Well I have thought about moving to Cambridge with my Tetra Paks...

Enjoying The Big Weekend in Cambridge, earlier this summer.

Okay I'm not that obsessed that I would up sticks and move over the county border just because of new recycling facilities, but it is really great to hear the news that Cambridge City Council is the latest Local Authority to introduce kerbside collection for cartons. That's something we don't have the benefit of in Bury St Edmunds. Currently all our drinks cartons have to be taken to the local reycling centres for collection.

However since April 2007, Tetra Pak and the Alliance for Beverage Cartons and the Environment (ACE UK) have made significant investments in the carton recycling infrastructure in the UK. These days, cartons can be recycled in 86% of UK Local Authority areas, with one in five Local Authorities now collecting cartons at kerbside.

Fay Dashper, Recycling Operations Manager at Tetra Pak, commented:

"By enabling cartons to be recycled though kerbside collections, councils like Cambridge City are now at the forefront of recycling efforts in the UK. They are helping their residents to recycle even more of their cartons, more easily. We and our industry partners are committed to increasing the level of carton recycling in the UK and our work with local councils across the country takes us and people living in these areas one step closer to achieving that."

Of course, whether you're lucky enough to have a kerbside facility or have to deliver your cartons to your local Household Waste Recycling Centre, don't forget to wash and squash them first.

By flattening your cartons, lorries can carry at least three times as many, which means fewer trucks on the road.

And on that note, I could really do with your help now....

Do you remember I entered Tetra Pak's "How do you squash yours" competition. Well... the exciting news is that our family video, called With Tantrums and Tears, has made it to the shortlist along with some other fabulous entries.

But it's now up to you.

We really now need your vote if we're to be in with a chance of winning one of the super-dooper prizes that are on offer. The kids are very excited about having made it to the final and as for Mr A...he's already deliberating between the benefits of despatching me off overseas on a volunteer mission or enjoying the delights of a new Eco-TV should we win.

So please, please, please drop over to the competition website by clicking on the picture below and take a look at the top ten videos that have been selected by the judges revealing some whacky ways of squashing cartons.

If you like ours, select the "With Tantrums and Tears" button and click on the "Cast your Vote Now" post-it note. And to raise awareness of the campaign, please email, Facebook or Twitter your friends too. I know they might vote for someone else, but it's all for a good cause.

So, thank you dear readers. I hope some of these lovely videos help raise a heart-warming smile, especially ours..... And of course, we won't be moving to Cambridge quite yet. We're having too much fun squashing cartons in the Suffok countryside.

Voting closes at Midnight on 29th November!

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Steps towards a thrifty Christmas

Friends and family should close their eyes now, as I don't want to ruin the festive surprise that awaits.

Inspired by fellow blogger, VioletPosy's Thrifty Christmas week, I took a break from blogging and tweeting on Monday to venture out into the garden to prune one of the Photinia shrubs - also known as a Red Robin. An appropriate name I thought for my festive plan, which was to strip the leaves and bind them together to make a twig star Christmas decoration.



It was a bit fiddly but with practice will become much easier. The best bit is, as I've only used scraps of fabric to tie the twigs together, this is a really thrifty idea indeed and can be made for pennies. And of course, it is a Zero Waste pressie as the leaves are already being composted.

So now you know how I'll be spending my evenings from now on.

For more inspirational ideas, pop over to www.violetposy.co.uk, where you'll find lots of gorgeous ideas, both thrifty and otherwise.

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CIWM Awards 2009: behind the scenes in the world of waste

Apologies for my silence on the blog, but I've been off gallivanting again with Mr A, this time living it up at The Dorchester in London.

The occasion was the CIWM Awards for Environmental Excellence, held yesterday, to recognise excellence within the resources and wastes management industry.



And look, I didn't even have to sneak in through the back door. I was there in my official capacity as a finalist in the Recycling Champion category.


And yes, I can assure you that behind the cool, calm exterior, I was very nervous as they read through each of the nominations, especially as this professional cameraman behind me was poised ready with his camera to film the winners as they walked on stage...



