We just got our Smart Meter

This morning Southern California Edison came by and installed SmartConnect Meters in our neighborhood. As a society we use considerably less electricity during off-peak hours than during peak-hours, this is common sense, but what is less common sense is the fact that we waste electricity during the off-peak hours. To put it really simply, this is due to the fact that it is not efficient to power down and then power back up our power plants as demand increases and decreases, so we waste a lot of electricity in the night hours when energy demand is considerably lower than during the daylight hours. This is energy that can very easily be used during these off-peak hours for any of our needs.

Learning all of this, as well as knowing that smart meters were coming in the near future, when we moved to California we began to change our energy consumption habits. We began doing our laundry at night, and since we bought our new washer/dryer this has been much easier as we have one unit that washes and dries our clothes. We simply put in a half load (still a big load of laundry) if we are going to use the drier too. We can even delay the start of our load if we like. We do have a preference towards hanging our clothes out to dry, but they just seem to take forever to dry in the winter months so we do use our drier. Of course even in the winter we do hang some of our laundry up to dry.

Simply moving some of our energy use to the off-peak hours has been an easy adjustment for us and now that we have our smart meter we will really start to see it pay off in our electric bill as well as simply knowing that we are helping to keep the demand for electricity from growing as quickly as it would grow if everyone kept using mostly peak electricity. All we have to keep in mind is that some things can be done any time and those things are definitely worth considering doing during off-peak hours so that we are lowering our impact on the environment. It is easy to make small changes that have an impact on the world and if we encourage others to make small changes too then the overall impact can be really big.

Found: recycled milk jug fence

We just had our second fence contractor come out to the house to give us an estimate on fencing in our front yard. We were a bit shocked that they had a recycled milk jug fence option since we had looked and looked for something like that for months before giving up on actually finding what we really wanted. We knew we really have to fence in our front yard in the next few months, but we really wanted an eco-friendly fence. We always ask whether or not each fence company has an eco-friendly option available, but it seems to come down to vinyl or wood.

When we called the fence company our neighbor used they said they did in fact have an eco-friendly fencing option available. This fence company said that they had composite fence material called Timberwolf. The fence contractor showed us a couple of pieces of this composite material. It was very nice looking. It had the wood grain detailing and all, similar to a real wood, but it has a lifetime warranty similar to the vinyl fences that everyone sells and installs around here. I really liked this option as I think it would fit the look of our 1948 cottage much better than a vinyl fence.

For anyone who is interested in seeing more about this fence please feel free to look at the Western Fence Co. website. I linked to a picture of the white picket composite fence that we are considering.

Meatless Monday...

I know that Meatless Monday has been pretty widely publicized, but I thought I would share the goal that we have made in our house.

I really liked the idea of getting people to make a small commitment like 1 day or 3 meals a week. Well since we haven't been eating a lot of meat for quite a while I figured that we would do better to do Meat Mondays. By Meat Mondays I mean that we try to eat meat only 3 meals a week. We figured that this would make a bigger environmental impact and would encourage us to keep getting greener in our eating.

An unexpected side effect of eating more vegetarian and vegan meals is that we are getting more creative about what we eat. We have really begun to enjoy our local Farmer's Market more and more as we have been adding more vegetables into our diet. It is a lot of fun to go to the Farmer's Market and see what looks good and just buy some to bring home and figure out a yummy meal to make with the fresh vegetables we picked up.

Last week I made baked potatoes with fresh broccoli, red bell pepper, onion and a little cheddar cheese. They were so yummy. There is nothing more tasty than some truly ripe and fresh food.

Greening up our Trash

Now that we have our own house with a yard and we aren't planning to move anytime too soon we decided that we would like to try out composting. This is a great way to lower the amount of waste your household produces because lots of things can be composted depending upon which type of compost bin you have. We haven't yet started a worm bin so we can't put dairy and meat into our compost bin, but all of our fruit and vegetable scraps are able to be composted. We can also compost a lot of our yard trash, though currently the majority of our yard trash goes into a yard waste bin that the city composts. The reason that most of our yard trash ends up in the bin is simply because we are still getting our yard in order which has involved a lot of major trimming of some of the trees and bushes. This results in a lot of yard trash. Of course trimming back some of the trees and bushes has been really important to the health of them so that we can remove diseased branches and clear enough of the limbs so that the sun can get through to the leaves on the inside of the tree which were dying.

