As you all probably know by now, I love my local farmer at the market. When I like a product or company, I tend to be loyal to them. It is not different when it comes to the local famers at the market! I love his prices, his produce and his attitude, so why look else where? He treats me well, and gives me freebies every once in a while

Last week, after buying my fruits and veggies, I realized I wanted some pears for little E. I picked up the basket and gave him some money. He looked at me with a  big smile and said “Oh, just take them, but eat them soon they are very rip.” How amazing is that? I know it was only $5.00 worth of fruit, but just the fact he gave them to me shows that he really values his customers. I am going to miss Jon, the farmer, when I leave Fort Worth in 4 weeks, just like I miss David the farmer in Williamsport, PA. I don't know how I am going to replace them? Whoever I find, has big shoes to fill.

Do you have a favorite local farmer or even company that treats their customers well?

Oh, and that's my big mouth and well, head chowing down on my favorite food- Chipotle!

1-PURCHASES

Farmers market (all grown in Texas)

• 20 small cucumbers
• 2 cartons of strawberries
• 3 cartons of small tomatoes
• 8 large tomatoes
• 8 red peppers
• 15 super large carrots- I mean gigantic
• 10 oranges
• 10 apples
• 5 pears
• 3 large pieces of ginger
• 1 clove of garlic
• 1 bunch of basil
• 1 bunch of parsley

Sub-Total: 65.00

Whole Foods

Bulk

• 2 bunches of bananas (1.93 lbs)
• Californian dates (2.00 lbs)
• 4 corn ears
• 4 Texas grapefruit
• 2 Texas portobello mushrooms
• California raisins (1.23 lbs)
• Almonds (5.91 lbs)
• Cashews (3.66 lbs)

Non-Bulk

• Coconut milk
• Dill pickles in a glass jar
• Feel Goodz sandals

Sub-total: 148.69

Restaurants

• Wednesday: J.P had his weekly lunch at Chipotle. 10.07
• Friday: Our friends were moving back to Montreal, so we went out for some pizza, and I had a tunny ache from the gluten. Oh, well. 35.00
• Sunday: I went to Chipotle for lunch 8.12

Sub-Total: 53.19

Total: 266.88

2-COMPOSTING
I was a “juice” monster this past week again- juicing everything in site. Again, I was mostly making celery, cucumber, apple, orange, and ginger juice because that is what is available at the farmers market! I felt so full of energy all day long while sipping my delicious juice. On the downside this creates a large amount of compost and we do not have a lot of room in our apartment. I am looking forward to the day when we have our own compost pile and do not have to worry about where to put our food scraps.

The total weight of our compost was 20.5 lbs.

3-RECYCLING
I am proud to say that we have reduced our recycling by a significant amount, just by not purchasing certain items- mostly prepackaged, and sticking to buying in bulk. This makes me so happy. I feel as though, we need to not only reduce our waste, but what is being recycled. Reducing and reusing most definitely should happen before recycling.

4-TRASH
We had barley any trash this past week. Just the usual suspects- receipts, pieces of plastic from my Kombucha bottles, and a few random pieces of plastic. I can’t believe that we are on week 34 and only have a trash can of garbage. This bring the biggest smile to my face, this means that if we can do it, so can you! Only you- can prevent stuff from going to a landfill!

5-TRAVEL
This week, we drove to the little gym, the farmers market, Whole Foods, Arlington three times for little E's daycare, Dallas and we did some local driving to Chipotle and Mellow Mushroom.

The total distance traveled on the TDI was  624.2 km ( 387 mi) and we filled up about 22.7 L (6 gals) for 20.00, and we still have gas in the car right now!