Filled with Life

From the seeds I planted during my green challenge, a lovely little window garden has emerged and the herbs have been lovely in my recipes the last two months. I think the tomato plant is about ready to move outside though, it's sort of taking over.

My Herbs

On Wednesday, I made a little trip to the local nursery at the Target and found myself a nice selection of grow in your home herbs, and a window-sill potted tomato plant. I miss having plants in my home and as part of my green commitment I decided to go get some. Houseplants, which had been on my original list...refused to speak to me. So the herbs and I headed home where they got potted, watered and thrust into the "greenhouse" window over my kitchen sink, where hopefully I will remember to keep them watered and they will grow into something cool for Layla to be able to pick and eat.

Green commitment, done and done.

Lifetime commitment to keeping something fragile alive...well... I'll work on it.

Book Worms

I love to read. I got it from my mother. My mom read so much when I was little that my friends from elementary school have vivid memories of my mom in her tattered blue bath robe and my dad's thermal socks sitting in a rocking chair popping sunflower seeds to the rhythm of her rocking and reading paperback books with scraps of mail as book marks. Most of my memories of coming home from anywhere involve finding my parents either playing a game in my dad's office or my mom in that chair reading and eating those seeds.

So, I'm not entirely suprised that my kid has a natural fascination with books. After all, she sees me reading at least twice a day if not more. And, most of the time if she comes across a book while playing she has you read it to her. She will also bring me books to read if she catches me reading my book without her and wants some attention.

For now her book collection is limited because I don't want her to destroy her lovely little library when she's supposed to be napping. So I boxed up the big kid books and put them in the closet leaving out a collection of about 25 books that all have sturdy pages for her explore until I feel she's ready (or until she stops pulling everything off her shelves for me to pick it up...whichever comes first).

So far her favorites are the Hermie and Friends books, The Ladybug book from Great Aunt Winnie, I love you through and through and the Doggy book she got from ShuShu and PapaMark. The books she loves are already improving her vocabulary and she points things out on the pages as you read along. So we got some flash cards, which when the mood strikes her she is totally willing to play with.

This month in my effort to stay more green I'm also going to try and spend a little more time on books and a little less time with the TV on in the background. I know that Layla will like that. As it is, when she's home with Mommy I try to make sure there is a chunk of time every day without outside stimulation (radio/tv/interruptions from mom) so that she can develop good imagination skills.

I'll keep you posted if she comes up with any more favorites.

Little Green Month

One of my girl-friends at the new J O B is challenging everyone to be more "green" during the month of April. She (on behalf of the girl scout troup she runs) asked us to make 10 commitments for the month of April to help save the planet a little at a time. These are my 10 commitments (she had a list of ideas so some are from that and some are my own). I would like to challenge you blog universe to do the same and make the world a better place this month (or longer if the mood strikes you).

Jon and I are already mildly "green" people. So I picked somethings that I sometimes do and am commiting to ALWAYS doing them this month as well as some things I've never done.

1. I will plant 1 plant/tree for each person in my family.
2. I will ALWAYS recycle my cans/cardboard products.
3. I will stop wasting leftovers and unused foods by buying with a meal plan that uses my leftover food.
4. I will ALWAYS attempt to get local fresh foods.
5. I will ALWAYS commit to buying 50% organic when shopping.
6. I will ALWAYS recycle or reuse items I need by both getting and giving things to people I know when I am done with them so that they can use them. (I am pretty good about doing this with baby clothing/things but I'm awful about doing it with adult stuff)
7. I will drink more water and I will not drink water from plastic bottles from vending machines unless it's unavoidable.
8. I will use this month to teach my child about 1 more "green" process than I normally would.
9. I will ALWAYS refuse extra paper napkins when I go out.
10. I will ALWAYS be aware of how much power is being used in my home by unplugging unnecessary items and turning things off when I am not using them.