Samsational Living

It’s been almost 6 months since I began my Zero Waste journey. Have I created waste in those 6 months? Yes. Have I created marginally less waste though? Absolutely. I always try and tell people, it’s not about being perfect, its about being responsible and making more informed decisions about your waste. That being said, summer has started and I have already run into new issues I didn’t have to face in the winter. The Sun I don’t know about you, but if I don’t wear sunscreen, I look like a tomato at the end of a sunny day. Sunscreen is so important for your skin and I’m a person that will go through multiple SPF 70 bottles in one summer. I found one store online that offered zero waste sunscreen in a small 2oz tin. It was $20 and would have only lasted me a couple days. So I did some research and came up with an alternative. Homemade sunscreen! There’s only a couple ingredients needed to make sunscreen. Treason there are so many listed on the backs of tubes are because those s...

How do you support a zero waste lifestyle if the university you go to doesn’t support it? I decided today was the right day to talk about this issue since I decided to get dinner at our university’s food court. After not having eaten there in a year, I noticed the plastic problem we really have. If you’ve been to the movies you may have seen a small dispenser on the counter where a single straw would come out of. We had a similar contraption last year at this university for plastic silverware. Somehow this year we’ve gotten worse with our plastic waste and those dispensers are nowhere to be found. Now instead, there are baskets full of individually wrapped plastic silverware creating even more plastic waste. Though most of the plastic in our food court is recyclable, there seems to be a surplus of garbage cans and not many recycling ones. Upon walking around, this was the common set up I saw… Even the things that can be recycled are being thrown away because of convenie...

Here are some tips to maintaining your zero waste lifestyle while living with roommates... This is not as difficult as you may think when it comes to maintaining a zero waste lifestyle. You can’t tell others how to live their lives, but you can open a dialog and offer a more sustainable way of living. My roommates use plastic and produce trash. That’s okay. But since I’ve started this lifestyle, collectively we are able to be more sustainable in several ways around our home.  Bar soap is the easiest place to start. You don’t need the plastic bottle of foaming soap no matter how fun it is. Get a bar of soap from a local farmers market or package free store and put it on a tray in the bathroom. Washing your hands just got a whole lot more sustainable. We have a homemade cleaning spray with essential oils that act as a disinfectant. It’s stored in a plastic spray bottle because that’s what was previously owned, but that bottle keeps getting reused when the solution runs...

The easy answer is - Zero waste is sending nothing to a landfill and refusing all single use items, primarily plastic.  But it’s not always that easy... I believe that zero waste  is an aspirational goal and something you’re always striving for. No one can become zero waste overnight. It requires planning and flexibility in the beginning and grows into a lifestyle. This isn’t about being perfect, it’s about being more conscious. I am going to try and give some insight to this lifestyle and it’s goals. Most people know the three Rs: Reduce, Reuse, Recycle With zero waste there are five Rs: Refuse, Reduce, Reuse, Recycle, Rot  Refuse This can be hard at first especially in college when free things are passed out left and right. The largest part of this is refusing single use products/plastics: straws, cocktail napkins, plastic cutlery, free pens, etc. start to think about where that free XL T-shirt is really going to ...

Grocery shopping in college is hard enough, but when you add zero waste to that it can feel a little overwhelming. Today I’ll be sharing some of my experiences and tips to making the process as easy and relaxing as possible. Zero waste shopping is actually extremely fast and easy. All you have to do is stay in the produce section! No more searching every isle to find what you need. Most non-packaging items are in the front of any grocery store in their produce area. Living zero waste kind of forces you to eat healthier because most of the “bad stuff” comes in packaging. Pro(duce) Tip: When picking out produce, try and find the items without stickers. Grocery stores actually have to re-sticker every item that the sticker has fallen off of. You’re saving the workers some time and saving the planet one tiny apple sticker at a time. Not all produce comes without packaging . There are many times where the kale or other leafy veggies I’m buying come with a twist tie. Instead of giv...

3 Tbsp coconut oil 1 Tbsp Shae Butter 2 Tbsp baking soda  4 Tbsp arrowroot powder (or corn starch) 1 tsp vitamin E Oil (optional) 7 drops thieves essential oil (or any you like) 3 drops lemon essential oil 1. Mix baking soda and arrowroot together in a bowl 2. Melt together coconut oil, vitamin E oil and Shae Butter in separate bowl  3. Pour liquid into dry mixture and stir well 3. Add essential oils to mixture. (should look like runny frosting) 4. Store in small glass jar or old washed out deodarent container for up to 4 months