Location:, North Carolina, United States

Name: Danielle

Week: 35

Personal Info:

See my week 1 post 🙂

Danielle’s personal blog: http://itstartswithme-danielle.blogspot.com

Total items: 10

Total weight:

Items: Recyclable
none

Items: Nonrecyclable
1 milk carton
5 caps/pulls from milk
3 produce ties/tag
1 plastic bag (from a case of bulk cranberries)

What items can I easily replace with plastic free or less plastic alternatives?
I’ve decided to stop buying milk in cartons (this one is actually from the previous week… and we finished it up at the start of this week) and getting back to glass. Still bummed the glass bottled milk isn’t local and that it’s not in larger containers… but it’s better than the alternative. Also, my youngest son is starting to like raw almond milk!! 🙂

What items would I be willing to give up if a plastic free alternative doesn’t exist?

What items are essential and seem to have no plastic-free alternative?
Milk… even with glass there’s the plastic cap.

Cranberries. My co-op pre-bags some bulk items… they work with me by having a box for me that I can drop off my own containers for them to fill as they’re filling bags to sell. BUT… when I was in the store the other day… I wanted to get cranberries for my kids. They were going to fill my container for me… but as I thought about it… I thought, “Why not buy the whole case??” So I bought it. Sure I have the plastic bag on my tally… but it’s there no matter if I just fill my container with bulk. I’ve transferred all of the cranberries to glass jars and will have cranberries for probably the next 6 months!!! 😀

What lifestyle change(s) might be necessary to reduce my plastic consumption?
Apparently, if we gave up milk (or got a cow…kidding!)… that would definitely reduce our plastic consumption. Unfortunately, that’s not going to happen anytime soon.

What one plastic item am I willing to give up or replace this week?

What other conclusions, if any, can I draw?
I set out to do plastic-free food week this week… and even though I ended up with plastic, I’m happy with the outcome. Last fall when I did plastic-free food week, I had moments where I really struggled… really had to put my thinking cap on… BUT… now it was no big deal. I didn’t realize how much I’m really avoiding using plastics and how easy it’s becoming!!

By the way, having friends who are striving to not use plastic rocks! I bought a whole wheel of cheese (zero plastic!!) on Wednesday and split it with my “rising above plastics” Surfrider friend!