Earth Month (Every Month!) Challenge

~ Becky Ross Michael

I remember the first Earth Day in 1970. I was a senior in high school, and the environment wasn’t exactly uppermost in my mind. Many of us weren’t all that worried yet. These days, I’m feeling a great deal of eco-anxiety but still have trouble finding purposeful things to do about that. If you’re feeling that way, too, Treehugger has 30 ideas for easy tweaks you can make in your daily routines!

Earth Month Challenge: 30 Easy Actions

And I’m reading Not Too Late: Changing the Climate Story from Despair to Possibility, which is a collection of essays edited by Rebecca Solnit and Thelma Young Lutunatabua. This book was suggested by Tracy Abell in one of her informative Climate Movement Monday posts. Thank you, Tracy! I’m already enjoying the book.

Maybe you’re lucky enough to have little ones to share books with! You can help them understand the importance of taking care of our Earth with some of these lovely picture books.

Let’s make it Earth Day every day!

57 thoughts on “Earth Month (Every Month!) Challenge”

  2. It is an uphill battle until China and India get serious about climate change. Demand that your representative pressure them on climate change where possible. The thirty tips are terrific. Thanks, Becky.

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  3. I already do a good few of those challenges, BUT who thinks about what emails are doing? Can’t quite see the pasta idea working, but that gave me another idea. Don’t drain your pasta water down the drain save it for the garden! Wandering round the kitchen with buckets full of boiling water to put out in the garden to cool down could of course be risky… When my water butts are nearly empty I have a shower bucket .

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  5. I remember first Vermont Green-up Day in April of 1970. I was in ninth grade, and we were bussed into the country to pick up roadside trash. It was a lot of fun and a very rewarding day! The trash “find” of the day was a dead mouse fully inside a Coke bottle.

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      1. We’re the same age! I was also a senior in HS that year. The only demonstration I was involved in during those years was Earth Day. I can’t remember a time when it didn’t matter a LOT to me. Of course, at 18 I figured I’d single-handedly fix the whole problem, but now I know more about my actual scale in reality. Still, I believe that if we each do what we can do SOMETHING will happen and the changes since 1970 kind of bear that out. A book I just read you might appreciate, The Accidental Reef by Lynne Heasley It’s so beautifully written you wouldn’t think it’s a tex book!

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  9. I’m an official tree hugger and have always been. My husband and I were big believers in zero population so we only had 2 children. When my daughter married, she chose Apr. 22 and gave out tree seedlings to her guests in a small park wedding. I read the link to the 30 ideas and do as many as allowable where I’m living at any given moment. I turned on my furnace twice this winter and just bundled up. Now, AC will definitely be required but I run fans full time to reduce AC need. Short showers and stingy with water. I take clothes out of the dryer as they dry or almost dry cutting the time in half. I think so many of us are really trying but it seems bigger corporations are not as mindful. So many of us simple people work so hard at it and see the massive waste outstripping the little we can do. Books like that getting into children’s hands early might finally put some pressure on the huge conglomerates that just don’t care. Thanks for bringing up the awareness again. It’s needed.

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  11. Thanks for the link to the list of tips, Becky. I already do a lot of them but a few are worth pursuing. Another thing we can all do is resist advertising and become aware of how it works on emotions like fear and greed to manipulate us into buying things we don’t need.

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  13. I share your feelings of anxiety, Becky! It’s good to see so many people really care. Evidence around me (not least littering) suggests that many do not but it doesn’t help to get into feelings of us and them. How to get everyone to do everything they can? Maybe it’s also good to measure our own carbon footprints and do more to reduce or compensate and be independently on zero or better! My old electricity company used to offer that as a service. And they were 100 per cent carbon neutral anyway. They were taken over by another which is still good but not as good. And I use Ecosia instead of Google as that helps plant trees! In the right place of course 🤔

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  14. I remember the first Earth Day in 1970. It was the first call to action for me. As I look back, I see that this day helped spark the modern environmental movement, resulting in the creation of the Environmental Protection Agency and the passage of important environmental laws. I join you in celebrating Earth Day! It is exciting to be an active participant in to protecting our planet.

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  15. We have to reach the children and if there’s anything left for them, since the people in charge are part of making this horrible mess for money, they will remember the books they read when they were young and encouraged them to be kind and activists. Excellent post Becky.

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  17. Thanks for the book suggestion. I’m always on the lookout for positive in the fight for our planet’s survival. I believe I am the same age as you as well. Let’s carry on!

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  18. That looks like a great read! Getting kids to start thinking about the environment and doing small related activities to help it is so important. I agree – Earth month every month! Wonderful post xx

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  20. Wow! There are some really great tips here that I hadn’t thought of before–like unsubscribing to emails. And, as an editor/proofreader, I appreciate it when people don’t double space after a period because it’s no longer considered a rule, but I had no idea that not double-spacing also helps preserve the environment. Very cool!

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  21. Pingback: Monday Musings…24th April 2023…I’m alright Jack, Food Waste and Green House Gases, Earth Month Challenges,life of animals on the assembly line. | Retired? No one told me!

  22. I just “refollowed” you. I don’t know what happened, but I think you were removed from my list, or something. I wondered where you were and saw that I had missed your posts. So, I’m back. Have no idea what happened, but this isn’t the first time.

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  23. This is a belated response, Becky, but I’m so glad you’re enjoying NOT TOO LATE. I’ve been dipping in and out, and find it a good way to center myself. And I love the list of PBs you included here, some I’m familiar with but many more new to me. 🙂

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