Children Inspiring a Greener Me

As a parent you are constantly learning with your children. Kids don’t come with handbooks so we learn as we go and use our own experiences as a child to build upon. As my children grew up I noticed that although I would be teaching them skills like reading, socialising and manners, they would also teach me things too.  This continues into school age and one of the ways my children have really educated me is in the environment and use of energy.

Schools can put amazing ideas into children’s heads from an early age about caring for the environment.

My children would come home with lots of information and new ways of trying to do their bit. When the kids were younger I didn’t recycle or really have a lot of interest in the environment as a whole, I thought it was a scam.  While I am still unsure about global warming I am now more concerned about the impact my rubbish has on wildlife and of course how much money I am wasting when using energy.

Once I would simply throw cardboard, food and glass all in the same bag, but now our home is a lot more environmentally friendly.  With the help of the children I have built up new habits which are benefiting everyone and they really have little impact on my life.

Recycling

We now recycle everything possible from old clothes and shows to egg boxes and bottles.  The council pack up paper waste and plastic but I have to go to the bottle bank to recycle glass. So we make it a fun event hearing all the glass smash in the huge collection containers.  We even managed to recycle our old computer and all of our ink cartridges are sent on to be broken down/recycled or refilled safely. In fact we hardly ever print anything out anymore.

Saving Energy

One of the first things my children started doing was telling me off for not turning lights off. I was terrible for leaving the landing light on at night and forgetting to switch the bathroom light off. The schools taught my children about how bad those habits were and they started to pull me up on it at home. Their good habits have rubbed off on me now as not only does this save energy it also saves money. It’s not only lights which are left off, each night I unplug appliances and electrical items completely.  The kids added little stickers on the switches until I changed my habits and they wouldn’t let me remove them until switching off was second nature. Good on them eh?

Save Money on Heating Bills

One day my daughter came home with a design to help us save money over the house. I was so impressed by her report so we decided to put her ideas into practice. We insulated the loft, filled in the gaps around the windows with filler, added heavier curtains to keep in the warm and used foil behind the radiators.  We also bought an insulating jacket for the boiler which is going to be replaced for a more energy efficient one as soon as we have saved up for it.

I also decided to see if I could save money by looking for a better deal.  I was able to switch my suppliers online and I have saved money by doing so. It was easy to do and to be honest the only change I noticed was when it came to paying the bill to a new supplier.

Children can come up with some amazing ideas for being green.

One of our big family favorites is using our old and scratched CDs in the garden to scare birds away from our newly planted fruit and veggy garden and using a composter for all our old waste food. We also have some rather interesting flower pots made from old shoes and teapots. The kids seem to collect all sorts of things to put plants in… they are ingenious to say the least.

You can save money and reduce the amount of waste you have in many creative ways, why not see what ideas your children can come up with.

Visit www.buyability.co.uk for some brilliant advice on improving how energy efficient your home could be.