Spring cleaning-cleaning up the neighborhood

Thanks to the Saint Paul city wide clean up this past weekend I found the inner motivation to do some spring cleaning!

This cleaning was me, and many other people from my lovely city, collecting and disposing of the trash on our streets and side walks. Over a three hour span I cleaned about 1 block (both sides), filled two garbage bags, one bag of recylable products (tin cans and plastic bottles), and collected even more smiles. The weather was marvelous and smiles came from every corner. Many neightbors stopping to say "thanks" for keeping things green. I'd smile and say "hey, we got to keep this world clean right?!"

On my journey I collected:

3 major chuncks of car bumpers (also many broken pieces of headlights)-which one of my new found neighborhood friends helped me dispose of-so I didn't have to carry it with me.
LOTS of pop/beer cans and bottles
Lots of plastic candy wrappers (it was like halloween had gotten buried under the leaves and snow)
Accidently collected one VERY dead squirrel-thank goodness I was wearing workman's gloves and this was near the end of my adventure...ewww!!!

Recommended supplies for anyone who'd like to follow in my footsteps with this theme:
Sturdy (KEY for all of these items) workman-women's gloves
A couple of strong trash bags
A container for recyclables (good to do the clean up a day or so before pick up-so you don't hold these items for long)
An i-pod to get you in the groove-personally, I like Regina Spektor for my dancing/cleaning
An extra person for company, plus it's nice to have one person with the trash bag and another with recycling doing it all by yourself makes it hard to juggle
Water-nearby to keep yourself hydrated and a snack-to keep your energy going



Over all the street looks much better, if I do say so myself. And it's a wonderful reinforcement for the change that one person can have on the world. A few hours out of my day is not so hard. And if it makes the world a better place to live I am all for it. Just call me the Queen of Green!

Hope you all had marvelous weekends too! Happy Monday everyone!