greenHILLhome: Earth Day

uploaded to flickr.com by Southernpixel

This Friday, April 22, is the 41st observance of Earth Day.  So please, go hug at least one tree.

Go ahead.  I’ll wait.

Doesn’t that feel good?

I’m guessing you didn’t just go squeeze a maple, but perhaps the thought behind the act was there.  Hopefully you are one of the thousands of residents on the Hill who already takes advantage of municipal recycling collections.  Maybe you’ve installed compact fluorescent bulbs in all your light fixtures.  Perhaps you take reusable tote bags to the grocery store each week.

Now take a moment to ask yourself what else you can do.  The cliche of “Make Earth Day Everyday” should be replaced with “Up Your Daily Green on Earth Day.”  Big ticket items like solar energy and green roofs are not quick or inexpensive decisions, but there are other regular things we can all do to lighten our environmental footprints.  Our household just purchased a composter in an attempt to reduce the amount of trash we throw away each week and create some compost for the vegetable garden we will be planting this year.  It took us awhile to find a composter of the right size and price, and then find one in stock somewhere (it had to make green sense to us in multiple ways).  So far the first goal seems attainable, with a mere one bag of trash for the week last week.  We’ll see if that trend continues, and with any luck we’ll be fertilizing our garden in a few weeks.

Over the past year greenHILLhome has covered lots of ways to green your Hill abode–installing rain barrels, insulating windows and doors, recycling electronics and batteries, etc.  Maybe something has piqued your interest and you’ve implemented it.  Or maybe now is the time.  So readers, how are you going to up your green game on Earth Day?