Hey, Green Junkie!

Fall is in the air and that means it’s time to give our homes all the fall vibes.

With all the fall inspiration on IG and Pinterest, I wanted to tell you today how you can decorate your home sustainably, easily and without a huge expense.

I think it’s okay to buy a few things but I also think that there is a way to save money and still have a fully decorated home of your dreams, that sets just the right mood.

Here is what you can expect in today’s episode:

• How to be sustainable this fall season
• Creative tips for using what you already have
• How to shop smarter for new decor
• How I decorate on the cheap and still keep my home clean
• Instructions on some DIY decorations for your home
• How to make your home smell like fall in a safe way

Check out the pictures below for how my DIY fall decor turned out.

If you love this podcast be sure to leave a review and share a screenshot of this episode to your IG stories. Tag @greenjunkiepodcast so I can shout you out and publicly say thanks. 

Thanks for listening and being here.

Your green bestie,

Xoxo Stephanie

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LISTEN BELOW

TRANSCRIPT FOR EPISODE 4

0:00 Welcome to the Green Junkies podcast, I'm your host Stephanie Moram and today we are going to be talking about fall and sustainability. Fall is my most favorite season. So I thought it would be a great time to talk about how you can decorate your home in a sustainable way during the fall season. Let's save you some money, and sustainably decorate your home for the fall season.

0:22 Two things I recommend is that you use what you already have at home. There is no use you going out and buying a new bowl, a new planner, a new this or that, when you might already have these items at home. Maybe you have a basket up somewhere that you can use as a decoration for the fall season.

0:39 If you're really jonesing to buy something “new” have you thought about thrifting? Maybe you can find a really nice basket or a jar or something along those lines that you can use to decorate your home for the fall season. Those are two ways that you can avoid buying something new and creating less waste.

1:00 I have a bunch of tips on how I decorated my home for the fall season. I'm generally not a DIY err, I like to keep things super simple in my house and clean, but about a year ago, we bought our new home and the kids were really excited. So I thought it would be a great time to decorate the home with some fall themes and some gourds and pumpkins and different things like that throughout the house.

1:25 So I'm going to talk to you about what I did to not really spend any money but also keep things super clean in my house and nice. First thing I did was I went pine cone hunting. I grabbed a bag, walked around my neighborhood and collected pine cones. I also collected leaves, which I dried out, once I brought them home.

1:46 And just a side note I would recommend putting your pine cones in the oven for about half an hour on a cookie sheet. This way if there's any critters or bugs or insects, on your pine cones, you can kill them off and then you won't have any bugs like all over your house.

2:06 Once I did that, I looked around the house and I was thinking “how can I use my pine cones and my cinnamon sticks to make some really nice decorations?” I had a nice bowl, so I filled it up with pine cones, crushed leaves and cinnamon sticks that I had at home. And poof, I had my first nice fall decor.

2:27 The next thing I did was I noticed that I had some oranges that were destined for the compost, but I was trying to avoid putting them in the compost. So I had an idea. I sliced them all up and I put them on a cookie sheet and I dehydrated them in the oven at about 200 degrees. Now I have oranges for year after year because they're dehydrated and they will not get moldy. I found in my house another glass container that was tall, filled it with pine cones, cinnamon sticks, and dehydrated oranges.

3:04 The third thing I did was when I was again looking around my house trying to avoid buying anything and thinking “How can I reuse what I have?” You're going to hear me talking about this a lot on my podcast – using what you have and thrifting. I think they're just two really important things on your sustainability journey. Always think “Can I use stuff I already have in the house and can I find it secondhand.”

3:29 So anyways, I looked around and I had two really tall drinking glasses and I had popcorn, a really nice red tape popcorn. I filled both those glasses up and now I have another set of decorations that I can use around my house.

