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A lot of people want to live sustainably but are unsure of the best way to go about it. Here are the best ways to live a more sustainable lifestyle.

Sustainability is tricky for many people to conceptualize because it means doing commonplace things differently. How you eat, consume, purchase, and live will change, and many people are unsure how to do it effectively. Continue reading to learn about the best ways to live a more sustainable lifestyle.

Reduce and Reuse

One of the best ways to live a more sustainable lifestyle is by embracing the idea of reducing, reusing, and recycling. Recycling is important, but it is the last on the list. There are a lot of significant issues when it comes to recycling, like companies improperly labeling items and recycled items going to the trash. Spending more time and attention on changing your consumption habits is a much better alternative.

A significant number of items at the grocery store and clothes bought online use a lot of plastic and oil in their production, and by buying less, you are contributing less to this waste. Similarly, if you reuse a grocery bag instead of getting new bags every time, you drastically lower your carbon footprint.

Invest in the Long-Term

Another way to live more sustainably is by investing in the long term. This strategy means purchasing high-quality goods made with quality materials that can last a lifetime, instead of cheap goods made from plastic that quickly break.

You can apply this to bigger items as well. For example, you should try and buy older homes that can last a lifetime or look into some newer contemporary homes. One key benefit of modern contemporary living house plans is that they are Earth-friendly, embracing solar panels and other sources of energy efficiency. Many are also constructed from concrete, an incredibly energy-efficient material. Invest in items that will last instead of spending more to replace the goods that are cheaply made and fail to stand up to the test of time.

Go Green, Literally

When people say go green, they generally mean living a more sustainable lifestyle, but to achieve a nice level of sustainability, you should embrace living green. That means buying fresh produce from local gardens or growing it yourself, spending less money on processed goods, and eating a greener diet. Some distinct ways to reduce your carbon footprint and go green are starting your own garden and eating a plant-based diet.

By consuming fewer factory-farmed goods, whether that’s produce or other animal products, you aren’t supporting one of the biggest contributors to climate change. In addition to being more sustainable and contributing less to carbon emissions, you will live a much healthier life! 

Living sustainably and green isn’t easy, but you can live a more sustainable lifestyle with some of these changes and know that you’re making a difference. One person’s impact is not the biggest, but when you live sustainably, you influence others. You are a leader, and your lifestyle can serve as an example of what’s possible when it comes to helping the Earth and changing society’s behavior.

The holiday season is swiftly approaching, and Halloween is here to kick it off. There are all kinds of fun landscaping ideas you can utilize to make your home and yard Halloween-ready. Here’s how to spruce up your landscaping for Halloween.

Include Fall Plants

The first way to spruce up your landscaping for Halloween is by including fall plants. You can plant flowers and plants that are fall colors like oranges and yellows. Adding seasonal touches to your garden and landscape is a great way to prepare for the upcoming holiday and festivities. You can also create cute planter pots with fun flowers and even add little Halloween-inspired planter décor like skeletons, bats, vampires, witches, and mummies. If you have children, this is an exciting project you can do with the little ones to get them excited for Halloween.

Put Out Pumpkins

Putting out pumpkins is another way that can prepare your landscape for Halloween. Pumpkins and jack-o’-lanterns are the quintessential pictures of the Halloween holiday, so they are worth including in your landscape design during this season. You can carve pumpkins into all kinds of different designs and make a fun day out of the process with your family to celebrate the upcoming holiday. Then, you can place these pumpkins in your garden, on your porch or patio, and in your yard. You can also purchase artificial pumpkins if you want to avoid the mess of pumpkin guts.

Utilize Spooky Lighting

Another way to update your landscape for Halloween is to utilize spooky lighting. Adding landscape lighting is one of the essential tips for planning your landscape design, and it’s also a great way to decorate for Halloween. You can use orange and purple bulbs in your landscape’s lighting fixtures to add that extra spooky flair to elevate your home’s holiday appearance. Pathway lights are a great choice and let you create a clear path for trick-or-treaters on the night of Halloween. Don’t be afraid to get creative with your lighting choices. After all, that’s what Halloween is all about, so have fun with the process.

Now that you know some ways to update your landscaping for Halloween, you can use these tips today. Make the most of this holiday season by getting creative with your landscape and décor.

The idea of dirty, contaminated water entering our potable supply is very scary; unfortunately, this scenario does happen, thanks to a phenomenon known as backflow. Backflow endangers the public by polluting drinking water supplies, but it also threatens the health of your plants. Read on to learn why backflow prevention is important for gardening.

What Is Backflow and Backflow Prevention?

In the simplest of terms, backflow is when contaminated water reverses flow and enters pipes with clean water supplies. This occurs when water mains rupture and cause pressure loss, leading water to flow backward into city lines. Agricultural runoff, pollutants, waste, and other chemicals enter potable water and put the entire community at risk of consuming dangerous water.

Backflow prevention ensures that, in the event of lost pressure, this contaminated water remains separate from potable water supplies. Devices known as backflow preventers are installed into plumbing systems, and they utilize one-way valves and redundancies to keep public water supplies protected at all times. Preventers are used for many different applications, including fire prevention systems and even residential sprinkler systems.

