Getting my Juju on!

Earlier this year I set a few goals for my sustainability journey. I have finally gotten around to number 2, trying a moon cup.

As part of my Plastic Free July activities I ordered my cup - this was a major step for me. It was one of those tasks that seemed like such a simple thing to do but it just wasn't happening.

My Juju parcel

I guess part of my hesitation was because it wasn't as simple as jumping on the computer and hitting buy. I had to decide what I wanted. I really knew nothing about moon cups and I don't think any of my friends use them.

My research included Sustainable Menstruation Australia and Environment House.

Both sites had really useful information to help me choose what I wanted. Unfortunately, the blog I read on Environment House's website at the time seems to have been taken down. A woman spoke about trying both the Juju and Lunette cups and preferred the Lunette I think. She found one of the styles just wasn't comfortable for her.

The main considerations when choosing a cup are:

• Are you a virgin? (not a big one for many of us, but clearly important for youngsters)
• If you are a mum, did you have a vaginal birth?
• Do you have a heavy or low flow period?
• Do you do any regular pelvic floor strengthening exercise like pilates or yoga?
• Your age - as you get older your pelvic muscles tend to weaken; and
• The length of your vaginal canal (probably not a huge factor for most people but if it is considerably long or short then you would need to buy accordingly).

There are two sizes available in each brand. The Juju is Australian made, which gave it a big tick in my book. It is also clear with no dyes, which I like because it means less chemicals. 

The Juju is a smaller sized brand. So the size 1 Juju is basically the smallest cup available. 

I have a low flow and practice yoga so was considering buying the size 1. Rosie from Sustainable Menstruation Australia advised that is would be wise to go for the size 2, which is bigger but still a small sized cup.

The sterilised cup

When my cup arrived I was expecting it to be bigger than it is for some reason (no idea why - clearly I know where it needs to be going!)

I boiled mine for 5 minutes to sterilise it before use - I plan to do that before each monthly cycle.

It is meant to take 2 to 3 months to properly get the hang of using my cup. I have been reading up on what to do and I'm feeling really excited about not having to buy tampons and pads every month. Not only to save the waste. I always seem to run of them out at awkward times! 

The cup is supposed to last 3 times as long as a pad or tampon would and it can last up to 12 hours. That would mean I could change it morning and night and forget about it in-between. That sounds like freedom to me.

I'm really looking forward to getting my Juju on!

Have you considered trying a menstrual cup before? 

Plastic Free July: Takeaway Coffee Cup

Hot drinks and babies tend not to mix well. Babies are unpredictable and you often need to make a quick getaway. It is, therefore, hard to order coffee and actually sit and enjoy it.

Since throwing away takeaway cups is wasteful I choose not to buy takeaway coffee either. I always plan to make one for myself when I get home but often that doesn't happen in the rush to eat lunch and get nap time happening.

Enter my new Keep Cup, which I bought as part of our efforts during Plastic Free July. I bought it sure of the realm of possibilities that would lay before me. I could see myself shopping whilst sipping on a warm (but not too hot) flat white. Turtle would be sitting calmly in the trolley, probably snacking on some crackers, as I stocked up on food for the house.

My first coffee experience didn't go exactly like that. Turtle had come down with a cold a couple of days earlier. I had dropped my elderly neighbours at a nearby medical appointment to save them having to walk to the train. We had half an hour to wait before seeing the doctor about Turtle's cold and an outbreak of blisters that had appeared on her bum and face the night before. My bets were on Hand, Foot and Mouth since it had been going around childcare recently.

I decided to use the window of time that we had to indulge in my first takeaway coffee experience. I carried Turtle into the shops. The coffee shop happily accepted my cup to use instead of theirs. I thought that was going to be the most difficult part of the experience.

Little did I know. Turtle got jealous the second she saw my coffee and demanded her own. She immediately went into full scale tantrum (which is unlike her!) and threw herself onto the ground in the middle of the shops. Since I had my coffee in hand I couldn't pick her up while she was writhing on the ground.