...not to mention the opportunity to shake hands with Dragons' Den investor Deborah Meaden.

(Photo credit, CIWM)

But no sooner had the nerves started to kick in, listening to Deborah Meaden read the finalists names, they were gone again, as the 2009 Recycling Champion was announced.

Well, I didn't gain the title on this occasion, but I am really pleased for the winner that did...

.... none other than the fantastic Tipton Litter Watch, a community-led environmental charity based in the West Midlands. And I must say they were extremely worthy winners indeed.



The judges had been so impressed by their "Think before you throw" educational programme, recognising not just their hard work, but also the potential for their community oriented model to be replicated around the country, that they also scooped the overall CIWM Award for Environmental Excellence.

(Photo credit, CIWM)

And here are Project Manager Lindsay Richmond and Trustee & Vice-Chair Bob Lloyd Jnr, clutching the much coveted awards.

It felt a real privilege to be a finalist in the same category, and Lindsay very graciously allowed me to momentarily share in the celebrations before she was whizzed off to be interviewed.



But don't worry this won't be the last that you've heard about Tipton Litter Watch. As a governor of a local primary school, I love the work that they've been doing with young people and how it is linked into the National Curriculum, so I am hoping to feature them in more detail on the blog quite soon.

But the celebrations didn't end there. I found myself in very good company, as fellow guests on our table scooped up awards in other categories.

Here is Neil Dugard, Development Director of The Local Epicurean Ltd, representing Thornton's Budgens who won the Sustainable Retailer of the Year award.

And it's easy to see why, for franchise owner, Andrew Thornton has been credited with implementing environmental initiatives that meet the needs of customers at his two stores, both of which are based in London - Crouch End & Belsize Park.

Not only has this included instore collection facilities for clothes, batteries, printer cartridges and small items of WEEE, but through their Pennies for Plastic scheme, they have also ditched the plastic bag in favour of donating money to local schools and charities.

So far they have raised a whopping £40,000.

That's right £40,000.



If that's not exciting enough, what also impressed the judges was that the two stores have reduced their landfill waste to just 6%, diverting the remaining 94% from landfill thanks to innovative recycling schemes, giving away whatever food they can and collecting the rest for converting to energy.

This is one shop I would absolutely love to have around the corner.

The excitement continued as another of the twelve awards was scooped up by finalists from our table, this time in the more technical category of Innovative Practice in Waste Management & Resource Recovery.

Here are Jane Hughes, the Joint Waste Manager for Cheshire West & Chester Council and Dr Chris Randall, who accepted the award for having helped lead the way with the introduction of Low Cal High Temperature flares at closed landfill sites. The technology that they have adopted will enable the continuous extraction of methane, preventing the gas from being released into the atmosphere.


This has just been a snapshop of the CIWM awards. It would have been great to have met all the winners, but there simply wasn't the time. However, the full list can be found on the CIWM awards site at www.ciwm.co.uk. My only regret of the day is that I didn't get to meet the other finalist in the Recycling Champion category, Sarah Blenkinsop, master composter and author of the Compost Bin blog.

So having had the honour of being judged a finalist at yesterday's awards event, I would like to publicly thank Suffolk County Council for having nominated me, particularly Anna Kowalczyk who has been very encouraging in her support.

It was a tremendous privilege to have been selected and to have had the opportunity to celebrate amongst those who are leading the way in what has become an exciting and innovative sector.

Of course, I wouldn't have been there if it hadn't been for St Edmundsbury inspiring me with their Zero Waste project nor the fabulous community of readers who have engaged with the blog as well as those who follow my Twitter ramblings. Despite not winning, I would like to thank you once again for joining in with my rubbish antics and supporting me with your ideas.

I would also like to thank James, Sally and Sharon of BBC Radio Suffolk's James Hazell show for their constant support, enabling me to share recycling tips with listeners across the county and reaching an audience that goes well beyond the scope of this blog. It's been great having them rooting for me from the very first day I sat in the studio like a rabbit caught in the headlights. And ever since, it's been fun and frolics all the way. We even managed a quick update on this morning's programme with, would you believe, a live recycling test to boot! You can catch it on Listen Again (Just fast forward to 3 hours 11 minutes into the show).

