Do I recycle more than my neighbors? I don't know, but I can tell you that our village has a wonderful recycling center staffed by tons of volunteers every Saturday morning. We drop of our own things there every couple of weeks and always see lots of our neighbors there.

Our family regularly takes aluminum cans, glass bottles, newspapers, flattened cardboard boxes, plastic bottles, packing peanuts, etc. in there. I have many "green" shopping bags that I now keep in my car so that I don't have to use a store's paper or plastic sacks. I'm looking for some generic ones, though, as it's frustrating trying to keep the individual store's bags separated . . . and the folks in Albertsons are none too happy to see my Trader Joes bags ;^P

We donate any good working appliances (large & small), furniture, dishes, Tupperware, school supplies, canned goods, wall art, lamps, tools, clothing, etc. to our local free store in the town below us. We've even donated one of our cars. Their list of clients who have needs can come in and "shop", thus saving their cash for things that aren't readily available in the free store. It makes us feel good that we're not only recycling all of this, but that someone in need is benefitting from it directly.

I drop off my magazines to DD's school for the staff lounge, and to the local senior center as soon as I finish with them.

Old towels and blankets that are not good enough to go to the free store, go to our local animal shelter.

But, I do have to say that as diligently as we recycle, we still have a lot of, what I would call, unnecessary trash each week. I can see the need for some packaging reevaluation on the manufacturers part. One thing I am encouraged by, being an avid gardener, is the new plant pots that are biodegradable. They really do seem to break down rather quickly. I make a point of taking all my plastic pots back to the nurseries to be reused or recycled. I'm not obsessed about recycling, but I do what I can.
Lynn

Our town has the Big Blue Bin, and ours is always overflowing. All paper, grayboard (cereal boxes, etc), cans, plastic, scrap metal, spray paint cans, oil (motor and cooking), batteries, glass, CFLs, styrofoam...what else? About the only thing that is tossed is the dog food bags since they're wax coated. Even plastic shopping bags are recycled.

Our local transfer station takes electronics and house paint. There is also a free haz waste recycle. AND they have a charity donation bin on site, so you can even take reusable things.

Oregon is very green...and I really like that. I'm considering taking a master recycling class, too.

I have no idea what my neighbors recycle. We are in a rural area, we take our trash weekly to a dump/recycle area. Those that live near us and use pickup have the huge covered cans that you do not see in. However, I don't see separate recycle containers, so maybe pickup doesn't offer recycling? I don't use alot of convenience foods (cans and boxes, etc.) so don't have alot of that kind of stuff to be recycled. Plastic, paper, cardboard, glass, etc. the occasional can or aluminum is all recycles. Plastic bags are reused and our grocery stores have recycle receptacles for those. A few times a year our county has the hazardous waste days and we do that. At the dump/recycle place, there is a place for oil, etc. and bigger items - I see a ton of grills left there!

tina

"Things like egg cartons go in the compost as do toilet paper rolls."

If you already compost, why do you not compost your newspapers? They are great for composting and you save transportation costs not having them taken to the dump/recycling center. You can also use them as a weed barrier or mulch for the garden.

I recycle just about everything I can. I just saw a TV ad encouraging a technique I use, which is to keep a recycle container in the bathroom, so that the toilet paper rolls and shampoo bottles don't go in the bathroom waste can. By my desk, I have a garbage can and a paper bag to collect waste paper.

What I would like to understand better is where recycled stuff goes. There are machines that take mixed recycling products and compact them. Where does the stuff go after that? It is a mixture of paper, plastic, glass and aluminum. Does it really get recycled, and if so how and into what?

One thing I've been getting bad about is my children's artwork/projects/homemade toys. Very often, it is COVERED with tape. I'd need to pull it all of in order to recycle well. And . . .I don't.

One book I read ("A Reasonable Life") made me realize . . .recycling is the LAST step we should be taking. As Americans, very often if we recycle we think we're doing enough, but really, it is better to concentrate on the other Rs (reduce and reuse) a lot more than we (general "we") do. So, as you say, toys come in terrible packaging. Buying a used toy would save you from that, and there would be less resources wasted overall. Of course, that isn't possible with everything, but it was a wakeup call for me.

We do the usual, what fits in the city recycle bin and if we have extra then we take it down to the recycle place. We try to give away usable goods to Goodwill and Habitat Restore. Thanks for the tip on the bathroom stuff, I do forget those items.

