Why Paper Plates are Good for the Environment

Today's post:  Paper plates!  Hooray for paper plates!!!  I am nearly in love with paper plates.  And I very nearly didn't know how great they were.  Until I ran out. 

I have 6 children, one is an infant so his dishes are a different matter.  But three days a week I keep two extra boys, because 6 just isn't enough most days.  That said, I daily have lunch dishes for 7 kids.  I try to use paper plates.  This week I ran out of paper plates.  So I persevered and used real plates.  I am not a good house keeper, I am not good at keeping up with basic things, dishes, laundry, etc.  So of course, even with my new larger dishwasher, I am swimming in plates.  On top of lunch plates for 7, (plus me) I have dinner plates for 7 and this morning my children had waffles.  Yay!  They sucessfully ran me out of clean plates.  I put the maximum amount of plates possible in the dishwasher and still have dirty plates. (It doesn't help that last night was Halloween and we were out late and busy preparing so I didn't have time to finish yesterday's dishes.)

So, why do I say that paper plates are good for the environment?  Well, they make a huge difference in the number of dishes I have to wash.  That makes my home environment a lot better.  That makes mommy happy.  Happy mommy makes happy daddy.  Happy daddy doesn't have to stop and buy cranky mommy a fountain coke.  Fountain coke means more money, more styrofoam, more energy to dispense said drink and more gas for daddy's car.  Ok, so that is all a stretch, but it does make for a much nicer home environment and frankly, that is enough for me right now.

This is not so much a Large Family Organization tip as a large family survival tip.  Use paper plates.  (We use them lunch only, actually, and that alone makes a huge difference.)  Check out more tips here.