So, I have now returned to Suffolk even more enthused than ever and my passion for promoting the waste reduction message is even stronger than it was before I arrived at The Dorchester yesterday.

In her closing speech, Deborah Meaden's message to the waste industry was that it needs to shout louder about its achievements, innovation and the opportunities that lie ahead.

I wholeheartedly agree. And as consumers, we need to do that too, continuing to use word-of-mouth to promote the ideas, businesses and services that help us manage our waste for the better.

So on that particular note I will leave you with a final image, which I snapped just around the corner from The Dorchester.

Seeing on-street recycling bins always makes me cheery, but this one in particular brought on a really big smile. I feel it needs a caption, don't you!


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The CIWM Awards for Environmental Excellence are now in their third year and are hosted and organised by The Chartered Institution of Wastes Management.

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Killing Thyme but it isn't all bad news!

Continuing on a gardening theme, I thought I'd offer an update on our growing antics this year.

But I am very sorry to admit that as well as being a worm murderer, this year I have also been responsible for killing thyme too as well as a few other green and lovely things.

The problem is I am not naturally green-fingered on account of me having great aspirations but insufficient time to achieve them. And it's been a great lesson to me that I shouldn't invest time in the garden unless I am able to commit regular hours to it its upkeep, otherwise our best intentions just go to waste along with the produce itself.

You see it's not just the thyme that got the chop - or in some instances the chomp - it was the beans & peas in the front garden too. I can now admit that planting a small vegetable garden next to a "snail hotel" in the shape of a Phormium was not exactly the best brainwave I've had this year. Neither was planting lots of salad leaves just because they were easy to grow, when we don't actually eat much of them as a rule, whether they come from the back of the garden or from a supermarket plastic bag.

Seeing a lettuce bolt is not a rewarding sight.

This is why I am taking these lessons learned as the foundation for going forth for next year's garden antics and instead of growing lots of different things next year, we will be focusing on what's worked and leaving behind what hasn't.

Where the Thyme was on borrowed time, at least the runner beans jogged along quite happily as did the tomatoes grew in such abundance, it's only now that I've pulled in the remaining harvest.

You can see the last fruits of our luck and fortune here. This weekend, we even pulled the last of our potatoes from the pots in which they had been planted. Some of the beans have gone to seed, but we're keeping those as presents to share with other novice growers as part of our Thrifty Christmas plans.




So our plans for next year will focus on tomatoes, along with another crop of runner beans, which were resoundingly successful this season.

However, all this talk of reigning things in doesn't stop me from dreaming. I am currently re-reading an excellent book, which was published this summer called "The Alternative Kitchen Garden: an A-Z", written by the wonderful Emma Cooper of www.coopette.com.



As well as advice about beans and tomatoes, the book covers a whole range of inspirational ideas for novice gardeners like me as well as experienced green-fingered folk who want to try something different.

With Emma's advice, there's hope for me after all, but one thing's for sure, next time I'm definitely not going to run before I can walk.

So apologies for my green-fingered failures this year. Next year, I promise I will do better.

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Cluck, cluck,cluck, cluck, cluck!

So here they are. My three little hens: Snowflake, Chickie and Speckledy (named by the children, of course - can you guess which is which?).

I've not given them much blogspace since they arrived in the spring, partly because I've been very busy with so many other things, not least sorting out their poop - yes chickens do a lot of that as I've come to learn. However, as my thoughts this week are focusing on the garden and how composting and wormeries can help with food waste, I thought it would be great time to share news of how my hens are getting on....or indeed how I'm getting on with my hens.

I remember when I announced that we were getting chickens.

"Bloody hell!" exclaimed my mother in here lilting Welsh accent. "What ew getting them for? Havven ew got enough on yewer hands woman?"

Then I'm sure CompostWoman sent a note saying "Just wait till you see what they do to your garden".

Hmmm.

