Going Green in Comfort

Plastic water bottle. (Photo by Sandra Trajkovska / FreeRangeStock.com ) Until recently, I thought the only things I have to worry about with plastic are its effect on the environment and that it might contain bisphenol A (BPA). So when I was shopping for baby products when I was pregnant with my daughter, I made sure to check that everything I bought for her was BPA-free. I didn't know why BPA was bad, but I knew I should avoid it. So I did. But, just last week a link to a 2014 Mother Jones article called, "The Scary New Evidence on BPA-Free Plastics," came up in my Facebook feed. The article outlines why BPA is bad for your health — it mimics estrogen, which is a vital hormone in the right amounts, but in too big or too small of a dose can negatively effect development of the brain and other organs. Babies (including those in utero) and young children are especially susceptible to the problems of BPA because they're still developing. So, whew! Good t...

I don't have a programmable thermostat in my home, but I know the benefits of turning down the temperature when your home is empty. It can mean more money in your bank account and is kinder to the environment. I can get behind that. The challenge for me is remembering to make that adjustment each day before I head out the door to work. And when I do remember, quite often, my husband and I will walk around the house for days, bellyaching about how cold our house is, worrying that our heater has crapped out and wondering how we could afford to replace it. Then one of us will look at the thermostat and realize we never turned it back up. But I want to have a few more dollars in my pocket each month. I want to do a little more to reduce my carbon footprint. So I've set my phone to alert me each day at the same time that I need to turn the thermostat down. If I forget to turn it back up later, so be it. It's for the best in the long run. We are a particip...

Merelize / FreeRangeStock.com One of my favorite memories of childhood was going to the library with my mom. As soon as we walked in, I could smell the books. It wasn't something we got to do often, which made it even more special. I loved and still love being surrounded by books. In the first five years or so my husband and I were married, the two of us could easily drop $100 at Borders or Barnes and Noble or Books-a-Million in a single afternoon. There was nothing like roaming through the stacks and finding an author or title that you hadn't heard of before but still piques your interest. Online book retailers have never held the same magic for me. There is no equivalent for finding your next read by accident because the color or title or font on a dust jacket just happened to catch your eye. And then there's the joy of being able to flip through to see how many pages you have left in a chapter. Hitting the "Next" button on your e-reader just isn...