For my family of six, going green is an ongoing process. Because really, when are you ever truly green? Changing old habits and behavior to make less waste is great when you’re willing to take the time and effort to do it. Starting the process is easy by changing light bulbs to fluorescent or taking reusable bags whenever you shop. Even having a garage sale or donating to resale shops. But what happens next? Can we go on doing just this much and really think we are a green family? Absolutely not.

Going green requires constant change that for us, has never been all that easy. Websites that form communities like this one are more important than ever to keep the momentum going. Not to mention the support! Waste comes easy to kids growing up with all the amenities of living in a suburban middle class family and undoing all their bad habits is a daunting task.

Most people don’t start out with a garden that feeds their entire family all year. There has to be a certain order to all this change. You kind of get bigger as you go depending on how much time and money you have to invest. We started with the light bulbs and bags and donations and have stuck with all that. I found that after getting started, the rewards of accomplishing anything on the path to green is rather addicting. So, aside from the tasks that I already mentioned, here are my three most recent favorite changes to make (so far!) on the road to getting green…

1. Composting
For kids, this has been a great adventure. We have a Wriggly Wranch worm bin and a Smith & Hawken Biostack. The kids love the worms and I love the compost I get for my garden. I even got free lessons from my friend Stefani at over at Magic Gardens.

2. Changing all my batteries to rechargeable was a big item on the list.
Sounds easy and it was! It is incredibly rewarding to stop buying batteries from Costco!

3. When buying school supplies this week I discovered eco-paper made from 80% bagasse (sugarcane waste).
The wide ruled paper uses vegetable and water based inks and it wasn’t anymore expensive than the regular paper and notebooks. I picked the paper up at Staples. It’s smooth as silk to write on. I found all kinds of products on The Sugar Cane Paper Company website, ranging from toilet paper to tableware.

The big things like installing greywater systems and solar panels will come in time for us. Even that eco-friendly car that will hold all six of us at the same time is a ways off financially. But the most important thing is that we keep going with what we started and incorporate new ideas into our routine as often as we can. Because for my family, like many others, green is a journey and not just the destination.