We are this family on a journey to “green” our lives.  The constant inspiration and motivation to live for wellness is our children.  We want them to have the best opportunity to live long, healthy, lives, so we feel like their best opportunity begins by building healthy habits.

Recently, I wrote about wanting to “green” our household cleaners.  Within the week of stating that goal publicly, we had an episode where one of the conventional cleaners our housekeeper used literally made Night Owl throw up – twice in the same day.  After airing out the house, he felt better.  That event definitely kicked me in the butt to make my desire to find greener cleaners into high gear, and turn it into a reality.

I will admit – I am a little afraid of our housekeeper.  She is a no-nonsense type of gal, and she is very particular about the way things are done.  On top of that, I don’t want to add more to her workload of cleaning for our family of six.

After fretting about it for a week, I finally came up with a solution.  I printed up different recipes that I gleaned from our Learning to be Green Pinterest Board.  I approached her with them the next time she cleaned for us.  I asked her to look them over and share her thoughts.  I told her I only wanted her to experiment with whatever appealed to her in the bathroom which we use the most.  Almost all the surfaces are represented there: tile, wood, glass, and definitely areas that need disinfecting.

As it turns out, by honoring her area of expertise, explaining my concern, and asking for help, we got a win-win for everyone.  She shared an idea that wasn’t on my list and will require no extra cleaners…just water and a good steamer.  She also told me that if Night Owl was getting sick, she was not going to bother with the bathroom.  She said she would do the whole house for us using the different recipes on the list I printed up.

I could have cried!!

So, in about the same amount of time that it usually takes her and her partner to clean the house, we got a “green” clean, the house smelled of refreshing peppermint from the Dr. Bronner’s castille soap, and no one threw up later on.

Lessons I am adding to the Tidbits & Soundbytes page:

• Being humble and asking for help can yield surprising and positive results.
• If you ask nicely, you can achieve the goal you want without having to tell someone what to do, and sometimes you get a better idea than the one you started with.

Has asking for help yielded positive results in your corner of the world?