Greener Homes One Step at a Time

I watched the shows about eco-friendly homes and felt vaguely guilty that my house isn’t green. It is at least recycled, since it was built before 1900, but it doesn’t have a lot of the things that an eco-friendly person would use in new construction. Then, I realized that I could still try to go green a step at a time and that I had been actually doing so all along. I have made many eco-friendly changes simply be choosing the greener option whenever possible.

For example, as each light bulb burned out, I replaced it with a CFL light bulb, which use less electricity and burn for a longer period of time. It is a simple and easy way to make my home greener. Other things I’ve done include:

• Repurposing an old mirror from a piece of furniture into a charming mirror for my bathroom wall.
• Choosing paint that is supposed to be less toxic and more greenly produced when the walls needed to be repainted.
• Making my own braided rug for the kitchen. (It didn’t last very long, but it was made with old jeans, so that’s okay.)
• Adding more insulation to any areas that needed to be re-drywalled to reduce the amount of heat I used.

Things I plan to do in the future include going solar and replacing my kitchen floor with eco-friendly, renewable materials.

Remember, if you rip everything out just to put in green materials, you are probably being less eco-friendly than someone who repairs, repurposes and repaints things that are already there. So, unless something is worn out or made with hazardous materials, don’t worry about how un-green it was when it was installed!

Are you interested in making your home a greener place?

Photo: SXC/Neil Hoskins