Our Five Year Old Environmentalist and Take3

There are many conversations had between a Mother and Child - this one is the reason our five year old unexpectedly became a young little environmentalist and it's all thanks to the organisation called Take3.

Posted by Shea on February 2, 2014

Take3 – A Clean Beach Initiative

Take3 is the non-profit organisation challenging us to pick up (and responsibly dispose of) three pieces of rubbish, every time you leave a beach or a waterway. This organisation, started by Tim Silverwood and his buddies, reminds us there is an action we can all take – starting right now!

Our Little Man is an avid photographer. This is a photo he took entirely off his own bat last year, while we were enjoying our beach holiday, in the family caravan.

We had many chats during our beach holiday, him and I, based on information regarding the effect our ‘world of plastic’ has had on the environment. We finished off our first conversation (regarding the amount of plastic ending up in the oceans) unanimously deciding to be part of the solution and not add to the problem. I showed him a distressing picture attached to the informative article about Take3 in Peppermint Magazine, which initiated this discussion. The image showed a bird lying on the ground with a tummy full of plastics – drastic I know, but gosh, this is one hell of a situation we have all got this planet into.

Take3 is such a simple, straight forward, place to start

Thanks to you Tim Silverwood and all who came up with the Take3 concept, I can report our Little Man almost instantly took this action on board. He recruited us (his family) and all his friends at the caravan park, to be aware of rubbish floating around and either take it either home, or find a garbage bin to put it in. You will be proud to know we no longer go a day without picking up any discarded rubbish we pass, not just the suggested ‘Taking 3’ pieces.

Having a safety talk to go with this new collecting habit has been necessary. Many times I have taken one for the team and picked up the rubbish he has come across. I step in if the rubbish is either completely putrid (mental note to always travel with gloves and hand sanitisers) or it is in a position where it is just too dangerous for him to reach.

During the remainder of our holiday I found myself yelling in my best Mother’s ‘Aussie Fishwife’ tone, reprimanding him for venturing into an unsafe, no-go area. On many occasions I had to swallow my words and apologise, as he pointed out the target of his mission – plastic bags. I nearly had many a heart attack as I turned around to see him venturing over oyster covered rocks along the creek, or attempting to swim out that little bit further to reach one floating in the ocean.

It is now 12 months later and we have returned to Crescent Head for our annual holiday. I am once again swallowing my ‘disciplinary’ words as, although we are conscious of picking up rubbish all year, Little Man ups the anti whilst we are at the beach.

On one particular day we were walking down the boat ramp to go ‘crabbing’. It was late in the afternoon and the fishermen were cleaning their boats and scaling their catches of the day at the bench. In amongst their putrid excess water was a small plastic bait bag, floating down the ramp towards the creek! Right in amongst the flow was my Environmentalist Son trying to retrieve the small bag before it reached the water. Lucky little boys have Mummies on hand, (where are those gloves when you need them?) I reached down and grabbed the bag, then set off to find a bin! After all I have to practice what I preach…

The fishermen barely looked up from what they were doing.

Reading the informative article about the Great Pacific Garbage Patch has left me with so much to think about, many changes to be made and much more to learn. How can we make more of a conscious effort to respect our planet and leave all that is beautiful, behind for our children and the many generations of the future to enjoy?

Must Read: Your Sustainable Lifestyle Checklist – A Universal Perspective

I invite you to join me each week as I share how our household has begun to make some changes regarding a whole lot of rubbish. I would love this blog to become a place where we can learn from each other how to:

– Instil more responsible behaviour with Reducing our consumption
– Reuse what we can
– Recycling even more than we do now
– Upcycle or Repurpose inspiring finds along the way…

Many people are fighting for this cause so I have started posting their interesting and inspiring stories and ideas on my Facebook page. The more we all ‘Share’ and ‘Like’ these stories, the quicker we can all work together to inform others and inspire action.

The perfect time to start is Right Now!!!

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There is a comment section below this post which is a perfect spot to share your stories with others or alternatively, find us on Facebook, Instagram or Pinterest. I’d love to hear about your experiences as we work together keeping our waterways rubbish free. Is Take3 something you would consider adopting?

X Shea