After moving to a new apartment that is a good 10 minutes further from my job and taking up more square footage (though in some ways less since this is a four story building), I decided that I wanted to try to take a few steps to lower my green footprint a little bit. To do this we started buying more eco-friendly products. A new kitty litter, green cleaning spray, laundry detergent, shampoo, and recycled paper towels.
The first is the kitty litter. We wanted to get a kitty litter made of pine in some way. We started with pine pellets but it took awhile for the cats to start going into it, and we didn’t think they really tried. It turned out that they did use it, who knows how much, but we never knew it because as the pellets became used they dissolved and sunk to the bottom. Even had we known, we really had no way to actually clean it out as the only thing our scooper could get out is the pellets themselves. So we went and bought a sawdust-style clumping pine litter from the same company, Feline Pine. We found that we love this stuff quite a bit. It smells good, not chemically, weighs less, and is less dusty than normal litter. We were very happy with this shift and wish we had known about it earlier.
Another thing I got was the laundry detergent. This I decided was something *I* wanted to use, and I realized that my roommate likely wouldn’t take the same chance with it that type of thing so I decided that I’d just get my own detergent. I decided to try Seventh Generation because the stuff was readily available at Target meaning that I didn’t have to order it special online and add even more costs to the purchase price with shipping. I got the unscented kind and I think it is pretty good stuff. I don’t feel that it leaves my clothes any dirtier than the traditional Tide that I had previously, clothes smell clean, they look clean and I can’t ask for more than that. It works well.
Rounding up my cleaning products is the recycled paper towels and window cleaner, again both by Seventh Generation. The towels work as expected. There really isn’t much to say, they are paper towels, except they come from recycled paper. They are a little more rough than normal paper towels but honestly that doesn’t matter. The window cleaner on the other hand has turned out to be rather bad. On counters and table-tops I don’t think it is particularly bad. It isn’t great at cleaning up messes, but it does the job. On windows and mirrors it is horrible, and is near impossible not to leave a streak. We feel like we need to get separate window cleaner just for windows which completely takes away the purpose. We won’t be getting this stuff again for sure.
Finally, the shampoo I got was Burt’s Bees Grapefruit and Sugar Beets. The shampoo itself has a very strong grapefruit scent which is very peculiar to me for a shampoo or soap, but not entirely unpleasant. I do like the citrusy and fruity scents so it works, and that it is something so weird actually makes me feel like my scent is that much more original. The cleaning aspect of it seems ok. Just last night I got my haircut and my stylist used a lot of product, today I feel like it got it all out with ease. My hair however does feel a little, well I don’t know how to describe it. Thicker works, but that seems positive, which it is, but it isn’t as smooth as what a normal shampoo gets it on its own. I feel like I need to have conditioner more than I might otherwise need it which sucks. I also don’t have the matching conditioner but oh well. Overall, I like it though it is weird.
So that is the score. 4 I like, 1 I don’t.