MomsRising.org Response, Part II

This is one I really enjoyed writing. My "political statement" at the end is a bit tongue-in-cheek, but hey, the basis for which I say "Gimme" is probably quite valid.
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Green Homemaker

When one of the parents is home full-time, they should get some kind of tax break for being less of a drain on the environment. As a stay-at-home person, I am "green" in two different ways.

Firstly, a full-time homemaker, in my case, the wife, leaves a smaller carbon footprint, or at least has a great opportunity to do so. My car is not making the daily commute, and I'm not using up paper and other supplies at work, and using all the resources that go into providing liability insurance for me (that costs the company money that has to be made somehow, usually by using other resources, many of them natural).

Nobody is paving over meadows or woodlands to house my children in daycare, or using up paper products and other resources on them while they are there. And of course, I am not driving them to and from childcare five times a week.

Secondly, and for me, most importantly, a full-time homemaker has more time and more incentive (because of less money) to be more frugal, which usually results in a greener lifestyle. I say more time, because I can give serious attention to perusing store ads and coupons, making my shopping list and meal plans around whole foods that are often local and on sale. I have the time to make things from scratch, using unprocessed food that is minimally processed and packaged (a biggy). Restaurants, and particularly fast food joints are big polluters, and I naturally do not depend on them, so I'm not driving there or having someone drive to deliver take-out food in paper and Styrofoam boxes to me.

I love the smell and feel of a sweet wash dried in the sunshine and fresh air, and boy, do I save a ton of electricity doing that! Plus my skin makes all the Vitamin D my body needs while I am out there hanging clothes on my solar dryer (clothesline)!

I don't need work clothes and can't afford a lot of fancy outfits so look at all the money, natural resources and sweatshop labor I'm not exhausting.

I have no problem wearing a few hand-me-down pieces of clothing. I just think of them as vintage and since I am a bit eccentric anyways, find it kind of amusing to dress a little funny sometimes.

Composting grass clippings and kitchen scraps instead of putting it in plastic bags to be hauled away to a landfill is probably one of the greener things I can do. I often throw the Halloween pumpkin down into it, or save seeds from Hubbard squash and have vines that go nuts all summer. I usually buy cucumber and other seeds at the end of the season when they are marked down and grow good crops from them, as well. I have used seeds that are two or three years old and they seem to do fine. So whatever I can harvest from these little efforts saves a few resources. I have listed several ways a full-time homemaker can be an environmental champion, and I'm sure there are several more ways, as well.

My political statement: I think my homey, green ways are red, white, and blue, and that Nancy and the boys should throw a little paper green my way.