Most of the green blogs that I visit have been spreading the word about Earth Day for the past month.  A month ago April 22nd was about a month away…………………..about 2 hours ago I figured out that today is April 22nd.  I admit that I seldom think of what day it is or at times even what month it is.   My promptness depends on events being in my PDA or people e-mailing me reminders.  The funny thing is that I never miss business appointments, family events  or social functions so long as I key them into my PDA.

In my feeble effort to repent for forgetting about Earth Day, I have decided to officially extended Earth Day.  From this day forth Earth Day is now everyday excluding Christmas.  I excluded Christmas for the religious people and the people who like to create landfills of garbage on that special day.  When you think about it, who really cares about the earth when you have piles of gifts in front of you?  Now that I have granted you one day off a year you can focus on the other days and what you can do to make our earth a nicer place.

The picture is from a site called http://www.care2.com, I joined there last week in order to network with other people that care about the Earth.  They have some really good ideas on how everyone can treat our planet with a little more respect.  Here’s my own short list of baby steps;

1.  Plant a tree.

2.  Grow a garden.

3.  Take a hike in a local state forest.

4.  Go camping.

5.  Turn off your T.V. and spend some time outdoors.

6.  Buy, rent or steal a canoe and enjoy a nice journey on a local river or lake.  If you venture into the ocean, trust me and leave the canoe at home they don’t handle waves that well.

Once you have tried a few of the above steps ask yourself how you can protect your environments air, soil, and water.  If you can’t think of any ideas take a look at some of the blogs on my blogroll or some of the sites that I’ve “stumbled” at stumbleupon.com.

Charles Faust, Green Home Improvements

As the winter comes to a close, it is a good time to examine your heating bills to see where you can make some money saving changes. One of the major causes of high heating bills are doors and windows that let your warm air escape and the cold air enter. Experts agree that you can save between 20% and 40% on your heating and cooling bills just by replacing your doors and windows.

Replacement Entry Doors

Replacement entry doors include the frame of the door and the door itself. This assembly is generally referred to as a pre-hung door. The biggest benefit of a pre-hung door is that the weather stripping on the frame are perfectly matched to the door. If the door is installed properly it should keep out rain and very strong wind. Another benefit is that steel and fiberglass entry doors are filled with foam insulation that reduces heat loss.

Storm Doors

Storm doors are a great solution if you have drafty entry doors and you can not afford to replace the whole entry door. Adding a storm door prevents or retards wind and rain from hitting your entry door.

Replacement Windows

Replacement windows are the #1 home improvement when it comes to fighting high heating and cooling bills. Most of the new replacement windows have 2 or 3 layers of glass compared to most homes that only have a single layer of glass. These new double or triple pane windows contain Argon or Krypton gas between the panes that act like and insulation to reduce the transfer of heat. The new windows also use a product called Low E which is a film that helps prevent heat transfer and reduces the amount of harmful UV rays that enter your home.

Weather Stripping

If your budget is small and you can’t control the heat loss around your doors and windows, weather stripping is a good short term solution. For around $75.00 you can buy enough materials to weather strip the doors and windows on the average home.

Testing Your Doors and Windows

This is the fun part! Borrow a shop vacuum from a neighbor or use any vacuum with an exhaust hose to blow air towards your windows and doors. Have one person outside with the vacuum while you stand inside and feel for the drafts. You should retest your doors and windows after your repairs to make sure that your repairs worked.