Brown-bagging it? Not quite…


“Blue lunch-boxing it” to be exact. Well, now that March is over, I’m sure you are all sitting with baited breath wondering how I did on my “No Corporate Greed” March challenge. Overall, I feel really good about what I accomplished… such as:

  • We are no longer buying juice boxes — only large bottles of juice and filling reusable containers (which you can also dilute with water).
  • We are no longer buying Uncrustables — we make PB & J every morning now with local peanut butter and whole wheat bread.
  • We are no longer buying individually-wrapped packages of crackers and cookies (like those 100 cal Nabisco packs) — only full-sized boxes and bags that we then portion out into reusable containers.
  • We are no longer buying individually wrapped American cheese — only deli-style. We still buy string cheese because they don’t sell it without individual wrapping (at least that I could find ).
  • Not a change, but we have always used a cloth napkin in the 4-yo’s lunch box vs. paper ones… it was a school request, but we whole-heartedly support it. I found some cool tie-dyed bandannas at A.C. Moore and they work great.

So here is what a typical lunch looks like for the 4-yo now:

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The only waste is the small Ziploc that the sandwich is in. It’s hard to find a container that fits half a sandwich perfectly. Something tells me I need to go to the Container Store though… I feel pretty confident that they will have something I can use.

After my last post (which was 1/2 way into the month), I had indicated a few slip-ups… such as several visits to Starbucks, a dinner from McDonald’s and some purchases at chain stores (such as CVS). My goal was to have “NO MORE slip-ups” — but I didn’t quite make it. I DID stay away from chain grocery stores until the last week of the month… when I got a full-time job and realized that we had NO food in the house and the only place that was open was a normal grocery store (Roche Brothers). At least it was a locally-owned grocery store. 

Since I had to go there ANYWAY, I bought individual drinkable yogurts because the 4-yo made it very clear he did not like the Kefir cultured-milk drink. Oh well — baby steps. I bought a few other things too, but nothing too awful… mostly just fresh ingredients and one or two frozen items. I decided that it was too difficult to be away from home from 7:30 am to 5:30 pm every day and have the time to purchase all our food and supplies from local business owners. It was a great experiment though and it DID force us to implement some healthy and environmentally friendly habits.

As far as Starbucks goes… I failed miserably. I CUT BACK… probably by 25 to 30% for the month… but I just couldn’t wean myself off the habit.

I am still making my weekly pilgrimage to Russo’s, but now I fight the crowds on Saturdays. It’s worth it tough..

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