My goals for this coming winter

First of all I will volunteer for Ohio Responds https://www.ohioresponds.odh.ohio.gov/Volunteermobilizer/ to be ready for the Pandemic Flu or any other emergency.
You can make a difference in case of an emergency in your community. Anyone interested in volunteering can go at http://www.serveohio.org/OhioCitizenCorps_MRC.aspx.

To be well informed about the Pandemic Flu and how to prepare your family, business or school you can go at http://www.flu.gov/ or http://www.cdc.gov/h1n1flu/.

Then I will try to introduce in the school where my daughters will start to go this year different available programs:
Kids walk to school (as this is what I did in Italy when I was in school from elementary to University, walking or biking) , http://www.cdc.gov/nccdphp/dnpa/kidswalk/.
Ohio EPA Clean Diesel School Bus Fund Retrofit Grants Program and Anti-Idling campaign http://www.hcdoes.org/airquality/Anti-Idling/idle.htm
Bring gardening to school following the model of Granny's Garden School http://www.grannysgardenschool.com/
And many more...

Will be a busy school year, no time to be bored !

Visiting the gas pump less often

This spring I finally convinced my husband to trade his demanding SUV for a hybrid compact car.

There were a lot of obstacles I needed to overcome: "Every family with kids in USA has at least a SUV or a Minivan, we need it" (we don't need it in Italy and we do perfectly fine). Then "How will I transport big stuff" (to transport big items one or twice a year you can make the store deliver them to you or you can rent a truck for one day). "We need space to make a long travel" (yes we do, but for 1-2 long travels a year we can rent a car).

Finally I won. When we went to the car dealer his last doubt was "Are you sure you have enough space with the kids and their car seats?" I got the car seats out of my car and fit them perfectly in the small hybrid. "And what about the grocery, the trunk is smaller", "Where will you put the bikes?". I took the bikes to the park one or 2 times in 5 years and there are bikes holders you can attach to the car. I never buy more than 10 days of grocery as we eat mainly fresh food anyways.

We will do just fine and the kids will be very proud of us because we are trying to give them a chance to enjoy nature like we did growing up.



I cannot tell you how good you feel when you do not need to fill up the gas tank for 2 weeks, and you bypass the gas pump many more times without stopping. My new hybrid car was suppose to make 42 mpg combining city and highway (40 city, 45 highway) and to my surprise I'm doing 50 mpg. Probably also because I learned a better way to drive on this website http://www.fueleconomy.gov/feg/drive.shtml.

Not to mention the reduction in air pollution. Every time you stop, the engine turns off automatically, as soon as you lift your foot from the breaks, the engine start again. With other cars whenever you are idling you are consuming gasoline and making 0 mpg while polluting the air.

With my trade our family will consume almost 12 barrels less of petroleum each year with a saving of about 1281$/yr in our budget (plus a possible tax reduction). And finally we will emit about 6.5 less tons of Co2 a year with an additional score of air pollution of 9 (where 10 is the least polluting car).

A car is one of the biggest purchase of a family after a house and also one of the biggest cause of pollution. At http://www.fueleconomy.gov/ there are many information on mpg and CO2 emissions of all brands and models. It is just a matter of choosing the right car for the right main usage that fits your family.

Spring/Summer 2009 local nature encounter

This Spring/Summer we meet a lot of friends around our house.
A Grassnake came to say "Hi!" to us in the yard. They are harmless if you do not step on their head, they are not venomous and they keep the yard clean from mice and other little mammals.



This is one of our 2 hummingbird visiting the sugar feeder placed on a tree in front of the study of my house. They are little perfect amazing fliers.

The deers come every evening at dusk in a cul-de-sac with empty lots in my neighborhood. No one is cutting the "weeds" so the animals have actually something to eat. There is the entire herd with 5 males 3 females and 3 fawns. We nominated this part of the neighborhood "Deer Park" and it is at a nice walk or bike ride from our house.

Here is a "stick" insect. Very strange to see one in my yard instead than in a picture book or a zoo. He climbed all the way to the face of my daughter very fast and then stopped as in a pose for a picture I could not take the last picture as my daughter was laughing and at the same time telling me "take it away!".

Just relaxing and enjoying the environment: a rainbow in a dry day, a sunset, , trees on the onset of a storm

Hope you enjoyed you vacation as we did.

July 22nd 2009: my plants think it is fall!

In almost 9 years I have been living in Cincinnati I never saw a summer weather like this. Temperature below the average for the all month of July with a lot or rain and just one or two tornado alarms from Spring to August.

Some of my plants decided it is fall already on July 22nd when I took those pictures. Today they look even more reddish. Some trees are even loosing yellow leafs. No one hot, sticky humid day with a lot of mosquitoes and a lot of showers to cool off, when you wish only one thing: winter! I don't know how I feel about this version of summer. Too much rain for my taste and not many hot days to go to the pool.