But I ignored the advice and took the bull by the horns, or rather went to the hen breeder just off the A14 past Newmarket and came back with three hens.

And within one week the Speckledy Hen was laying. Within a month the other two were following suit.

But my mother was right. I have had to juggle around routines to fit in the extra work. But that's okay, because what it means is that I am now happier to stay at home watching the hens than gallivanting around town shopping.

Chickens have an amazing therapeutic and calming effect. I just adore watching them and their funny little movements, scratching with their feet, and pecking at the ground.

But I often think of CompostWoman's wise words about what they would do to our little suburban garden.

It's all come true. All the leaves that are spread on the lawn are thanks to the girls getting busy hunting under the bushes.



And the view from my living room has changed a lot, on account of them digging out the gravel from the flower beds. This is the scene from the French windows as I write my blog this morning.



We don't mind the leaves so much or indeed the poop that gets dropped on the lawn. Indeed parts of our garden have never looked so good.

But it's the gravel digging that has caused us the greatest problems, because the stones have spread across the lawn, killing the grass in many places.

So as a temporary measure (while we work on redesigning our space), Mr A built a chicken run to keep the girls in one place.

What he hadn't anticipated however was how the chickens would plot their great escape, particularly Chickie who appears to be the ring leader.

First she dug under the fence and was successful, so we soon put a stop to that and blocked her escape route.

Then she learned out to jump up onto the chicken wire and with a bit of a wobble was the free bird she wanted to be.

But I put a stop to that, by digging in some extra canes to block her path to freedom.

However, not to be beaten, her final "piece de resistance" has involved jumping on top of the eglu henhouse, flapping her wings and launching herself over the fence, to the admiration of the other hens she's left behind.

She's most definitely worthy of a part in the animated movie "Chicken Run". In fact it was Chickie who sent me into a Benny Hill kind of dance, with me and the boys following her up the stairs and down again the first time she "broke into" our house.

Despite our "teething trouble" with the garden, they are the most wonderful pets. The children adore them and so do their friends. Where my youngest boy is a natural in picking them up and handling them, my eldest son has been more cautious. But even he can catch and hold them now too.

And as for the scraps, they help out in many ways, supporting my 5 year old bin saboteur with his leftovers. He's not much better than when I first started The Rubbish Diet, and still leaves half-munched apples and a compulsory amount of pasta or rice, no matter how little is served on his plate.

So the chickens are now my best friends, when it comes to reducing my little one's food waste. Better on their hips than mine. Anything that's too spicy for them, I add to the wormery.

And the thanks we get are the eggs we collect each morning. Mostly three a day, except when they are broody, but even then Chickie, the Calder Ranger, kept laying every day, when all around her had stopped. They've been so productive, I've only had to buy eggs on one occasion since we've had them.

At least that's some compensation for the destruction of the garden.

And long may it continue...the eggs that is...not the gravel!


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You really don't need much space to compost

Look, you can even get a wormery for your desk at work!
available from Bubble House

Hot on the heels of yesterday's post about my new Worm Cafe wormery, comes the news from Recycle Now that lack of space in the garden is one of the main reasons given by many people for not composting garden and household waste.

However according to Recycle Now’s Home Composting campaign, it need not be a barrier and with so many composting and other options available, anyone with outside space – around 95 per cent of households - should be able to give it a go.

Recycle Now's research reveals that over a third of us already compost garden and household waste in one way or another, using a compost bin or heap. Of those that don’t, one in four say this is because they do not have the space.

But as we've already seen on this blog, even the smallest outdoor spaces can be used for making compost.

Carl Nichols, Head of Home Composting at Recycle Now said:

“With so much choice available, anyone with outside space can compost at home. Even those of us with just a small patio or balcony, can do our bit, for example by using a wormery to turn waste food into free food for plants- indoors or out."

“Increasing numbers of people are starting to compost at home and we want these people to pass on their tips to their friends and families. By composting at home, not only are we reducing the amount of waste sent to landfill each year, we are also producing a rich and nutritious plant food with a wide range of uses for vegetables, indoor and outdoor plants and even lawns.”