I had to rest the coffee on a nearby shop wall (with everyone in the coffee shop staring) and attend to her before carrying her and the coffee from the shops. Oh dear. Reality check... She did have Hand, Foot and Mouth and we had a few days of her being ratty while she got over it, poor love.

Last weekend Mr Fix It and I took our matching Keep Cups and Turtle to the beach. We stopped for coffee on the way and spent a lovely morning playing in the sand with Turtle, soaking up the beautiful Perth winter sunshine. It was much more in line with my idea of a relaxing takeaway experience.

I've also started using my Keep Cup on mornings when I think I might not get to finish my cuppa before I leave the house. If I haven't finished I can just pop the top on and head out. I'm really happy with my new purchase.

Are you a coffee fiend? Have you discovered the delights of having your own reusable cup yet?

Joining With Some Grace today for #FYBF. I hope you've fitted in a nice cuppa while reading this (hopefully not on the run!).

Plastic Free Bread

Since Plastic Free July started I have found myself being much more mindful each time I head to the shops for groceries. This has been particularly true when buying bread.

A friend is in the habit of baking her own (delicious!) sour dough bread. While this is a goal I have set for myself I am not quite ready to take it on just yet.

The next best thing, which is a lot less time consuming, is to simply buy bread without plastic. I have done this on four separate occasions in the last couple of weeks. Each time has been from a local chain bakery - three different ones so far.

The first time I was on my way home from toy library duty and had not prepared myself at all for the task. I grabbed a reusable shopping bag from the back of the car, took a quick look in it to make sure it wasn't too grubby, and used that.

I'm not sure if I was feeling conspicuous the first time, or if the girl serving me was just a total cow. I asked for a loaf of bread (unsliced) to be placed into my reusable bag. She immediately grabbed a plastic bag that they would normally put the bread in. I quickly repeated that I didn't want plastic and she curtly replied, "I need to use it to pick up the bread". After that she would not meet my eye. I even smiled and tried to catch it. She did not make eye contact. She clearly thought I was a crazy hippy freak.

Each time since then has been completely fine with the person serving me being lovely and helpful. On one of the occasions I was organised enough to bring my own soft plastic bag (see picture above). The lady sliced the bread and tied it for me. I have kept the tie to reuse.

I reused the bag and tie when I bought six rolls to have lentil burgers last week. Since I didn't have the foresight to bring two bags I bought unsliced bread again at the same time (for $6.20 - bargain!).

I am pleased to have overcome whatever it was that was stopping me from previously buying my bread plastic-free. I am confident that I can continue doing this in future.

Thank you Plastic Free July!

Have you ever thought about buying your bread plastic-free?

Once again linking up with Essentially Jess for #IBOT

Why Plastic Free July is Important

Our Living Smarties group watched Bag It last week. It was a great way to kick off Plastic Free July. It reminded me that there are very important environmental, health and social reasons to reduce our family's use of single-use plastic.

The environmental reason that struck a cord for me is that plastic is made from fossil fuels (oil and natural gas), which take hundreds of thousands of years to form in the earth. They are non-renewable and, after a fossil fuel is burned, can never be used again.

Many single-use plastic products are used for less than a couple of hours before they are discarded. It doesn't make any sense to buy a single-use plastic bottle of water, for example, when we live in a country where we can get clean drinking water straight from the tap! It is such a waste of precious fossil fuels. My re-usable bottle is so much nicer to drink out of too.

The health reason that struck a cord for me is that since the late 70's we have been surrounded by plastic. It touches our food, our drinks, our medicines and everything else. Let's be honest. We are offered plastic shopping bags to carry food that is often packed in at least one layer of packaging or plastic. Although the use of some plastic elements (think BPAs) are being phased out of products that touch food we don't really understand the potential impacts of the other components yet.

