Welcome

My name is Amanda. I am married with 3 gorgeous kids, living in Auckland, New Zealand.

Since becoming a mum I have reflected on the beautiful New Zealand that I was so blessed to grow up in. I look around and see how our country is changing over the years and realize that my children and my children’s children will not enjoy that same blessing if we collectively continue to treat the planet the way we do. That saddens me and I am committed to making environmentally-friendly changes in my life and to raise my kids to be mindful of the environment in their lifestyle choices. Hopefully I can be a good example.

The task of saving our earth seemed a little overwhelming to me. So instead of putting it in the ‘too hard’ basket and doing nothing, I decided to break the task down into more achievable ‘bits’. I’m committing to make small, achievable changes regularly (at least 4 per year), in a bid to ‘do my bit’.

This website is a diary of my journey. I hope it inspires you to consider how you can be more environmentally-friendly. There are others out there who are far more committed and inspiring than I, whom I greatly admire. I am just a regular consumer trying to make one small, positive change at a time - because I believe that if we all do a little, collectively it adds up to a lot.

I have called this site EcoMum because my children are my motivation to care for this earth our God has given us to be stewards over. The reality is that we probably won’t feel the effects of our mistreatment of this Earth, it is the future generations that will. Let’s ‘do our bit’ to ensure a bright future for them.

Amanda

Sunday, May 10, 2009

Birthday Parties

Well it's birthday season for me as my kids celebrate their birthdays in May, June and August. All winter birthdays, arrrgghhh! I wish it could be an outside, summery affair but alas that shall never happen. Instead we must huddle crowded inside with the heaters on. Anyway! Enough moaning! So I have been thinking about ways I can make the celebrations a little easier on the environment.
  • First up I have sent an evite (electronic invitation sent by email that recipients view and RSVP to online) instead of my regular posted invitations. Thus eradicating the use of paper, printing, envelopes, stamps and the Postie. Poor Posties will be out of a job soon! There are loads of pre-designed evites to choose from covering all occasions, or you can design your own.
  • For the party itself I am going to reuse plastic plates I bought in previous years rather than buying and throwing away disposable paper plates.
  • The kids can take home a paper 'goodie bag' rather than a plastic one. The paper bag can be recycled and the kids and I can have fun decorating them to make them more attractive.

If you've any more suggestions, I'd be glad to hear about them.

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3 comments:

  1. GailMay 10, 2009 at 1:03 PM

    I saw a segment on that program Wasted last year on TV3 about birthday parties. There is a website: www.wastedtv.co.nz which has some good practical ideas.... making your own decorations instead of buying more, hiring toys...

    some from me: save wrapping paper from pressies to recycle - either reuse (if good enough) or to make cards from, for the kids to cut up for craft bits. Send it along to your kindy.

    Instead of a goodie bag - perhaps make an edible take home gift eg, a themed biscuit or cupcake.... or something practicalfor kids like homemade playdough with a themed cutter, pavement chalk - stuff that is useable and not just another piece of plastic! It can work out a good money saver too!

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  2. SophieMay 27, 2009 at 7:02 PM

    Hiya Amanda!!! Great to see your blog!
    Sx

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  3. UnknownJune 3, 2009 at 5:57 PM

    Hi there,
    I make fabric goodie bags, that way they can be reused again and again. For boys I usually put in a couple of marbles for a marble bag.
    I have also started collecting mixed matched fine bone China from my local op shops to use for my daughters birthday parties every year.

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