☆ Green Tip: Lessen your need to Recycle! ☆

Obviously, recycling is fantastic! But recycling is only half the battle and sometimes comes as an excuse to still buy over-packaged items, etc. We think to ourselves, well I can still Recycle this, so what's the harm? While, yes, the benefits of recycling are grand, it does still take a lot of energy to recycle items into new ones. Don't let the ability to recycle items be your excuse to not reduce your impact. Choose to reuse more than you buy new. For instance, you can sometimes recycle plastic grocery store bags but you should still bring your own canvas or tote bags instead as this is far more earth-friendly. You can often recycle cardboard food boxes but that doesn't mean you shouldn't bring your own reusable bags and buy in bulk--and you can still find another use for that cardboard box before recycling it as well. 

Get creative and get savvy. Pay attention instead of just throwing something into the recycling. Pay attention to just how much you recycle and what you can do to reduce the number of things that need to be recycled.

Here are some tips to get started:

Use tote or canvas grocery bags instead of plastic. 

Reuse cardboard boxes for packaging or for art projects. 

Reuse paper to write notes on--or, again, for packaging or art projects. 

Think before you print. Reduce how much paper you use. 

Buy in Bulk! And bring your own reusable bags. 

Buy products that are minimally packaged (when not buying in bulk). 

Use your own stainless steel water bottle and never buy super wasteful plastic bottled water. 

Just because we CAN recycle, doesn't mean we shouldn't still pay attention to our global footprint. Reduce and reuse before you automatically opt for recycling. :)

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