Since plastic doesn't break down in the environment for millions of years it fragments and is eaten by wildlife, particularly in the ocean. Apart from being terrible pollution the plastic is then passed up the food chain to humans. How can we begin to understand the flow on health effects of that for not just humans, but all of the animals impacted within the food chain? Hormone mimicking effects (again, such as BPAs) are also realised through the food chain, particularly in the ocean.

Image Source

The social impacts motivating me arose directly from Bag It. The movie talked about plastic recycling and how numbers 1 & 2 (in the recycling triangle) are the most readily recycled products (as opposed to numbers 3, 4, 5, 6, & 7). I know this is true because when I was working to increase plastic recycling at my work the only plastics that were collected (because they have a market) were numbers 1 & 2. Bag It explained that numbers 1 & 2 (which include PET plastic drink bottles) can easily be recycled into the lower grade of plastics (3-7). The lower grade of plastics, however, can't be recycled into a plastic of high enough quality to be economical. This means that plastic is generally only recycled once and then it becomes unusable waste.

When the higher quality plastics are collected and recycled they can be shipped to third world countries and processed in abominable working conditions. Workers sift through plastic waste and melt it down with no safety equipment. That is a pretty considerable social price for my plastic use.

On a more positive note I should mention what an amazing product plastic is. It can do so many things and it is so cheap to manufacture! In countries where there is no clean drinking water I'm sure many would suffer incredibly without it. It's like everything - let's try to use a great product responsibly so that we can continue to use it in a much nicer world for a much longer time.

Do you share my concerns about plastic? 

Plastic Free July in Our House

I'm a bit late with this post... We are already a week into July. I can barely believe it! Since Plastic Free July is such a great initiative, however, I want to share what our family is up to this month.

I have previously posted about how to use less cling wrap. That is a very simple and easy thing to stop using around the home. Our family already takes our own re-usable shopping bags into the shops (well, most of the time!), doesn't use straws, and uses re-usable water bottles. These items are good ones to start out with when you are beginning to cut back the plastic in your life.

My glass re-usable water bottle. Sure it cost more upfront but I love drinking out of it.

This month I am challenging our family to reduce single-use plastic even further by:

• Buying more bulk products, such as oats, beans, lentils, sultanas, & cleaning products, by bringing my own containers to be refilled.

• I have bought myself a reusable takeaway coffee cup (at last!). I rarely buy take away coffee since I feel too guilty about the waste. This is a very exciting purchase since I am now able to indulge on the run.

• I am saving all of the single-use plastic packets that we finish throughout the month in a (re-usable!) shopping bag.  I will review these products each week to see if I can find ways to reduce or eliminate more plastic from our lives.

• I have spoken to my child care centre about trialling using cloth nappies for Turtle on the day that she goes there each week. They have agreed to trial them this week. If it goes well then we will continue to use cloth at child care in future.

Have you already heard of Plastic Free July? Are you inspired to try and reduce your single-use plastic this month? Please share any tips and ideas below.

Sustainability Game Plan - Setting some goals

To try and stop myself from being pulled in a million different directions at once I have decided to set some goals (or more specifically, eleven goals) for myself. I am hoping that it will help me to start and then continue to work on projects, make some changes and try some new things that I have been wanting to do for awhile. I will share my experiences each time I tick off a goal. I will also share any entertaining events that may occur while I am attempting to achieve one of these things.

1. Organise our family schedule

We have just started to make a huge effort with goal number 1. We were kindly given a family organiser calendar for Christmas. I got it out at the end of March, which shows just how organised things have been in our house so far this year! Not only have we planned out jobs, appointments and commitments but we have also planned meals through the week too. This is a huge change for us. So far it has helped me to set firm boundaries for what I need to do each day. This is helping me to find time to relax and we are fitting in some more family activities too.

2. Try a moon cup

This is something that I have been thinking of trying for a couple of years now. It is amazing how much negativity surrounds women trying alternative menstrual products. They are definitely not something that is discussed openly. I recently read this fantastic account of a mum trying a moon cup for the first time.  It has provided me with some additional, and probably much needed!, motivation to buy one and give it a try.

