Doing Dishes

What do you think is the more eco-friendly way to do dishes? By hand or in the dishwasher? Lucky for us busy mom-folk its the dishwasher!! Yay! It actually uses about half the water as doing a sink full of dishes by hand (11 gallons v. 22 for by-hand). Just make sure you're doing a full load to be the most efficient. Source: Family Fun Magazine. (and I also heard it on TV the other day)

Tired of sinks full of dishes every time you turn around? Try this clever trick. One mom of 8 got so sick of all the dirty dishes she boxed up all her dishes, bought each family member ONE plate, had them personalize it with glass paints, and made them responsible for their own dish. They even figured out it only took 12 seconds to wash their one plate. Smart! (Also, from Family Fun magazine)

Physics lesson for the day - heat will contract glass. At least I think its physics, I never took that class. Anyway I had two glass Pyrex bowls hopelessly stuck together for the past couple months. I tried to trick Dave into using one so he would have to unstick them but he gave up and used a different bowl. He did make a passing statement that heat should make the glass shrink thus letting us pull them apart. So two days later the bowls are still in the sink. I try spraying Pam around the stuck edge and pry in a fake credit card from the junk mail, no luck. So I finally go with the heat trick. Put some water in the top bowl and microwave it 2 minutes. Tada! It worked, I was so excited. Yay for Physics!!