Maureen Wise

Do you have a craft stash at your home? In your collection of crafting supplies, do you have partially used paints that you know you’ll never use again or a partial packet of buttons? Maybe you have irregular pieces of fabric, foam, and felt. Or there’s a third of a skein of yarn that just won’t match anything, half a sheet of stickers for a very specific project, crayon stubs, worn-out paintbrushes, outdated cake toppers, or any other leftover materials from your crafting projects.

Look around your bathroom and you'll likely find a lot of plastic that can't be recycled, including toothbrushes, floss containers and floss itself, feminine products, deodorant containers, and toothpaste tubes. The latter of these tends to be especially confounding to recycle because it's hard to tell what materials are even used to make these tubes.
So, are toothpaste tubes recyclable, and can they go anywhere beyond the landfill once they're empty?

If you've committed yourself to caring for the planet, you're faced with the challenge of balancing your drive to live sustainably and your desire to explore all the incredible wonders our world has to offer. We have some tips on how to minimize the environmental impact of your travels to help you plan a truly green vacation.

The Viburnum Leaf Beetle (VLB), native to Europe, was first found in North America in 1947, in the Niagara Peninsula of Ontario, Canada. In 1996, it was discovered in New York State in Northern Cayuga County. The Viburnum Leaf Beetle has continued to spread south and west through New York into Pennsylvania, and in 2002, was discovered in Ashtabula County, Ohio where it appeared to have been established for at least two years, based on egg scars.

If you're an avid reader, you probably have a bookshelf bursting with books . . . and stacks of books that don't fit on that bookshelf . . . and probably a few out on loan from your local library. That's great! The power of literature has been scientifically studied—though a good story's full mental and emotional impact likely touches us in ways we will never fully understand.

In general, plants need sunlight, water, and nutrients to grow. Certainly, there are exceptions, and plants can grow in dark places without a lot of water—but they won't thrive. When gardeners want their plants to really flourish, they'll add in fertilizer for extra nutrients.

Veronica, also called Speedwell or Birds Eye, is a member of the largest genus in the flowering plant family that grows mostly in the Northern Hemisphere. Veronica is both a weed and a cultivated plant. There are two distinct varieties of Veronica: the short groundcover described above and a tall plant that grows in clusters with tall spikes of flowers. The groundcover variety can easily become a lawn weed.

Do you know how your car’s carbon dioxide emissions compare to those emitted by other cars? Are some car brands bigger CO2 emitters than others? And do all new car models really produce fewer emissions than the older models on the road?

Let’s first define what a tree lawn is, as this is not the only term people use for this space, especially in Ohio! Those in the Akron area frequently call the grassy area between the sidewalk and the road, a “devil’s strip.” Others say it’s the road berm, curb strip, a snow shelf, the curb lawn, the nature strip, a city easement, parking strip, planting strip, the parkway, an extension lawn, or the sidewalk buffer.

Many power tools use batteries to run instead of corded electricity or the muscle of the user. You can find rechargeable batteries in a variety of common household power tools such as drills, drivers, saws, blowers, work lights, and trimmers, and more. Most people find it more convenient to use battery-powered tools than to be tethered to an electrical outlet. And rechargeable batteries are easy to charge when their power runs low.

Water use may not be the first area you think to tackle when it comes to reducing your personal waste. But reusing water can go a long way toward lessening your personal environmental footprint, as clean water is a limited resource. If you want to know how to recycle water at home, there are two major kinds of water to reuse: greywater and rainwater.

Even if you are committed to using a reusable water bottle for your daily water intake while on the go, there still may be times you find yourself drinking from a single-use plastic water bottle at an event or an unplanned thirsty moment. But once that water bottle is empty, how do you go about recycling it properly?

Fall and spring are election seasons in the United States when citizens select their representatives and pick their sides on local issues. Political signs sprout up in voters’ front yards to endorse the candidates and issues they want their neighbors to also support. After the election, these signs are usually no longer usable since the year or campaign branding becomes obsolete before the next election cycle. What should we do with our political yard sign after the election cycle ends?

The term Thistle is used for a variety of wildflowers and weeds, mostly part of the sunflower family. Generally, Thistle leaves have sharp prickles along the edges of their leaves and along their stems to act as a defense against grazing wildlife. All varieties produce flowers, usually purple or yellow, and spread through seed. In the Fall, the flowers frequently produce puffy, white fluff attached to the seeds to ride the wind and spread seeds farther. Some varieties do al...

Cucumbers are a vegetable of choice for many Midwestern gardeners. They are relatively easy to grow and cucumbers are a family favorite, eaten on their own with just a few seasonings, in salads, or preserved by pickling.
However, if you are a cucumber gardener and your plants aren’t thriving, it’s likely you have a beetle problem. Cucumber beetles are hard to get rid of, but there are many organic methods to stop the destruction they inflict on your crop.
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