3. Phase out plastic in the kitchen

Since I am increasingly worried about the environmental and health impacts of having so much plastic surrounding us I try to minimise the plastic I use, particularly single-use items. I am a proud participant of Plastic Free July and I have found it easy to apply these ideas to many areas of my life. I have decreased my use of cling wrap to practically zero. I have also stopped buying water in plastic bottles. I use a glass re-usable bottle that I carry most places with me. My next step is to reduce plastic storage in the cupboards by using glass jars and any suitable up-cycled containers that I can find.

4. Decluttering the house

This is an ongoing job since we live in a small house.  However, with the change of season I am particularly focused on clearing out Turtle's and my own clothes. I will gift items to friends if they need them, sell things on Gumtree or donate them to charity. There is no plan for things to be thrown in the bin unless they are really worn out. Even then there might be a use for them as rags.

5. Increase my yoga practice

I am currently doing 1 to 2 yoga practices a week unless there is a big disruption, such as Easter long weekend! Since I am considering doing a yoga instructing course in a year I would like to increase my practice to 2-3 yoga session a week. The idea will be to keep increasing in frequency until I am practicing daily (gasp!).

6. Make homemade muesli bars

I have had one try at this already and, although it tasted delicious, the mixture didn't stick together. We ended up with a kind of trail mix of muesli bar, which was (luckily!) very well received. My main motivation to make homemade muesli bars is to provide nutritious snacks for the family without the packaging of bought muesli bars. I am aiming to create a yummy treat that isn't too sweet.

7. Make my own bread

I am keen to make my own bread. We don't have space for a bread maker so I don't want to buy one. I  want to bake a traditional loaf that is simple so that I could realistically do it regularly. If I set my mind to this goal I am sure I can easily achieve it. I was even given a recipe by a friend awhile ago that is apparently quick and simple. Baking bread has just not been at the forefront of my mind. Clearly it did not make the top of this list either but since it here I am feeling confident I will get to it soon(ish)!

8. Continue to increase the garden's productivity

This is something that Mr Fix It and I are very committed to but we are limited by time. We have recently scheduled a gardening day a month to try and help with this problem. At the moment the vegetable garden is in transition.

There is some basil that still needs to be harvested (I feel a batch of pesto coming on). The corn crop we planted in late summer didn't yield any corn unfortunately. However, the late zucchini crop is going well. We harvested our first zucchini a week or so ago and they are producing a lot of zucchini (big delicious zucchini!). I have just planted some snow peas since Turtle was getting quite upset that there was nothing for her to eat regularly from the garden. The eggplant is still producing baby eggplants and she gets upset every time I take them away while she tries to eat them raw. We are still getting some strawberries too, all of which Turtle is eating immediately after they are harvested.

The kale and celery in the back bed are infested with aphids so we are planning to rip them out and refill that whole bed since the soil has sunk. So there is definitely some work to do here.

9. Make a toadstool stool and other up-cycled toys, mending and crafts

I recently saw a post about making a toadstool stool and I am inspired to make one. The other ideas in that post on how to up-cycle kitchens and toys are brilliant too. Goal number 9 also includes crafts to make gifts and mending things to extend their life (including dog beds!). This is such a broad and fun area, I hope that I find some quality time to make some things (which will rely on goal 1 going smoothly!).

10. Reduce our water use at home

Occasionally our toilet pipe makes funny sounds that we think could mean it has a leak. I have been meaning to properly check out this problem and, while I am at it, check to see if there are any other opportunities to save water. Our water use has gone up a lot since we put in the garden and again since we had Turtle. It's time to see if we can change that.

11. Stop buying products that contain palm oil

I recently changed peanut butter brand since I found out the popular name brand that I was buying contains palm oil. Palm oil production requires huge areas of important forests to be cleared. This has significant environmental impacts, especially removing habitat for many endangered species. To find out more about this issue follow this link to Say No to Palm Oil.

Can you join me on one or more of these goals? I would love to know if you are working towards anything similar or different.

Lizzing Lightly