A little while ago, my daughter asked me to attend her school's weekly assembly because she was going to be performing in a short skit as one of the captains of the Green Team (yup, it runs in the family).  

The students, about 60 of them all together in the upper grades at Wade Thomas, work together with a dedicated group of parents to promote being green on campus. That week the group was promoting the fact that they would be working with all the students to separate the trash into different cans every day at lunch: compost, landfill, recycle, and liquids.  The compost and liquid buckets (no meat or oil -- it attracts rats and we definitely don't want that!) are transported by these dedicated students to the garden to be turned back into earth. Recycling gets recycled and the school sends a lot less to the landfills.

A bonus: less landfill waste saves the school in dumpster fees, too!

That got me to thinking. We were walking in San Francisco a few weeks ago and on the way into the city we had bananas for a snack. Now, bananas are a great snack, but the peels are not a great thing to leave in the car. As luck would have it the street we were parked on was ready for garbage pick-up and all the cans were in front of the houses. Did you know San Francisco allows food waste in the compost containers? Why, oh why, do we not have this yet? I have heard that there is a pilot program being tested in Sleepy Hollow and I certainly hope that it is a success. It is genius, it would make so many garbage disposals obsolete, and it would help folks who can't or don't want to compost, but don't want to throw it away or down the drain either!

Luckily, here at home we have both a high- and low-tech form of composting: chickens. 

They came to live with us after our daughter's first grade teacher incubated 12 eggs for the students to observe and learn from the process. Those cute little chicks needed a home and shelter, so we adopted them and built a recycled chicken coop from a bunch of left-over lumber and old windows from my husband's contracting business. Every morning, we bring out the kitchen scraps (I also do not put out meat products) and collect the eggs. It's a nice trade, if I do say so myself, and a lot of food scraps stay out of our garbage disposal and the garbage. 

Chickens eat just about anything and they turn it into 'compost' a little faster than a regular compost pile or container. Without getting too gross here, chicken poop is a pretty powerful compost product and amazing for plants. It is so powerful in smell and potency, though, I have to be sure to really mix it in with other soil and leaves before using it in our yard, but it sure beats buying compost in plastic bags!

We now have six chickens, even though nine hatched in the classroom and came home with us. Three ended up being roosters and, since laws prohibit rooster in the suburbs (no one wants to be woken up by a rooster, especially me), they went up to Petaluma's Rivertown Feed store and found good homes. With six chickens and only three of us, we are able to sell a dozen eggs every once in a while and that goes into our daughter's college fund. It helps, too, that her initials are E.G.S.!

Speaking of buying compost in plastic bags, I so appreciate that every grocery store around town offers the ability to recycle plastic bags. I collect mine in a basket I made out of recycled materials at a Wacky Basket class I took almost ten years ago from Emily Dvorin, the previous owner of Various & Sundries. Emily still offers these classes and there is another one in April through the San Anselmo Recreation Department.

I will admit to loving Ziploc bags, especially the freezer kind that keep everything fresh for almost ever! But I also reuse these constantly and when they need a wash I turn them inside out and give them a gentle scrub. We used to have a special drying thing made out of little dowels and wooden rings, but I find it just as easy to put a tall wooden spoon or spatula into the utensil container in my dish drying rack, hang the bag on that, and let the it dry overnight. Note: Never reuse a bag that has had meat, chicken, or seafood; it just isn't worth the risk of not getting the bag 100 percent clean!

Now, you know that I don't buy sponges, and you may be wondering what I use when I need to really scrub a pan or bowl. I actually make my own scrubbies from the plastic webbing that onions and other fruits and veggies get bagged in which I simply tie around the rag (see picture). This works great on nonstick pans and my All Clad metal.  

When I have a really difficult pan, I turn to a plastic hotel key, gift card, or expired credit card. These are amazing tools for scraping pans, especially for getting into corners. Ooh, and if you have something stuck on your hardwood floors or tile and don't want to get gunk under your finger nails, just grab a card and get scraping!

Look for more thoughts and ideas next time or let me know what kinds of tips you're interested in.   And, if you'd like to share your own green ideas, I'd love it!