One way to make composting a little easier for us was to get a small crock for our kitchen counter that we could put scraps in while we are cooking. This prevents us from having to constantly run outside to the compost bin and also allows us to leave the scraps for several days before we bring them outside to add to the bin in the yard. This was especially great when we had several days of rain and didn't really want to run out to the compost bin in the yard. It's also nice when it is really cold out or really dark out or we just don't feel like running our scraps outside.

Greening up my Cooking

In our last two rentals we had a built in microwave oven so we left our old microwave back in Wisconsin when we moved out to California. Now that we finally bought our own house we ended up losing our microwave and dishwasher. It turns out that we really don't miss having a microwave oven overall. There are really very few things that it is really that much nicer to have a microwave oven for and even those we have managed to find ways around using a microwave. The only problem we have had with ditching the microwave oven is that now all our leftovers must be cooked on the stove or in the oven, also not a big deal to us except that our gas bill shot up with all the extra oven usage. We finally got around to getting ourselves a nice reasonably sized toaster oven for our kitchen.

Replacing our Clunker Refrigerator - the saga continues

Soon the moment of truth came when the refrigerator was delivered. The old refrigerator was moved out of our kitchen and into our garage so that it could be picked up by our utility company who was going to recycle it for us. Our utility company offered a small rebate for buying an energy star qualified refrigerator and another small rebate for having it recycled.

When the new refrigerator was slid into the open space of our old refrigerator we found out that it was a little wider and a little taller than our old refrigerator, but that it will fit with the removal of some of the "trim" on the bottom of the cabinet above the refrigerator. Well removing the "trim" was easier said than done since these cabinets are over 60 years old and are solid wood. It took several hours of chiseling and smoothing out and shaving off the heads of nails and such, but we careful removed enough of the "trim" without causing any real damage to the cabinet or leaving the cabinet unsupported.


The end result was worth it to us. We got a beautiful new side-by-side refrigerator with ice and water in the door, complete with a lock for the ice and water. That being said there is no way that a bigger refrigerator would ever fit in that space without removing cabinets so we will enjoy our version of a jumbo refrigerator and just feel spoiled as if this were the biggest refrigerator ever, because for us this is the biggest refrigerator ever to fit in this house.

Replacing our Clunker Refrigerator

It is kind of funny that we requested this refrigerator be left in the house when we bought it since shortly after we moved in the fridge started to leak. That left us mopping up our refrigerator. Of course mopping up a refrigerator isn't really something we wanted to keep doing so we looked to see what the cause might be and if it was something we could reasonably fix. Well it turns out this is a fairly common problem with this particular model of refrigerator and getting it fixed requires someone who knows what they are doing, in other words it's a costly repair. Well to us a costly repair on a 9 year old refrigerator that isn't very energy efficient to begin with just didn't make sense.

That left us to decide on a new refrigerator for our kitchen. That was not nearly as easy a task as you might think. Since we still have the original cabinets in our kitchen from 1948 we didn't have a huge opening for a new refrigerator to fit into. We carefully measured the existing refrigerator and looked online to find out what our options were going to be. In figuring out the right refrigerator we also had to decide what color we wanted to go with, we were deciding between another white fridge or going with stainless steel (or the metallic color).

This led us into thinking about what we want to do with the kitchen when we update it, this is probably several years down the road for us. We knew we wanted to go with a cottage style for the kitchen and to keep the old cabinets if at all possible. We also knew we didn't want a white counter top or floor. It took a lot of looking around and thinking to decide that gray would be the way to go for us. We are thinking a medium gray counter top and darker gray floor. Once this was decided we decided that maybe going with the more modern look of stainless steel would be our best bet as this would give the kitchen a more high-end professional look and would blend well with the gray counter tops and floor.

