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Judy Ulrich's avatar

Judy Ulrich

Community Team

"To be part of the solution by using less plastic "

Points Total

  • 0 Today
  • 0 This Week
  • 1,063 Total

Participant Impact

  • up to
    23
    zero-waste meals
    consumed
  • up to
    1.0
    documentaries
    watched
  • up to
    95
    minutes
    spent learning

Judy's Actions

On-the-go

Visit a packaging-free store

I will visit a co-op or zero waste store to check out my local options for bulk products and plastic-free items.

Completed
One-Time Action

At Home

Purchased metal straws

This will count for both at home and in the go - purchased a set of reusable metal straws that included a carry bag and a cleaning brush

Completed
One-Time Action

At Home

Collecting bottle caps for recycling

So there are always metal caps on glass bottles or plastic caps on glass bottles or on paper cartons that cannot be put back on original container before the container is placed in recycling bin. And the caps are too small to go into recycling bin separately. I have now received the TerraCycle box I purchased for bottle caps & am putting those little separate bottle caps into the box. I purchased the smallest box but it is plenty big and I will be able to fill it with lots and lots of caps before I mail it back to TerraCycle for recycling. 😊

COMPLETED 17
DAILY ACTIONS

Community

Estimate Your Plastic Footprint

I will complete a plastic consumption calculator to learn about my plastic footprint.

Completed
One-Time Action

At Home

Purchased TerraCycle box for caps

So glass bottle come with plastic or metal top & cartons come with plastic caps that are not supposed to go into the recycling bin with the glass jars and paper cartons. I ordered a TerraCycle box that I will be able to put those bottle caps in instead of throwing them out. Once the box is full I mail it back to TerraCycle with the pre-paid mailing label and both plastic and metal caps will be recycled instead of trashed.

Completed
One-Time Action

At Home

Saving for multi-plastic featured Ridwell pick up

I have Ridwell subscription recycling pick up. In addition to the 4 main categories (threads, plastic film, batteries, & light bulbs) that are picked up every two weeks for every pick up there is a featured category. By reading for up coming featured categories I found out that there will be a multi-layer plastic featured pick up scheduled for March 10th. It includes resealable food bags,frozen & fresh food bags, plastic bags for fry pet food & treats, thin wrappers w/shiny lining, plastic granola bar and energy bar wrappers, chip bags, plastic candy & candy bar wrappers, crunchy plastic food bags, potting soil, fertilizer and bark bags, woven plastic bags, and produce netting. These are all things that usually have to go in trash.

COMPLETED 27
DAILY ACTIONS

Pets

Reuse plastic grocery bags for poop bags

I collect plastic grocery bags from friends and family and use them for dog walk poop pick up instead of buying new doggy poop bags. And when I walk the dog I will also pick up trash and add it to the bags so the bags do double duty for dog poop and trash pick up. If the plastic grocery bags I collect are too damaged to use I add them to my Ridwell “plastic film” category.

COMPLETED 4
DAILY ACTIONS

Community

Support a sharing economy by using my FaceBook Buy Nothing group

When I have things I am no longer using or will not use I post them on my FaceBook Buy Nothing group site to see if someone else can use it & I check postings to see if somebody else in the group is giving away things that I can use. This way we reduce things going in the trash that can be used by somebody else.

COMPLETED 27
DAILY ACTIONS

Food

Swap the Snacks

I will swap 1 prepackaged snacks for unpackaged fruits or veggies or homemade or bulk items each time we need more.

COMPLETED 23
DAILY ACTIONS

At Home

Watch a Documentary

I will watch a documentary film about plastic waste with family and friends and talk about what we learned.

Completed
One-Time Action

Feed

  • Reflection Question
    On-the-go Visit a packaging-free store
    Did you find anything at the store that you didn't expect? What was it, and did you find it useful?

    Judy Ulrich's avatar
    Judy Ulrich 2/26/2023 1:32 PM
    I went to Zeroish & found out I could bring my glass jars that I had been saving and donate them. I bought 3 wool dryer balls, a sisal bag for using my bar soap scraps & compostable dental picks for my partner.

  • Judy Ulrich's avatar
    Judy Ulrich 2/22/2023 6:23 PM
    My partner and I signed up for the webinar for tomorrow from 7 to 8 pm. Mostly today we have just being staying put and watching the snow coming down and winds blowing drifts.

