Gorgeously Green step 1: composting

Recently I checked out a book from the library called: Gorgeously Green by Sophie Uliano. I first saw her and heard about this book on the Oprah Show. I requested it from the library and a couple of days later I began reading.

As I child, I remember going to my uncle's house with my grandpa before our annual vacation to Coldwater, Michigan. We would trek back to the far right corner of his property, wearing our big rubber boots and gloves, and head back to the compost pile. My grandpa, my uncle and I would open the little gate and start flipping over the piles of leaves and food waste. Once the leaves were flipped over, we witnessed BIG FAT JUICY worms!!! We would collect and collect many many worms and place them in our little styrofoam containers filled with dirt. These were our BIG FAT JUICY fishing worms! We caught the best blue gill off of these healthy worms.

I have been looking into starting a compost pile and considering how I would go about doing this a little over a year now. I'm ready to take the challenge. In Gorgeously Green, Sophie explains just how easy it is to start your own pile, and realy how UN-gross it is. When I think of composting the first thing that comes to mind is smelly, old, decaying items. But the more that I read into the process, it sounds absolutely amazing. After the composting has fully decayed, you have fertilizer. The benefits to the planet are astrinomical. Matthew and I have cut down our trash now to a half of a 13 gallon trash bag a week. So a full 13 gallon every two weeks. When I think about what's in that 13 gallons, it surprises me what could be composted. Below I've listed over 30 things, just in our weekly trash that can be heaped onto the pile:

****paper napkins (even though rarely use these to begin with.....cloth napkins baby!) *Post-it notes * wood chips *popcorn * leaves *spices * grass clippings * potato peelings * weeds * stale bread * coffee ground (can you say daily, sometimes twice a day?) *tea bags * shredded newspaper * egg shells * houseplant trimmings * receipts * kleenex tissues (allergy season anyone? uhh me too) * flower petals * stale potatoe chips * moldy cheese * shredded cardboard * apple cores * outdated yogurt * toenail clippings :) * watermelon rinds * dryer lint * bread crusts * cooked rice * banana peels * burned toast * vacuum cleaner bag contents * greeting-card envelopes * dirt from soles of shoes and boots ****

Look at all those items! All of this is going in the landfill when I could be making fresh fertilizer for my plants.
There are many different ways of compositing. You can just have a bin, water it down every so often if it is warm and dry. Or you can try vermicomposting. I haven't fully decided on how I would like to do this, but I'm leaning toward vermicomposting just for the benefits of quick compost and our own worms this July for a trip. From what I've read, depending upon how many worms you have in your pile, your waste can be turned into fresh silt within a week!



I'm excited to start doing this. I'm actually going to the local bait shop on the way home today just to get some prices on worms. It sounds so weird that I'm going to purchase worms, but I'm excited for the prospect of saving just a little bit more of the planet, and making my own footprint that much smaller!!

Here are a couple of site that I found interesting about worms and also about composting....

http://www.unclejim.com/
http://www.compostguide.com/