Public Safety

Before diving into why backflow prevention is so essential to gardening, it’s important to understand public safety in relation to the water supply. Unfortunately, backflow affects everyone. When water mains rupture, everyone located at a lower point than you is at risk of receiving your contaminated water flow.

In most states, having any appliance that draws from public water systems is legally required to have a backflow preventer installed, especially your residential irrigation system (sprinklers, hoses, etc.) If you want to ensure the health and safety of your community, it’s absolutely imperative that you have the proper backflow prevention solutions in place. This includes each and every gardening spigot, hose-end fertilizer and pesticide devices, and hoses connected to sprinkler systems.

Plant Safety

Backflow prevention is the responsibility of everyone within a community. When someone fails to protect water supplies, it can impact your garden growth when it comes to watering. Yes, you can technically water plants with non-potable water without many issues. However, this is highly unrecommended for watering edible plants like fruits and vegetables.

If non-potable water touches the edible parts of your vegetation, that plant is no longer safe for consumption. Ultimately, if everyone does their part and ensures the proper backflow prevention solutions are in place, the chances of you accidentally using non-potable water in your garden are much less likely.

Not knowing why backflow prevention is important for gardeningis one of the many things people get wrong about backflow prevention. Ensure your garden and the entire community are protected by installing the proper devices and maintaining them when needed.

Many American citizens create waste and throw trash away like it’s nothing. Once it’s out of sight, it’s out of mind. The problem with this is that our landfills are overflowing, and the earth is struggling to handle the piles of garbage we’re creating. More and more people are participating in disposal methods that can help the environment, such as recycling and composting, but there are other ways we can address waste. Keep reading to learn about some creative ways to cut down on waste and live better.

Make Your Own Clothes

The textile industry is the second largest producer of pollution in the U.S. If we can take steps to combat that pollution, we should. Protecting the planet is one of the many reasons why you should consider making your own clothes. Doing so also allows you to get the exact clothing items you want without participating in fast fashion. While making your own clothes may be a time-consuming way to cut back on textile pollution, it’s certainly the most effective. However, if you don’t know how to sew, or you’re still developing your skills, you can always focus on repairing the clothes you already have. You can also shop primarily at second-hand stores.

Change How You Shop

Many of us don’t realize just how much waste and pollution we create when we grocery shop. When we shop at large stores that bring in pristine produce from afar and use plastic bags, we’re encouraging the food industry to continue these trends that hurt the earth. We need to change how we shop. Firstly, we encourage you to try your best to shop locally, both to help boost your local economy and cut down on transportation pollution. Try to bring a reusable bag, too, when you grocery shop, either locally or at larger stores. And bring home the fresh pieces of produce that don’t look perfect—they’ll still taste the same!

Take Cooking Lessons

Food waste isn’t just a problem with large stores, it’s also a problem for many households. While the recycling and composting we mentioned above can help combat your personal food waste, learning how to cook can also help you cut down on waste. As you take cooking lessons or just learn on your own, you can figure out how to incorporate food scraps into your meals, so you don’t even have to carry anything to the compost pile. While you can’t use every food scrap you create, learning how to cook better will still help you cut down on waste.

Some of the best creative ways to cut down on waste and live better are making your own clothes, changing how you shop, and learning how to cook. These strategies will allow you to be creative, exercise critical thinking, and cut down on your waste while sending a message to larger, wasteful industries. Continue to learn how you can better yourself and help the planet by visiting our website.

Thanks to their size and the amount of resources they use to operate, large businesses have the potential to do a lot of good for the planet by choosing eco-friendly options. If you’re curious about how to make your hotel more eco-friendly, check out these tips for inspiration.

Limit Water Usage

Showering requires a lot of water, and many hotel showers are used every day. Also, when people aren’t paying for the water themselves, they may feel more comfortable staying under the spray longer than absolutely necessary.

Low-flow showerheads are the perfect way to lower the amount of water guests use in your showers, and they likely won’t even notice a difference. Many low-flow showerheads have the same water pressure most people are used to, so there’s really no way to lose.

Install EV Charging Stations

Electric vehicles (EVs) are becoming more and more common, especially the various types that use charging stations. By installing EV charging stations at your hotel, you can show your commitment to eco-friendly practices and make it easier for everyone to choose eco-friendly transportation options.

Provide Seed Paper Coasters

Hotels often supply their guest rooms and dining areas with branded coasters that protect surfaces from condensation. Most coasters don’t last very long and end up in the garbage. With seed paper coasters, your coasters become souvenirs guests can take home and plant in their gardens to grow flowers, herbs, trees, vegetables, and many other kinds of plants.

Let Guests Reuse Linens

While showers account for a lot of the water that hotels use, laundry is just as responsible. Many hotels have started posting signs in guest rooms that allow guests to signal to housekeeping when they want new towels and when they’re happy to reuse the ones they have. This encourages guests to use the same towel a couple of times, keeping laundry loads a bit smaller.

We hope these tips for making your hotel more eco-friendly are helpful. Even taking a small step and applying it across a chain of hotels can make a positive impact on the environment.