I am writing this as I prepare for my return to work in the next week and am looking forward to having real pocket money again. I love my blog, but I'm not quitting my day job. Not yet. Not by a mile.  The costs heavily outweigh the income from this site. Don't believe me? Let me break it down for you lovely readers, in case any of you are contemplating starting a website or blog; 

​I just earned my first Google Ads cheque from this site (almost...I have to wait for it to arrive still).  What?!? Earning money off this site? I am a bit excited! No I'm not quitting my day job. No I'm not hiring guest writers. And no I'm still not breaking even from when I started this site way back in 2014; not even close. 

Do you know how hard it is to grow and increase a following in a niche market from nothing? Do you have any idea how many clicks and ads I have to have to actually start making a profit? 
Here's how it starts;

1) purchase domain for 4 years for $200 US (back in 2014)
2) purchase pro pack web tools to create your website for $100 US
3) drive around and take a lot of photos over 4 years, which is let's say $400+ in gas, mileage, and snacks 
4) think about advertising with Google Ads in 2016 (after seeing a solid base of followers) and figure out how it works (click here to read more about Google Adsense)
5) sign up for Google Ads and restrict the ones that make you the most money, because you run a family friendly website (right?) 
6) strategically place a few ads throughout your site, as you yourself hate when blogs and websites are overrun with ads and popups (and never have time to update any or change strategies)
7) sit back and watch the dough roll in, or in my case TRICKLE up to $100 OVER 2 YEARS!
8) renew domain for another 4 years at $250 US (once I had enough followers to motivate me to keep going) 
9) hold a contest in hopes of increasing readers and followers to increase traffic and hopefully increase visibility for ads ($70 expenses for 2 prize packs)
10) hope that the average 400 visitors to my site each week increases, even though I'm not posting new content over the past month

So summarizing the math: $1,000+ out of pocket over the 4 years I've been writing vs $100 earned total. Yep this is really just an expensive hobby that I can only hope will pay for itself one day. At least it's not the most expensive hobby out there! I also didn't include the hours of time invested in researching parks, driving there, taking photos, uploading photos and posting them at home, sharing other stories on Facebook, Twitter, and randomly posting on Instagram. If this was a full time job, I would be able to post WAY more content. But it's just a hobby and I appreciate all of you sticking by me as we take our time adding content a little bit at a time. I hope you continue to enjoy our posts and the parks we visit!

If you have a park to recommend that we haven't been to yet, send us a message at durhamregionplaygroundreviews@gmail.com 

We love nature and being outdoors. We want the environment to be as clean as possible and have many future generations enjoy nature too for years to come. This is why we are a green household trying to go more green (besides my green thumb). My husband was skeptical at first but is totally onboard with more effort after seeing an article on a massive 'plastic island' floating in the Pacific ocean. Although there are islands, most of the ocean has mingling debris and these guys explain it best; marinedebris

For years we have already been doing things that are good for the environment like;

• ​recycling as many items as possible
• reusing items, fixing items, or passing them on if no longer needed
• reducing our waste footprint

​The reduction of waste is a huge one to tackle in our culture of consumption. Everything is packaged and wrapped at the stores, when given as gifts, even to be shipped. Where did we start?
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I credit the origins of going green to my mom. She got started on cloth diapers back in the 1980's (we have come a long way since plastic pants), she made cloth christmas sacks before they were cool (try explaining to your friends that your presents really were only in a bag so you were just trusted not to peek, and we didn't), she didn't buy paper towels all that much (just did more laundry for hand towels), had dad build a garden compost bin out back for all of our food waste, had us drinking tap water in reusable containers (*gasp* the humanity of clean drinking water from a tap!) and I know I'm missing more. When we bought our house I was already living green with cloth christmas bags, cloth hand towels, reusable water bottles, and a city green bin. When kids arrived I had a heyday with the selection of cloth diapers available.

This year I have a friend who challenged herself to go plastic free and has inspired me to do more. She started with phase 1: reduce her single use plastics. These are one time use items like packaging, fast food utensils, grocery bags and things like cling wrap we generally would use once and toss. So here we go diving into our first phase of plastic consumption reduction.

Step 1.
Bring the bags - make a habit of not forgetting the massive pile of reusable bags we have acquired (note: reusable wine bags are great for carrying glass jars and bottles from grocery shopping)

Step 2.
Ban the straw - bring your own if you enjoy using them (there are silicone, glass, or stainless steel options) or simply don't use one and drink from the can, bottle, or cup itself (note: this last one works best if the lid comes off)

Step 3.
​Buy less plastic packaged goods - this is a tricky one once you notice how many things have plastic wraps, lining (think milk cartons), and fasteners (6 pack of pop anyone?). Start where you feel comfortable and of course where budget allows. But please if you start somewhere then stop buying bottled water! This is my biggest pet peeve in a nation that prides itself in clean accessible drinking water. Will we be laughing if beverage companies like Nestle drain our water table and sell it back to us in plastic bottles at a price per litre higher than gas? Ok I've probably got your attention now.