One thing I wish our trash company would do is be a part of the Recycle Bank Program. I haven't checked the website recently though so maybe our area is offering it now.

I recyle better as time goes on. I just started looking for the #1and2's on the plastic and found out I really do have lots of it from berry and other boxs. I also have started to do the cracker and other small boxes plus dry cat (or dog) food bags . the boxes and bags go in with magazines.I also drop off items to Goodwill and other places like them. We have 1 33 gal. trash can shared with the 4 houses on the property and it is picked up once a week.

I'm not sure how I compare to my neighbors but I try to recycle and reuse as much as possible.

The town where we weekend in ME has limited recycling (due to costs, supposedly). I bring home a bag after every weekend to recycle in MA where they take almost anything.

In lieu of throwing anything out, I try to give away on CL or Freecycle - broken pottery for people that do mosaics, etc. It really is true "your trash is other people's treasure". I'm always amazed....

When I wonder about my neighbors, it's usually the same ones that have the over-filled trash can. We have the large one with wheels- a truck with the arm comes. Some neighbors don't put the recycling can out much; and while I understand that it could be some don't buy a lot of things in cans or paper; but even in my old town, it didn't seem like a lot of people recycled. With my old town, some threw the bags on the curb, you could see inside the white bags.

My hubby was telling me that some towns have a sensor on the recycling bucket that tracks how much each house is recycling. I'm going to read more about that.

I've always carried brown bags in my car; and used to bring them into Target & Walmart back before reusable bags came out. I've been doing that for a few years. Every now and then I forget to bring them in so ended up with plastic bags, which is what I now need to get rid of now. These days, if I forget to bring bags in, I put it in the cart and bag it in the car.

Lynn, I didn't think to include the magazines; we also do that. Depending on what magazine it is, we've given to the school for use in child study (for the kids waiting for counseling) as well as any doctor appointments. I used to pass them to my elderly neighbor who then passed them down to other people. We're not getting many magazines these days, but the ones we do get are passed on.

I like the idea of the "free store"; would love to find one of those. I have stuff in the basement that I haven't donated somewhere yet.

Dilly Dally, that's why I separate newspaper from the paper; I use it in the garden. It's great when planting, I shred it up. The stuff I have saved so far (we don't get a newspaper every Sunday) will go in the veggie garden when he expands it.

One book I read ("A Reasonable Life") made me realize . . .recycling is the LAST step we should be taking. As Americans, very often if we recycle we think we're doing enough, but really, it is better to concentrate on the other Rs (reduce and reuse) a lot more than we (general "we") do. So, as you say, toys come in terrible packaging. Buying a used toy would save you from that, and there would be less resources wasted overall. Of course, that isn't possible with everything, but it was a wakeup call for me.

Anele, I don't have small kids any more. I used toys & electronics as an example of things I hate having to dispose of; especially when I have to replace something. I wonder how much of the over flowing trash I see is due to that. The last packaging I had like that was from perfume I think; it was a sale gift set I got my daughter. Normally I don't buy perfume packed like that & since it bothers me, maybe I'll stop buying things packed similar.

The message, reduce & reuse; I'll have to figure out if there is more I can do with that.

I'm in California so it's very 'hip' to recycle. (Is that word still used?) We recycle everything that is allowed, including wax milk cartons. Batteries and halogen bulbs are left on top of garbage cans, generally in a plastic bag, taped to the top.

Styrofoam peanuts go to the post office here. We have garbage service and recycles are picked up every other week, in bins provided by our service.

When Max was a young driver, he was always taking our stuff to the recycle stations so he could get a little money.

I wish Costco would go green! I love Costco but their packaging drives me nuts! So much waste.

Our weekly waste is 2/3 recycling and the other 1/3 is split between 1/2 true garbage and 1/2 compost.

Our paper recycling place gave us one hint....If you shred paper, shred only the bare minimum because shredded paper is very hard to sort by the recyling company. If you want to shred a bill for example, only shred the bill - throw the envelope and inserts away whole.

Our community uses RecycleBank. There's an RFID on the recycle cart, and the recycle truck scans and weighs the cart when it collects the contents. You have to register with RecycleBank, and then you collect points based on the amount of material you recycle. You can redeem points for various things. I use it to get coupons for free organic cereal (and when we finish the box, it goes into the recycle bin.).