From there we narrowed our search down to see what we were left with as options. There wasn't a lot left. There were a number of top and bottom units and one side-by-side that we thought would fit the space without much if any chipping away at the cabinet above the refrigerator. When we went to the store the sales person told us that the same manufacturer made another brand and they were the same exact refrigerator other than the name. We were fine with that and then we were also told, when we asked about a lock on the in door water dispenser, that they had one and it was the same dimensions as the other one also. We were all settled on the new refrigerator now and happy with our decision. Then my paranoia set in that somehow this refrigerator wouldn't fit the opening.

All that baby stuff

All of you parents out there will know this problem fairly well: What do you do with all of that baby stuff? There are a few options, some green and some not so green.

You can store everything for your next baby in hopes that you will be able to reuse everything and save some money. Of course this makes a lot of sense, but there are certain things that you probably shouldn't hang on to for too long. For instance cribs and car seats are constantly getting upgraded to make them safer and safer. If you want to get one crib to keep for future children as well I would suggest going with a very basic crib, in other words one without a drop side (which is often a cause for recalls in cribs) and slats that are fairly close together and preferably one made out of a nice solid wood or some other material that will really hold up. I know my son was very tough on his crib, but I anticipated that and bought him a solid wood crib without a drop side. I will admit the crib wasn't as convenient to use as some of the higher end cribs on the market, but it is still in good shape after he used it for 2 years and then had it as a daybed in his room for another 6 months. Of course saving everything can take a real toll on your storage space and you need to make sure that your possessions are protected from the elements. Also keep in mind that when you pull all of these things out of storage later they will need a really good cleaning before you can use them again. It is possible that not everything you stored will be in good enough shape to be used again either.


You can hand your old baby stuff down to a new mommy who could make good use of your old baby stuff. We were the recipients of some old baby stuff when we were expecting our little man so I can attest to just how helpful this can be to new parents. Of course keep in mind that not every new parent is happy to receive less than new stuff for their baby, but there are plenty of parents who would be more than happy to get their hands on some gently used baby stuff. Probably the best benefit of this method for dealing with all that clutter is that you get to see how happy it makes someone else to have your old things. Of course the downside is that this can be a very time consuming and sometimes frustrating method for clearing out the clutter. You will have to decide if the great feeling you get from helping someone else is worth the added time and effort on your part. That being said I really do think that if something was handed down to you then when you are done using it (if it is in good shape still) you should hand it back to the person or pass it on to another person.

You can sell your old baby stuff to a second-hand store or on Craig's List or eBay or at yard sale, etc. You get the idea that the ideas as to where to sell your gently used baby stuff is seemingly limitless. One advantage to this is that you will make a little extra cash which may help you buy some more gently used stuff that your little one needs as they grow out of their things. Kids always seem to be outgrowing their clothes and always seem to be in need of more stuff. Of course the disadvantage of this method is that it can take time to get rid the stuff since you need to wait for there to be a need for the things you have. It may be worth it to you to try to sell the big ticket items in particular though. Also you may get to see someone get really excited to get their hands on your old stuff for a great price.

You can donate your old baby stuff to a charity like the Goodwill, Salvation Army, or even a women's shelter, or other charity of your choice. The big advantage this option has is that you can probably get rid of everything at once and they may even be able to pick it all up from your place of residence for you. You also get a tax write off on your donations. This is a great way to go if you just have to get rid of a bunch of stuff quickly.

You can reuse some of your old baby stuff. Maybe make a quilt out of baby's old clothes (especially the ones with holes or rips in them that make them no so reusable). You can repurpose those receiving blankets as napkins. Just get creative and you would be surprised with some of the things you can reuse.

Remember that no one option is right for every person and no one option might be the only option that works for one person either, but all of these options are far greener than the last option which is to simply throw it out. Granted I'm sure there are probably times when throwing something out might be the only option you really have, but it should really be a last resort only.