Earth Day 2021 is asking “WHAT IN THE WORLD IS GOING ON WITH THOSE BILLIONS OF MASKS BEING DUMPED”! They are appearing in the ocean, landfills and really just about any place you can look! A large amount of them, especially the medical ones, are made with tiny fibers that keep breaking down and getting into EVERYTHING. Also, Earth Day 2021, you no doubt noticed the huge increase of take out boxes and items associated with ready to go food items being added to the landscapes and landfills. The little ketchup packages have gone the way of the toilet paper, flour and yeast shortages at the beginning of the Covid 19 event. Yes, Covid 19 has really changed the world in many ways. We are very much aware of it each and every day. It’s going to be very interesting five years from now to see what the results of all that we have been doing affects us. Will all the use of hand sanitizes affect our health as a number of them turned out to have not so good things in them? Will the use of masks for extended period of time have caused long lasting health problems. Was social distancing a good thing or was it not needed? One of the biggest questions is how the trial vaccines have affected us.

We can’t give up on taking care of ourselves or Mother Earth even if Covid 19 has turned our lives upside down. I think at the beginning almost a year ago, almost everyone did housecleaning and major recycling during those first few weeks of lock down. The recycling became a serious problem because places that normally took these materials were closed. My cleaning hormones are on very low right now but places have reopened to take recyclable items.

Each county has recycling programs and they no doubt have a variety of programs. It may be a good idea to recheck what your location/ or hauler will take as things do change. I was standing around and deciding if the large dog food bags went to plastic (the plastics that stores take back) or if I needed to trash it. Trash was the answer for me after I looked it up. Our portable air conditioner died due to mouse damage and that had to be taken to one of the places around that would handle that product and Judge’s Appliances took it for a fee. I was surprised to see that our hauler, Highland Sanitation and Recycling, do take some aluminum items.

Organics have a number of components that can influence it and that starts with grocery shopping planning, eat first, cook and freeze, and proper storage. It is amazing to hear that 40 percent of the food we buy goes to waste! We compost our organics that collect but if you choose not to or can’t do it, Dakota County has several places you can take it to. Go online and see how to get started with the program and get the code to enter the intake place.

I am a member of the Textile Center in Minneapolis and they (before Covid 19) hosted the WORLD’S BIGGEST FIBER GARAGE SALE. They are doing things on a smaller scale for now but hope to get back to the regular giant three day sale later this year. If you have any items that are related to fiber, sewing-including fabric, craft items, books related to crafts and fiber, started sewing projects, yarn, started crosstitch or needlepoint canvas projects to name some, here is what you can do to recycle them. You can drop them off at the Senior Center and Lorri will see that I pick them up for transporting to Minneapolis. You can e-mail me at [email protected] and you can make arrangements to bring them out to my home which is just a bit beyond the high school. I myself would love to have any of your wool items such as skirts or blankets to reuse for rug hooking. I would almost leap a tall building for a good Pendleton pleated skirt!