I don't compare myself to my neighbors. That way lies madness. I do what _I_ can and that's that.

My city contracts with the corporation Waste Management. WM provides the Big Green Can for trash and two regular recycling bins per household, one for paper and one for metal/glass/plastic with the option of buying more recycling bins for $5 each (we have one extra). WM won't accept very much plastic for recycling - for instance, they only take #1 and #2 plastics, but probably 75% of the plastic that comes into the house is neither of those types. Grrrr. They only take certain kinds of glass, too. Batteries are not accepted for recycling - ni-cads and lithium batteries have to be taken to dropboxes at most hardware stores, alkalines in the regular trash.

We do not compost and I refuse to tear myself up about it. We do not garden, nor do our neighbors, and discarding food scraps outside attracts vermin we neither need nor want near the house. WM has no composting program, either with curbside pickup or dropoff at the transfer station. However, even if they did it as a dropoff option, the landfill/transfer station is almost half an hour's drive from my home and nowhere near anything else for sensibly combining trips, and from an overall environmental POV I think it's pretty stupid to drive nearly an hour round-trip to drop off a couple of bags of carrot ends and potato peels.

I use the tote bags for groceries about 80-90% of the time (and I don't stress about using one store's bags at another store, the baggers can make all the faces they want but until they start giving the reusable bags away for free they'll use whatever bags I hand them to pack) but we use the regular plastic grocery bags for so many purposes that I don't castigate myself for forgetting. BTW, plastic shopping bags are usually #2 plastic and can go right into the recycling bin - stuff a bunch into one bag and knot it so they don't go fluttering away when the bin is dumped.

The dog-poop pickup bags we use are compostable or rapidly biodegradable with exposure to moisture even in anaerobic conditions (like a landfill). And when they say "rapidly" they mean it - we tested them ourselves in the back yard. They're a bit on the pricey side but we consider it worth it. The "doggie dooleys" are a big PITA and useless half the year here anyway.

The local Goodwill started accepting dead computers (I guess they make money somehow on parting them out?) earlier this year and I took over a station-wagon-load accumulated amongst my social circle, but it's very difficult to get rid of any other electronics here. Our city has one hazmat disposal day a year, for four hours on a Saturday, and if you miss it, too bad so sad, you have to figure out how to store it until next year's disposal day. Crazymaking.

One of the local pack-and-ships will take styrofoam peanuts and airpacks but will not accept any kind of formed styrofoam (which is also unrecyclable here, so all you can really do is bust it up and either try to reuse it or cram it in a trash bag and fit it into the Big Green Can).

We donate and Freecycle and regift and put things out on the curb with "free" signs on them. The trash can is the last resort for things that cannot be discarded another way with a reasonable level of effort.

Fresno, where I live, has a great recycling program. I contribute as much as I can. We do the basic recycling, with paper, cans, and plastics. I send our paint cans, batteries, and other waste, to the annual disposal where we have to register, then, get your car in line that day to have all your stuff unloaded. I garage sale everything we can no longer use that has enough value to appeal to people. I even sell all my husband's old shirts for a quarter each. The farmworkers in our area need them for protection from the sun. I buy mostly used furniture. I buy used garden ornaments and decor. For many years, while my kids were young, I bought most of their clothes at consignment stores and garage sales. My husband won't throw away anything he can weld, bolt, screw, hammer, or machine, back into useability.

One thing I haven't done yet, is compost. I want to, I just haven't.

Red

We lived in a NYC suburb in the 1970s and drove quite a few miles to recycle cans, glass, and newspapers. When we moved to Indiana, it was hard add those things to the trash! Finally we got a town recycling center where we could take aluminum and steel cans, glass, plastic, cardboard, mixed paper, and newspaper. I ended up with about 1 trash can per week for our family. I've always used newspaper under garden mulch and to help make new soil, and buried compostable kitchen waste between garden seasons and between plantings.

During the building year, we were in an apartment with no access to recycling so I was back to throwing everything away -- except the aluminum cans, which we took to a Habitat group.

Now that we're isolated on a Tennessee ridge, we take all trash to the town collection center. They have recycling bins so I'm back to recycling.

