Today is Earth Day. By the way, a little lesson in history for those who don't know, today is also Lenin's birthday. This day was celebrated in Russia (Soviet Union) every year and we, as school children, had to wear white aprons with our uniforms.
During breakfast I came across a section of the paper that talked about living green. In honor of today's holiday I started thinking: how can we improve our lives by living green? I started skimming through the articles looking for answers. After a few pages I realized that we already do, and have been for a long time, living green.
We are a shoe-free household. We recycle everything. We garden pretty much organically. We buy organic as much as we can. We bought a front-loading washer last year that saves a ton of water every time we do a load. We turn lights off when we don't need them. We use energy-saving light bulbs. We walk to Alex's school, local parks, and neighborhood cafe. In the winter months we lowered our thermostat by 2 degrees and just used warmer clothes around the house. In the summer months we use our fans in the bedrooms. We have eliminated a lot of our plastic containers and bought glass instead. We've been cleaning our kitchen sink with baking soda instead of harsh chemicals (it really does work, try it!) and using environmentally-friendly cleaning products.
Granted, there are still many things we could improve on. There is that gas-guzzler Expedition (I love you, Expedition! I really do.). We can eat even less beef, although we have been improving on it. We could rip out all of our carpets (I can't even begin to write what's wrong with carpets!) and replace it with bamboo floor. We could even plant more trees, only if Dave would let me rip out that grass of his :) There are many more things I can think of that we could do to live a simpler, greener life. 
But for now, I think we're doing pretty great! And the funny thing is, this green movement of mine doesn't come from the "popular" notion in the US. It's built within me from birth. Living in Russia was always a simple life without excessive chemicals, appliances, and gadgets. My grandma collected cow poop and made her own compost for garden. We cleaned our dishes with water and a little "hozyaistvennoe" soap (a natural kind, but smells weird). We walked everywhere and my family didn't even own a car until I was 10 years old. We ate everything on our plates, grew our own food, turned the lights off (my grandma taught me that), took our shoes off in the house, and spend the majority of our summer outdoors in the nature.Hey, the communists had it right, after all!