Here are some areas we started reducing plastic in our house this month;

• ​organic milk in returnable glass bottles
• Rivera petit pot yogurts in glass jars (Ella calls these 'princess yogurts')
• stainless steel straws (kids gotta have their straws)
• stainless steel and silicone lunch containers (there are sooo many different kinds on the market but we like ecolunchbox best as they are easy for small hands and the silicone lids let me overfill containers)
• ​face towels for kitchen spills (bulk purchase from costco) and baby bath wipe towels for sticky hands (seriously those baby bath wipe towels are the perfect size!)
• our cloth christmas bags in fun prints (because some fancy wrapping papers can't be recycled)
• bamboo fibre outdoor plates and juice jug (all amazingly dishwasher safe which we use for picnics so no more paper plates even)
• reusable grocery bags (even clothing store cloth bags are used for groceries now) and we have so many I'm thinking I should be using some for produce so I can stop grabbing the plastic produce bags
• reusable plastic bags and sandwhich bags (we use lunchskins for sandwhich and chip bags for lunch and have other dishwasher safe plastic ones I'm going to start using to freeze small things instead of disposable zipper bags)
• beeswax cloth (this is a summer project for me to make to replace all of the cling wrap we use in the fridge but you can also find them in stores and online now)

​Next up is finding a meat share or butcher that can give us meat in bulk to freeze without so much excess packaging and wrapping. I'm also going to ask our bakery if they will let me use a flour sack bag for bread instead of their plastic bags after it is sliced. I think this is a good start for the summer and I know I'll see and hear about more options and ideas as we go. Will you take this challenge with us?
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Follow us on Instagram under #plasticchallenge and share your reduction accomplishments with us.

Have you ever had a day where you felt that you haven't checked your phone in hours, yet you were ok with that? It sure feels good to get lost in a day of activity and to totally disconnect from technology.

​Why don't we do this more often? There could be a number of reasons holding us back. From waiting for an instant message or reply, to checking in on friends far away virtually, or nabbing the latest sale....I could go on. The worst one is boredom or killing time doing 'research'. I couldn't tell you how many hours I have spent researching the best sales, deals, flights, gifts, or social media images (ummm I admit it took me over a half an hour to do up that pretty little image up top). In the end it makes us feel drained, unsatisfied and more disconnected than before we started.

​Now imagine if we put that energy into something else like playing with the kids or pets, a face to face lunch or even a quick road trip sans phone *gasp*! What? Leave on a road trip without your phone? But what if our car breaks down or we have an emergency? Well generations before us survived these events without much inconvenience, or at the least it makes for a great story. Why not give it a try? Besides the worst case these days is you flag down someone else to borrow their phone and simply explain you were taking a technology vacation.

If taking a road trip without your phone sounds a bit risky to start with then here are a few other ideas to try taking a break and untethering yourself even more from your smart phone;

• ​Plan a weekly family tech free date. Play board games, go for a walk, whatever you enjoy doing as a family.
• Leave your phone behind on your lunch break and take a walk.
• Use do not disturb and put your phone away after the kids are asleep, I promise there are still plenty of things to do around the house.

​Some of you may never intentionally leave the house without your phone but that's ok. Scientists are researching cell phone addictions, 'FOMO' (fear of missing out), and anxiety to better understand our relationships with cell phones in this day and age. There is even a label now for the fear of leaving your phone at home called 'nomophobia'. You can read some new research here at Scientific America.

Whatever your relationship with your phone is, it is important to keep up face time (no not the apple video chat app). I mean keep trying to untether and unplug from your devices as much as possible to stay connected to the people and things going on around you. Smile at a stranger on a walk. Listen to the sounds of nature. Have meaningful conversations with the people around you uninterrupted by phone alerts.

​Keep your faces up, not buried in a screen, and you may be surprised at what you discover.

read the first post here on untethering

This doesn't mean I deleted my personal Facebook account, but I have deleted Facebook and some other annoying apps from my phone. I must admit it is a freeing feeling! I am less depressed no longer seeing how many things others I know have accomplished (I am proud of you all, but I don't see the blood sweat and tears you shed to get that perfect Facebook/Instagram worthy picture or completed project 'Brag' post right?). I also don't waste as much brain numbing time scrolling through nonsense ads, reposts or 'interesting' news (otherwise known as click-bait), or funny videos that sucked away precious time spent with my family. I now am more purposeful when I log into Facebook and look at specific family and friends updates and posts. Then I make sure to log out to make the enticement of mind numbing scrolling less accessible! I now log in only once or twice PER WEEK! This is a great improvement over the multiple times PER DAY I used to waste on 'virtual friends'. I do really care about my friends still but I prefer face to face time. BONUS if it's face to face time going for walks or other healthy activities!

So goodbye Facebook App! I will NOT be missing you or your notifications or constant red alert badges. Farewell. Adios. Good riddance! 

Disclaimer; I still have my Facebook Pages App to check in on my readers! The push notifications are turned off though so I am not as quick to reply as in the past ;)