Moving Week: Trying to Keep it Low Impact

Moving in a sustainable way is tough! I will admit that we didn't do all we could have to make it sans carbon. It has definitely been a long week and Yoga in the Park yesterday was exactly what I needed. 

 Our cluttered but moved living room with a decorative and no longer working fireplace (ahhh, smores would have been tasty!)

How were some ways we kept it low impact? 

We got our friends to source some boxes, from their University department that had recently moved, to work paper staples boxes. We had at least forty boxes, 10 or which only held all our books. 

One box of books will be donated to a local library or bookstore (I kept forgetting to do that before we moved... so it got moved with us).

 Our new 'curio' cabinet for which I can place yoga things and books on display!

 

Andrew baked cupcakes which I took four and marched over to our former neighbours place. I had noticed that they got newspaper every morning. I offered an exchange- four cupcakes for previously read newspaper. We had enough to pack up all of our breakables.

 very cool molding and circle dealy in the ceiling- too bad it's no longer hooked up for a ridiculously huge chandelier. I like sparkly things...

 

No extra plastic packing stuffs went into wrapping our furniture or packing our things- old pillows, mats and blankets were used along with some packing foamies that I had saved from receiving packages last year.

We recycled all the boxes, paper and minimal plastic that went into the move.

We donated as much as we could to Value Village and the local transition house, I think we had one garbage bag from our purge.

Our cluttered but now CLEAN kitchen- so much bigger than our last one!

 

Cleaning both apartments (sigh, you'd think other people would actually clean before they left) we used low-impact products. 


Andrew and I are very fortunate as we had a lot of help during our move. My parents and brother and his girlfriend came up with both their pick up trucks which meant no rented truck and money saved (but a pretty significant carbon footprint for the three hour drive up and back... but what can ya do?). I have read over at An Adventure Called Bicycling how she moved her apartment via bicycle- which I think is ridiculously awesome. 

 Our very cool door and where our bikes now live!

We also had lots of friend help, from baking muffins (Jen knew I wouldn't eat breakfast otherwise!) to helping to furiously sweep and mop and move boxes... and still come out for Yoga in the Park. We're very lucky people :)

The actual move is done and we're trying to unpack and clean as much as possible while waiting for the walls to get painted (ick- toxic paints. wish we had a choice in the type of paint used). I heart our new neighbourhood very much: coffee shops, grocery stores and the farmer's market are all within walking distance. Along with a ten minute bike ride to the park- WOOT! :)

Happy Independence Day to all my American bloggy-friends!


Blessings!


article and photograph copyright of EcoYogini at ecoyogini.blogspot.com