To demonstrate that time and space needn’t be an issue and to bust other myths about composting, Recycle Now has put together a beginners’ guide:


1. Heap or bin? A compost heap is perhaps one of the most traditional methods for composting. However, compost bins are now widely available and popular as they are simple to purchase, construct and use.


2. What type of bin is for me? There are compost bins of all shapes and sizes, to suit your gardening needs.

· Small garden? There are many alternative designs of compost bin to suit all garden needs such as beehive designs or bins made out of recycled wood.
· Balcony or porch? A wormery is the ideal solution for someone with little or no garden. · Lots of space? The opportunities are endless – there are a range of larger bins available from many Local Authorities and most garden centres.
· No outside space? Some councils offer a separate collection for food or garden waste. Why not check with your local council to see if this option is available in your area.


3. Garden design: If you are concerned about how your garden will look when you start composting, build the bin into the design of your garden. Compost bins could be disguised behind surround made of either brick or timber (or stone if in keeping with your garden), or you can put trellis in front of your bin and grow climbers over it for a really natural screen.


4. Getting started: Simply add a selection of ‘greens and browns’ to the bin for the perfect mix. ‘Greens’ are quick to rot and provide important nitrogen and moisture – try tea bags, vegetable peelings, old flowers and nettles, or spent bedding plants. ‘Browns’ such as cardboard, fallen leaves, twigs and branches are slower to rot, but provide carbon and fibre to the bin.


5. The end product: After nine months to a year your compost will be mature enough to use. You’ll know it’s ready when the compost has turned into a dark, crumbly soil-like substance. It can be used to enrich borders and plants. If you have little use for compost, consider using a wormery as this will produce less compost but plenty of plant food. For further information about home composting and how to get started, as well as advice and information to help you along the way, visit www.recyclenow.com/compost

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To support Recycle_Now's campaign I would love to feature photos of your home composting solution as well as details of the most unusual things you compost. I'll publish my favourites on the blog at the end of the month. Either email at karen[at]therubbishdiet[dot]co[dot]uk or send me a link via Twitter.

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Getting all wiggly at the worm cafe

Don't you love it when folk give you a second chance in life?

It makes you feel grateful doesn't it, especially when you're carrying a whole load of guilt about being a...

...Worm Murderer!

Yes a killer of defenceless little wiggly things.

I know. I am guilty as charged m'lord and I don't feel good about it.

Which is why I am thankful for a lovely gift I received from Wiggly Wigglers, which arrived on my doorstep just over a month ago.



It was their latest wormery...appropriately called the Worm Cafe, giving me the opportunity to make up for my misdemeanours.

The Can-o-Worms wormery that I'd previously been using had been going quite well until we hit winter last year, when I really couldn't be bothered to take my peelings and food scraps along the path, past the spikey plants and delve amongst the wet bushes just to feed the worms. It was much easier to bung everything in the Bokashi bin.

If the wormery had been smaller, we could have simply stored it outside the kitchen door and would have been far more convenient to use. However as useful as the Can-o-Worms was, it was just too big to do that and would have got in the way. I know, because I tried it.

But the Worm Cafe is perfectly shaped to fit into the smallest of corners. And just like the Can-o-Worms, it is easy to set up and comes complete with bedding, worms, a lime mix, worm treat and moisture mat when bundled with the Value Pack. It's also made from recycled plastic, so that's great news too.


I'm now pleased to say that our Worm Cafe has now been established just outside our kitchen for over a month and from a convenience perspective is very easy to use, particularly because its lid rests on the edge, so you don't have to juggle that while adding the scraps.



And as we no longer throw so much away these days, it is now the perfect size for my family, especially as we also have chickens and I no longer use the Bokashi bins.

I am confident that at last we've got a fool-proof system but I suppose I'm going to have to get through the Winter and see the first compost before I can truly celebrate.

In the meantime, I'm pleased to pass on our old wormery to our Beaver Scout leader and make my promise to be better behaved with my new batch of worms.

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More information about the Worm Cafe can be found at www.wigglywigglers.co.uk.