Our Indiana church had a thrift shop, so decent used clothing and knick-knacks, books, etc. all went there. Every time we go back for a visit, there are a couple boxes of stuff for the TS, and between times we support a local one.

I have enough re-useable bags to grocery shop, and when I do get things in plastic bags I use them to line wastebakets.

And I'm about to start a vermicomposting box so that earthworms can eat my garbage! The grandkids think it will be fun, and I love the idea of worm castings on my plants.

Where we live, WM does not do recycling pickup, only once a week garbage cart collection, and there are no recycling centers in our county. A neighbor collects old newspapers for an animal shelter, but we no longer have a subscription since I can read it online. I buy the Sunday paper a couple of times a month and save it to use in the flower beds. When our kids were younger, we had two garbage carts/wk. but cut back to one once they went to college. So we don't recycle the way we used to in other states, but we have made an effort to reduce waste. As for old clothing, linens, & household misc., I keep a shipping box in the garage and when it's full I drop it off at Goodwill or Salv. Army while I'm running errands.

When I compare myself to my neighbors; we all have access to the same services that come to the house weekly. The town picks up both trash & recycling once a week. Recycling doesn't have to be separated, can all go in the same bucket.

My town will not take the plastic bags. I'm pretty sure most of the stores have a bin; so I'll bring them with me. If I reused them it would be ok but we don't. I have 1 trash can that will take the bigger bags but the regular sized ones I have no use for.

Most food stores don't give paper bags any more & I miss it. I also don't care what brand bag I bring in. So far no cashiers have looked at me funny with the green bags; when I brought paper bags into a competition store I did get the look then.

It's neat reading about recycling in different areas.
I realize that not every area recycles; you do what you can..

RE: Composting . . .I kept wanting to and did not because I didn't know which system was best, DH didn't want to spend the $, etc. Then, our village said it would reimburse us $80 for a composter, but again, I was stuck. (Ones that you can turn are at least double that.) So, I realized that I HAD been composting, by just throwing all of our lawn waste in one corner of the yard. I got DH to do it (saved money on the yard waste stickers we had to buy), but I did not add food scraps since it was open. Well, DH put in the rotten pears that had fallen off of the tree (!!!) and then it started to smell . . .so I just covered it up with the all ready composted material and that seems to be working. I don't think I'll regularly add food scraps, unless I get a worm bin (and I just don't know if I can stomach that) or maybe I'll get one paid for by the village and devote that to mostly food scraps and whatever else I need to throw in to make it work (and use my corner in the yard for the big stuff).

RE: City recycling . .When I lived in Chicago, the system was a joke . . .while everything went into special bags (that you paid for), the bags would go in the same truck as garbage. Turns out, very little actually actually got recycled. Here in the 'burbs, we now have separate bins and a truck comes by once for recycleables, once for garbage. Much better!

I agree though, do what you can!

The show I was watching was Planet Green - Wa$ted!

When I bought my first house we had a garbage can and then three small bins for cans/glass/paper. Problem came when local homeless folks would wander the streets taking the items. I did not mind, but they left a mess, were noisy and started getting a little to comfortable hanging around our sideyards looking for more. Program quickly ended. Now we have garbage/recycle/green. Most folks do their own cans so the homeless have gone away.

I decided to gather all the bottles after the girls softball practices and games. Put the money towards team party. Girls were very conscience of it and appreciated it.

DH and I have been trying to repurpose things. We took one of those little tykes basketball hoops and stood it up inside our boat to allow the boatcover to stay up during the rain. We could not give it away at yardsales because the net was rotted off. He had some parts on his jeep that he could not craiglist. Took them to local jeep junk yard and got a $100 credit. There are a few other things we repurposed and it was kind of fun.

I do feel as though we recycle more than our neighbors. At least now that is. When DS1 was 3yrs old his teacher did a program about recycling. That was all it took - that kid was on our you-know-what right away to recycle. He checked everything! We suddenly went from 1 small bin filled every other week to 2 large bins and 1-2 plastic kitty litter buckets and a bag of paper and a bag of broken down cardboard every wk.

I just got 4 plastic adirondack chairs and when I brought them home I noticed the made from recucled products sticker on them. I was excited to show DS1 (now 5) and he was just like 'Yeah - I know. I saw that mommy.'. Recycling is so matter of fact for him now.