I’m not sure if I’ve bragged on my friend Robert over here. Robert is my pal who writes for How Stuff Works, where a lot of his articles are on environmental topics. Earlier this year he was writing up a piece on Gray Water Reclamation. This got me thinking about all the water that goes right down my drain that maybe isn’t potable but maybe isn’t too dirty for things like watering plants and whatnot.


[photo by Apes Abroad]

When Dave and I made that trip to Mississippi and scored all of those awesome vintage housewares, we also became the proud owners of a ton of metal buckets. We have buckets everywhere, and those buckets got me thinking. Finally, a few weeks ago I put one in the bathroom next to the tub. The next time I showered, I stuck it in there while waiting for the cold water to turn hot. By the time I got out of the shower the bucket was full, and I dumped it on our front lawn. It was so easy, and our Elephant Ears were totally grateful. Now, we have a whole potted garden out front that is living pretty much exclusively on shower water that would have just been wasted.

Sitting Area

It’s such a tiny, easy thing to do, but it’s totally transformed the front of our home without using an extra drop of water! Hurrah!

<3