Still deciding how to enhance and eco-ify your life in 2012? We rounded up resolutions from Grist readers and staffers to give you some ideas. This year, they’ve resolved to:
Learn to make yogurt, because it’s the item I buy most frequently that comes in a plastic container.
— Dawn White, Grist Facebook fan
Not have a baby — and donate more regularly to Planned Parenthood.
— Jess Zimmerman, Grist List editor
Adding rain barrels and doing a raised-bed garden.
— Kathryn Tilley, Grist Facebook fan
Transition from a bus-powered commute to a 100-percent bike powered commute, which will also help me transition into having quads like canned hams.
— Ted Alvarez, managing editor at Grist
Buy fewer new items. Hit up thrift stores and focus on handmade gifts for special occasions.
— Matthew H. Smith, Grist Twitter follower
1. Don’t eat anything from a Concentrated Animal Feed Operation (CAFO).
2. Don’t buy anything from China.
3. Don’t use any plates, napkins, or utensils to throw away. This means carrying around a coffee mug, water bottle, bowl, and utensils.
— Katie Rose, Grist Facebook fan
Try to restrain that ravenous critic in my head, to give the dreamers and chance-takers a little more room to … ah, just read about it here.
— David Roberts, Grist staff writer
Do more freecycling.
— Cecile Susie Mills, Grist Facebook fan
Eat vegetarian two days a week (up from one last year).
— Gerald McLean, Grist’s director of sales and sponsorships
(Get tips from Umbra.)
Hassle more climate deniers. These fools are a menace that needs to be challenged at every level.
— Scots Renewables, Grist Twitter follower
Make more art from used things — paper scraps, junk mail, reconstructing old jewelry into something “new” again, etc.
— Rosalie Miller, executive assistant at Grist
We put a plastic wastebasket under the kitchen sink and filled it with old towels and torn-up sheets. Using those instead of paper towels for most tasks.
— Robert Mittendorf, Grist Facebook fan
Get rid of our second car.
— Greg Hanscom, Grist special projects editor
Speak loud and often about realities of climate change — making it an issue this election year! For my children …
— Climate Mama, Grist Twitter follower
Grow some of my own food.
— Claire Thompson, editorial assistant at Grist
Reduce/avoid clutter. As simple and as difficult as that.
— Feigh Bottcher, Grist Twitter follower
Limit myself and my household of seven others to as little trash as possible — one bag a week or less! (They don’t actually know I’ve made this resolution, so I should probably bring it up at our next house meeting.)
— Laura Schlabach, social media assistant at Grist
Keep chickens in my yard and eat even more locally.
— Allison Asbury, Grist Facebook fan
Cease making so much fun of the crunchy-gran-gran crowd, and instead adopt their best habits (but not a hemp necklace or Ani DiFranco).
— Ted Alvarez, managing editor at Grist
