Down the power for an hour

This Saturday the 25th March 2017 at 8.30pm is Earth Hour for NZ.  So Down the Power for an Hour.

Around the world people switch off their lights and electronics for an hour once a year, to celebrate and be a wee bit gentle on our planet. Coincidentally Earth Hour is the same day as Neighbours day, so what better way to celebrate than with your neighbours.

In the last six years of my Serious Eco journey we have ashamedly only celebrated once. The first couple of years I didn’t even know about it. One year we were going out to dinner with friends.  Another year we forgot and last year we were wrangling a huge change of life with a 2 month old. But we did achieve it two years ago.

We opened a bottle of wine, pulled out the candles and an early 80s copy of Trivial Pursuits.  It felt liberating to be doing something different to our normal Saturday night (which normally consists of flicking through the TV channels trying to find something decent to watch) and purposely turning off all electronics. And we got to use all the candles we were given as gifts. I took a snap on my phone, but it looked a little bit like we were having a seance. We should do it more often. (The wine & board games that is; not a seance!)

This year we will be doing again, with a toddler in tow. Although he should be in bed by then. We will do the same as two years ago. We may even have a friendly neighbour over over to celebrate… now we are out of the cloud of infant-hood.