3:47 One thing that I did buy were pumpkin squash boards. I used those and I kind of just placed them around the house along with a really nice square black platter that I already had. So I set up my pumpkins and squash and gourds on this platter and had another decoration to put around my house. So I had that set up in my house and the leftover squash and pumpkins I placed them somewhere in my house as well.

4:25 If you're thinking you're not going to eat the squash or the gourd or your pumpkins, you can spray them with rubbing alcohol and that will extend the life of those pumpkins, the squash and of the gourds and they won't get moldy as fast.

4:41 If you're thinking that you do want to open up your pumpkins, have you thought about eating the pumpkin seeds? They taste amazing. Add some avocado oil, and some salt to the pumpkin seeds and then place on a cookie sheet in your oven. I look forward to every year when it's pumpkin season to be able to eat the Pumpkin seeds.

5:01 If you're thinking you want to decorate your pumpkins in some fashion, but you don't necessarily want to open them up, you can be creative. If you have kids, you can get your kids on the job and they can, you know, use markers to decorate the pumpkins or you can cut out different pieces of paper and glue or tape those on the pumpkins as well. Just a couple of suggestions.

5:25 Another thing that I did, which I never thought I would actually do, again, like I mentioned, I'm not a big DIY'er. I do like to DIY but it has to be super simple for a DIY. It can't be a science experiment is what I'm getting at. Anyways, I made DIY beeswax candles. It's very mind blowing that I actually did it. And it was also actually really simple.

5:52 I grabbed a pot, filled it up with some water, took a glass container, put that in to my pot to create a double boiler. I grabbed my beeswax, put it into the glass container turned on the stove and I let the bees wax melt. I added some coconut oil as well to the beeswax. I let it sit.

6:11 Not really sure how long it took. It felt like forever, but it probably was not that long. While that was melting, I grabbed two glass jars that I was going to be reusing. I did have to buy wicks for my candles because I did not have those on hand but those were very inexpensive as well. I put the wicks in to the each jar and I used clothes pegs to hold up the wicks.

6:38 Once the combination of the coconut oil and beeswax is melted I poured it into each jar and it did not take long to harden at all. I crushed some leaves on top of the candles to just give it a nice look. And there you have it, I have two candles that I can use to burn in my house.

7:00 If you're thinking you don't want to make candles because it's too complicated, I totally get it. But you might want to buy some candles, I would suggest that you get beeswax and avoid wax candles because that is basically just petroleum and you're going to be burning that in your house. You know I'm gonna save this topic for another another episode, but it can just be toxic for you to be burning the wax in your home.

7:23 So that's an option if you really want to buy something new. I think candles would be the thing that you could buy new for your fall decorations. If you don't want to burn candles in your house, but you want a nice smell in your house, you can diffuse some essential oils. If you have a diffuser, you could add clove cinnamon, and some vanilla/ orange scents. Or you can kind of make your own fall blend and then diffuse that in your house, during the fall season. My favorite combination is orange, cinnamon, and vanilla. It smells awesome in the house.

8:01 So those are just a couple of things that you can do to create a really nice fall atmosphere in your house. Also, I just wanted to add if you are looking for decorations with the pine cones, and you wanted to use it like a potpourri, you can also add a drop of clove or a drop of cinnamon on to the pine cone directly and then you'd have a little bit of a scent through your house. Again, totally optional to do that.

8:29 These are just a couple of things that I put together rather quickly to add some fall decor to my house. I didn't really have to spend a lot of money at all. All I bought were the pumpkin squash and the gourds and the wicks for my candles and the rest was stuff I found around my house and out in nature.

8:50 So be creative. Look around your house, look out your window, what do you have that you can use to create a really nice atmosphere in your house during the fall season.

9:02 I invite you to tag me on Instagram at Green junkie podcast and show me some pictures of how you decorated your home this fall season. If you're looking for some inspiration, you can go to the show notes. I have a link that shows you pictures of my decorations. I took a bunch of pictures to give you some inspiration so you can visually see what it is that I set up for my house during the fall season.