed foods. People still don’t see the correlation. I’m guessing that other fruits and vegetables prices will stay the same, unless there isn’t enough to feed everyone because farmers have grown less because not enough people wanted them. If those fruits and vegetable prices don’t soar, I’m wondering if people will even notice that they’re cheaper or will people die of starvation because ‘food’ is so expensive.

What We Can Do About Animal Cruelty






















The Cost of Eating Meat






Cost/lb Corn- .043










Humanitarian Cost.


Percentage of US farmland devoted to beef production: 56

Health Costs





Environmental Costs.









All is not lost though. Click here for some solutions.