  • Judy Ulrich's avatar
    Judy Ulrich 2/20/2023 5:11 PM
    Ok, so you might wonder why somebody was so eager to get rid of the toy system I just posted about. 🤷🏼‍♀️Seriously good quality and like new! Apparently, their kid was just not interested! Surprising to me. I thought most kids liked Duplos and Legos and other construction type toys. But most doesn’t mean all!

  • Judy Ulrich's avatar
    Judy Ulrich 2/20/2023 5:08 PM
    Today while we were clearing our driveways of snow I talked to one of my neighbors across the alley. I had gotten a PlayNStore & some Duplos from FaceBook Buy Nothing Group that were posted as legos. Yes, Duplos are a Lego brand but could not tell in the picture that it was for the bigger Duplo blocks - poster was so eager to get rid of it that they delivered it to me almost immediately after I had said “interested but consider me last”. They did not wait to see if anyone else would indicate interest. 🤷🏼‍♀️Well, Duplos are too young a toy for my niece and nephew. So looking to see if I can find family with younger children. Not that many kids on my block but next block over has lots of kids. My across alley neighbor said he was happy to send email to families he knew on his block with younger kids to see if anybody else interested in this toy. Plastic toys need to be reused as much as possible!

  • Judy Ulrich's avatar
    Judy Ulrich 2/19/2023 1:13 PM
    Today I spent some time checking out Tare & Zeroish websites. I later took walk to drop some mail off in mailbox & while I was walking picked up some trash: some weird plastic beads that may have fallen off holiday decorations, a small paper bag, a couple of empty ziplock bags, & a pair of tennis shoes. I had seen one tennis shoe in the middle of my street for about a week & then it disappeared. Thought someone had picked it up. Nope. It had just got knocked to side of road. When I went to pick it up saw the other one down a ways on the other side of the road. Been outside in the snow, ice, and muck long enough that they were pretty icky so into the trash they went! Sort of assuming after a couple of weeks whoever lost them not bothering to come back for them. We have more snow coming but whenever it starts melting more trash gets revealed.

  • Judy Ulrich's avatar
    Judy Ulrich 2/13/2023 4:50 PM
    Went walking with my walking buddy today. We both brought our picker-upper sticks & she brought a plastic grocery bag & I brought a big trash bag. Reason I had brought a big trash bag was we had taken a short walk on Sunday and saw a lot of plastic debris from a car accident. I knew if that was still there we needed the bigger trash bag! We picked up lots of trash - not all plastic but a lot of it was. We did find more than one spot where there were bits and pieces of plastic car parts & when we got to the area of the car crash debris that we had seen on Sunday it was still there, although more crushed into smaller pieces from people driving over it! When managed to pick up about 99% of the mess - we used one of the bigger broken plastic car parts as a scoop to scoop up as much of the little pieces as possible. That bag ended up being very heavy! But we managed to drag it to my friend’s house and dumped it into her trash can. Attached below is the photo of the accident scene. My garbage bag was already partially full of trash by the time we found this mess again - we knew we had seen it on Sunday but did not remember exactly where. If I had thought to take an “after” picture it would have shown the difference - we managed to get about 99% picked up - some of it was just to small & would have needed a broom to sweep it up. 🫣

  • Judy Ulrich's avatar
    Judy Ulrich 2/11/2023 1:43 PM
    Purchased a set of metal reusable straws that came with carry case and cleaning brush - plan to use these at home and on the go

  • Judy Ulrich's avatar
    Judy Ulrich 2/09/2023 1:25 PM
    Received my TerraCycle box for bottle caps that I cannot put into regular recycling bin & have started putting bottle caps in it. This is the smallest size but it is plenty big and I will be filling it for a while before it is ready to be mailed back to TerraCycle for recycling.

  • Judy Ulrich's avatar
    Judy Ulrich 2/08/2023 10:05 AM
    No longer have Dexter the dog so not using plastic grocery bags for collecting dog poop. I was dog sitting while his human was out of the country visiting family. But I will still dog sit occasionally!

  • Judy Ulrich's avatar
    Judy Ulrich 2/08/2023 10:02 AM
    In Wales, Wisconsin helping a friend move from Minneapolis