April: Earth Awareness

When my daughters went to summer camp, they were taken on short camping trips throughout New Hampshire and Maine. When they left each campsite, their counselors instructed the girls to leave each place “better than they had found it.” And though I’m sure my girls grumbled (I can only imagine, based on their groans when I asked them to clean their rooms when they were younger) as they cleared other people’s litter, I know they also learned an important lesson about taking care of the beautiful parks, forests, rivers and lakes they’d gotten to visit.
 

As Earth Day approaches this year (April 22nd), I find myself thinking of this concept on a larger scale: How can we leave this planet a little better than we found it?

From the Earth Day Network website, I’ve learned that the campaign focus for this year is to end plastic pollution. From their website:

“From poisoning and injuring marine life to disrupting human hormones, from littering our beaches and landscapes to clogging our waste streams and landfills, the exponential growth of plastics is now threatening the survival of our planet.

In response, Earth Day 2018 is dedicated to providing the information and inspiration needed to fundamentally change human attitude and behavior about plastics.” 

This month, I’ll try to highlight various little things we can all do in and around our homes in regards to making smarter choices for the care of our planet, so that we can make it safer for ourselves and for our children.