A little about us...

Since we’re just getting started here, I thought we should take a moment to introduce ourselves. We are a blended family of 2 adults, 4 kids, a dog and a cat (that thinks he's a dog). This summer our older daughter will most likely be staying with us, making us a family of 9 (pets are family too!). Joe is currently enrolled full time in school and handles the graphic and website design portion of Haystack Marketing. Elizabeth works full time outside of the house (temporarily) and handles the promotional product side of Haystack Marketing. The kids are ages 10, 12, 13, 17 and 19 and they all go to school full time, with the oldest is graduating this year.

We do our best to keep our environmental impact low. We have our own garden and compost pile, we try to avoid excess plastic and we are slowly switching out all our plastic items for reusable glass or metal items. A few years ago we moved from a small town to a much larger city. Living in the city has definitely changed our environmental impact. We drive less - 3 of our 4 full time kids can walk across the street to the school. The grocery store is next door to my office and the library. But on the other hand, our property is much smaller, which means we have less room to grow our own food.

We are always looking for more ways to reduce our waste. We have a compost bin on site that we fill up regularly. Cardboard boxes are used in the compost and also to kill weeds in the garden beds. We reuse containers as many times as possible. We even bought reusable bags for produce (more on that later). People always seem surprised when they learn how little waste we produce so we had the brilliant idea to share our knowledge. If our family of 6/7 can produce less than a garbage can full of waste a week, then a family of 3 or 4 should have no problem reducing their garbage pickup from weekly to twice (or maybe even once) a month.

We are also using this opportunity to challenge ourselves to create even less waste. We hope you enjoy the journey and maybe even pick up (or share) a few tips!