5 Easy Ways To Recycle With Kids
Tips from a parent, for parents
Truth be told, our family was late to the whole recycling thing. Between the early morning rush, asking three times to put shoes on, collecting hats from lost property, the sports run, and the homework-dinner-shower-bed dance, it wasn't high on our agenda. It wasn't until my son's school introduced nude-food-Wednesday that I realised how passionate he was about doing more for the environment. These are our easy tips to get a bit more sustainable in your home.
1. Invest in beeswax wraps
All it took was a trip through the supermarket and some conveniently placed beeswax wraps at the counter for us to abandon cling wrap overnight. Cute patterns, different sizes, reusable, washable, and sustainable, these nifty wraps are made from cotton, beeswax, and coconut or jojoba oil, and can last up to a year!
2. Saving lives, one reusable coffee cup at a time
Our coffee obsession is real (the parents, not the kids!) and it wasn't until I was tentatively balancing four half full cups of cold, week-old coffee out of my car that I realised something had to change. Enter my trusty Frank Green reusable coffee cup; ceramic lined, or made from stainless steel, these beautiful cups maintain the temperature of your coffee so you can drink it the way it was intended and help you do your part to keep coffee cups out of landfill.
3. Bread bags make the best collectors
When our school signed up to Wonder Recycling Rewards, we used one bread bag to collect the others (we're a 3-loaf-a-week family) which has meant the only challenge now is negotiating who gets to officially put it into the Wonder collection bin at school.
4. Eat the fridge, one baked good at a time
It's amazing what you can sneak into a dinner to use up what's hidden away in your crisper. Every Sunday I discover what's left over and make a veggie-rich sweet bread or savoury muffins for school lunches. My favourite hack? Using left over berries and some finely grated broccoli stems in a banana bread loaf, with a handful of choc-chips for sweetness. Hidden veggies never tasted so good!
5. Old clothes are never old
It could be the sandwiches packed full of vitamins & minerals that my kids plough through, but they seem to grow out of their wardrobe at least three times a year. At the end of every season, I diligently go through our drawers and bag up anything that's been worn maximum twice and send it off as a little care package to a friend with younger kids. Not only is it saving her money, but I also love knowing that we're doing our bit to not contribute to the 23kg of clothing that each Aussie disposes to landfill every year.