Sustainable Living Challenge

My sister Rachel and I have been working together this year on taking certain steps to make our lives more sustainable, healthier, and happier, and we have been tracking our efforts at our blog called Handcrafts & All Things Green. We have organized our efforts into our very own Sustainable Living Challenge, where we will be challenging ourselves (and our readers) to make more earth-friendly choices in our daily lives. 

Here are the basic goals we have outlined for ourselves under the Sustainable Living Challenge:

1. Be Healthy
   
2. Maintain an Efficient and Sustainable Home
   
3. Benefit the Environment
   
4. Save Money
   
5. Support Community
   
6. Live a Simple and Enjoyable Life
   
7. Encourage and Inspire Others
   

Under each of these goals we will be exploring more specific areas of our lives, and our reports will be given from two very different viewpoints: the Urban Sister (that's me) will compare her sustainable living progress to that of the Small Town Sister (that would be Rachel). Watch for our Sustainable Living Challenge reports (or sign up for email updates at the top of our blog), and feel free to leave us any comments on your own sustainable living progress!

Finally...a sustainable-ready apartment!

For renters, it is sometimes hard to live as sustainably as you would like, since some landlords and apartment buildings aren't very green-living friendly. If you live in an apartment, you don't have a yard - making it difficult to start a compost pile or a garden. If you live in an old building or if your heat is included in the rent, chances are you can't regulate how high the building's heat is turned up in the winter. Many landlords are usually more concerned with the cheapest materials, repairs, or upgrades rather than the most earth-friendly. These obstacles can make green-living, especially in an urban area, frustrating for many and nearly impossible for some.

Having experienced many of these obstacles myself, I am now happy to report that I have found an apartment for my roommate and I that not only encourages sustainable living, but in some cases requires it! (Our lease requires us to recycle all materials accepted by the city.) Our new landlord owns many old houses in the area that he advertises with a sustainable spin, and is slowly upgrading each of them: our building has received new energy-efficient windows, new bamboo flooring, and compact-fluorescent bulbs screwed in by the landlord himself. We will have a compost pile, an herb garden, and a clothesline already in the backyard for our convenience, and we have the go-ahead to plant as many vegetables as we want! The washer and dryer provided in the basement are coin-operated, which will help to discourage electrical clothes-drying. It is located in an area that has almost everything we might need in walking or biking distance - groceries, banks, restaurants, and shops. And finally, we are encouraged to get some fresh air and exercise in the canoe that is provided for all of his tenants! (And since we don't have a TV or air conditioning, we might be looking for some water recreation come summer!)

If only more property managers and landlords were conscience of the environmental impact not only of their own personal lives, but also of the lives of their tenants - which are often influenced by where they are living.