Easy Actions You Can Do To Tend Our Planet

"What can one person do?"

An environmental question for the ages. If you find yourself asking these same questions, here's a compilation I created from the visuals I found on 1 Million Women's Facebook page. Just as titled, they are "10 easy actions you can do to look after the planet this week." Click through to see all the slides.

Easy to do, and necessary to share. 

As you are going into the week ahead, which of the 10 can you do? 

1. Be a flexitarian 
2. Rethink your modes of transportation
3. Chill out your laundry
4. Go LED
5. Take action with your local/national leaders
6. Shop & use less
7. Eat why you buy--fridge-wise
8. Push away plastic
9. Eco-invest when it comes to your banking
10. Come up with your own solutions and share!

10 Easy Actions You Can Do to Look After the Planet this Week by Vicki Dabrowka--Slideshow created on Canva.com using the visual slides created using the social media visuals from the“1 Million Women” Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/1MillionWomen/posts/pfbid01T91VUhM715k5WQswHhVHJ7XawfKgSoUdeUZCiJiSXVjEuokxD1G2MEZwApiBfu1l

Wonderful Ways to Embrace the Summer

The heat and humidity are here, and we are knee deep in the middle of summer. I've already mentioned how this is my time to rebalance my equilibrium. I landed on the amazing Facebook page of Ordinary & Happy, where they have created a lot of lists on a myriad of subjects. I found my favorite 10 of their nature-minded, summer-centric, outdoors-oriented lists. These will help anyone who is starting to get into a summer rut by helping you figure out creative ways to beat the heat and embrace the outdoors, living in the moment with the chunk of summer we have left. I interspersed the lists with some classic summer imagry to give digital viewers a little eco-meditation between lists. How many creative ways can you still get outdoors these last 2 months of summer.

Wonderful Ways to Get Outside this Summer by Vicki Dabrowka

Images created at Canva.com, using Canva images and Ordinary & Happy's Facebook pages https://www.facebook.com/ordinaryandhappy Presentation link: https://www.canva.com/design/DAGrdlXbb1A/ubmcu_vGl5V24clXE88-mg/view?utm_content=DAGrdlXbb1A&utm_campaign=designshare&utm_medium=link2&utm_source=uniquelinks&utlId=hb8637527c4

Plastic Free July

Stop. 🛑 

Set a timer for 60 seconds. 

Watch that minute count down. 

In that minute (not to mention every other minute), the equivalent of one garbage truck full of plastic finds its way into the ocean. With 525,600 minutes in a year, that amounts to over 8 million TONS of plastic pollution created each year. 

But that's just what ends up in our waterways. Compare that to the approximately 400 million metric tons of plastic humans globally produce each year. And of that, 91% is often still not recycled--hard to believe when recycling has been "a thing" for decades. 

Not to mention, a majority of this is single use plastic--used once, then tossed. 

We need to be "once bitten, twice shy" instead! And July is a great time to flip this script. Plastic Free July is the perfect time to ditch disposables, rethink packaging, and demonstrate that "plastic is not fantastic." 

Small behavior shifts can make a a difference in our consumption, our landfills, & our values. 

Grab your stainless steel straw, your reusable tumbler, your tote bag of tote bags to make moves to step away from plastic.

Here's an oldie but goodie--It's not me, it's you:

Places to check out:

• Plastic Free July's website:
• To learn, go to their Ideas & solutions 
• For inspiration from others, check out their What Others Do page
• Take their Plastic Free pledge where you can get inspired by their visual gallery of pledge cards
• The Story of Stuff's "Fight Plastic Pollution" page
• Plastic Bank's Facebook page

Videos from https://youtu.be/ByayHG5CscE?si=0WkLH0_YXsmmRhHA and https://youtu.be/-DEc16dEMns?si=SIOjks5X-RLzQHk1, images from https://www.plasticfreejuly.org/resources/assets/ and https://123timer.com/60-second

Independence Day & The Declaration of Interdependence

The summer is clipping along and the 4th of July is here. Our nation's birthday. Next year on this date, it will be our country's 250th anniversary of our country's birth.

Where are you on your Civics education? When was the last time you read the Declaration of Independence, written July 4, 1776? If it's been awhile, you can read it here at the National Archives. 

The 4th of July brings with it all the celebration of a national holiday and a day off of work: parades, pools, barbeques, and fireworks. Bigger than that though, it brings with it the ideas central to our nation: freedom, autonomy, self-determination. 

But, in a world growing more complex by the year with digital advancements, AI, social media, innovation, technological growth, environmental issues, climate change, and more--perhaps we're also on the cusp of needing more. Yes, we're celebrating our independence, but maybe there's also a need to celebrate our interdependence. Ways that we are all connected to each other and our planet, requiring not only life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, but perhaps also an approach and vision toward shared responsibility. 

In doing so, we take note on how local actions ripple outwardly to our global community. How our stewardship of the Earth is tied not only to our greater purpose but also our greater connection. A vision toward sustainability and how caring for our shared home will impact everyone with the cleanliness of the water, air, the soil that grows our food, and the energy that powers this planet of ours. 

Knowing and understanding this interdependence is what environmental literacy is all about. 

Maybe this holiday as we are thinking about flags, fireworks, and freedom, maybe its time to think about freedom not about standing alone, but standing together. Maybe its worth create your own Declaration of Interdependence by filling in the blanks below, in the style of the Declaration of Independence's Preamble:

Creating a Personal Declaration of Interdependence by Vicki Dabrowka at Canva.com using Canva Code; Top image created in canva.com