Bathroom Week

Hi there! I’ve been watching a bit of The Block NZ and as they all design their beautiful new bathrooms, I thought I’d tell you about what changes I’ve made to make mine more eco-friendly. Some changes I started with over the last year when I came across things that were easy and practical for me, so it was a more natural evolution at the start. When Plastic Free July came along I made more of a concerted effort to hunt down products that came either without packaging, or with fully compostable packaging. Further down the line I’m looking forward to doing some investigating into products that are truly environmentally friendly – products that are safe for our beautiful ocean and waterways.

I changed to Ethique shampoo bars and face wash

This took a little getting used to after only ever using liquid products. I bought the shampoo sampler pack so that I had a few options to try but I seemed to hit the nail on the head with my first selection from the pack. I used Fizz Wrangler and The Guardian. My hair has been so soft and shiny since using the product and I can even get to day 3 before needing to wash my hair again! I’m looking forward to trying out the rest of the sampler pack, but I’d be confident buying either of these again.

An amazing friend who shares and celebrates my environmental values gave me the most thoughtful gift of the Ethique face sampler pack for my birthday in April. I didn’t really get stuck into it until Plastic Free July and I wish I hadn’t waited as long as I did. The Gingersnap bar is such a perfect every day face wash with an ever so mild exfoliator. It smells absolutely delightful. I’ll be needing a full bar soon! The moisturising bars take a little more getting used to. The instructions say to warm in the palms of your hands, but seeing as it’s winter and I’m nearly always freezing, I do need to rub my hands together to get the product on them. I’m also not very gentle and there’s more rubbing than dabbing, but the Face Saving Serum is a life saver for my dry skin, especially in the cooler winter weather. I’ve repurposed an old moisturiser tub to store mine and keep it nice and clean.

I switched to bamboo oral hygiene products

My awesome new eco friendly oral hygiene kit!

I had some reservations about using a bamboo toothbrush after years of smooth shiny plastic brushes and in more recent years an electric toothbrush. When you first use your bamboo brush you need to soak it in water so that the bamboo swells slightly and binds to the fibres. Unfortunately those fibres aren’t compostable, but the rest of the brush is, so once you’re done with it you simply slice the fibres off and add the brush to your regular domestic compost. I’ll probably at least break mine in half to assist with the decomposition process. The brush was actually really nice and soft and my teeth felt just as clean as they would have if I’d used a regular old plastic brush. So this is another no-brainer and will definitely be my choice of toothbrush going forward. Definitely a win!

The bamboo toothfloss was more of a challenge. I’d bought The Eco Floss for the special occasion of Plastic Free July and was excited to try it out – I’d also tried WooBamboo floss that I’d previously picked up from EcoWarehouse but I wasn’t too sure about it so I thought I’d try a new brand. As it turns out, I must have very tight teeth because the Eco Floss wasn’t up to the task and simply shredded and broke apart in my teeth. So it was WooBamboo to the rescue and on the second round of trying it out I decided that I’m actually pretty happy with it. It’s a slightly thicker floss and doesn’t have that silky feeling of regular supermarket floss but it does a really good job and my teeth feel great afterwards! Luckily the team at Good For Store let me return the Eco Floss and I put the refund towards some great packaging free pantry supplies! Even though my experience with the Eco Floss wasn’t great, I 100% recommend that you give it a go and keep trying different products until you find what works for you.

I continued with my Smartass toilet paper subscription

I stumbled across this product at a local burger bar when we were out with some friends last year. I love the idea that not only is the wrapping compostable, but the toilet paper itself is made from sustainable, ecofriendly sources AND to top it all off, Smartass donates 10% of their profits to the Retree Project. This is run by Million Meters and is all about planting native trees along our waterways – it’s called riparian planting and it’s so important for our waterways in New Zealand. If you have a moment, check out their website for more information and see if there’s a way that you can get involved.

The paper wrappers and the toilet rolls go straight into my compost. The rolls have no glue on them so I can compost them knowing that I’m not adding nasty toxins to the veggie patch down the line. As an added bonus, the paper wrappers are extremely pretty so they make a great display if you’re one to have these things out in the open!

I kept using my soap bars

I switched back to soap bars earlier in the year to help reduce my plastic waste. Strangely enough I’ve been gifted 3 soap bars this year – are people trying to say something? (haha. ha) So far I’ve only finished using one, which is a great testament to how long soap bars last, though as I’ve said before, I’m quite a light user of bathroom products in general. There are so many great options for plastic free soap bars. You can pick something up at your local packaging free store, from Lush Cosmetics (located seemingly everywhere) or even from your grocery store if you keep an eye out for EcoStore bars or something that comes in recyclable cardboard. Obviously compostable packing is the best, but recyclable card comes in at a close second! It’s still so much better than the millions of plastic bottles that are disposed of every year.

I started actually composting my bamboo cotton buds

Little rubber ducky has done a great job of reminding me to compost my cotton buds, keep them out of landfill and away for real life birds and animals!

I was using my bamboo cotton buds but still putting them into the landfill bin. I can’t explain what was going through my head but I can only put it down to many years of habit forming. I still catch myself going to throw it in the bin sometimes and fishing it out to take it to the compost bin instead. Part of this I think is due to the inherent laziness that comes with human nature at times. The compost bin is in the kitchen and the bathroom bin is for landfill and is so much more convenient. Let’s be honest – convenience is what got our planet into this mess, so I’ve been making much more of an effort to snap my cotton buds in half and pop them in the compost bin instead. I know that we shouldn’t actually be using them at all but it’s a really hard habit to break and I only use on average 2-3 a week so I’m not going to beat myself up about it. I’ve never claimed to be perfect and I’ll just keep trying to make small improvements.

Overall I’d say that going plastic free in my bathroom is a success. Unfortunately I still have a lot of products in the bathroom that are in plastic bottles. I don’t want to waste them so over the next few months I’ll be focussing on using them up and making sure that they’re recycled responsibly. I’m looking forward to making my new plastic free finds a regular part of my life and I’m excited about the amount of bottles and wrappers that I’ll be saving from heading to landfill in the future!