Cardboard is pretty easy to recycle, and it is accepted in most curbside recycling programs. In fact, it's valuable and desirable, generating about $100 per ton for recyclers, so you can rest assured your flattened cardboard boxes are definitely staying out of the landfill. When recycling cardboard boxes, be sure to flatten them; it makes transporting them in recycling trucks much more efficient. Also, there's no need to remove labels and tape -- it gets separated out at the recycling plant. But the most important tip: Don't recycle cardboard boxes on rainy days. Wet cardboard is ruined and tossed in the trash.

Sure, we know eating too much sugar is bad for us, but did you know the sweetener is also bad for the planet? Sugarcane is often grown with chemical insecticides and fertilizers, but it's the way it's harvested that should have you concerned. Since 20 to 25 percent of the leafy part of the sugarcane plant is unnecessary and unproductive, when it comes time to harvest the plant, farmers burn the tops off. This leaves the cane stalk, which is where the sweet sugar is contained. It's bad for you and bad for the planet, so skip sugar.

It might be time to replace your plastic ice cube trays. Traditional hard plastic trays usually contain chemical BPA, which is something many of us avoid due to the fact it has been linked as a possible endocrine disrupter. Hard ice cube trays can also get scratches, leading to microscopic areas where harmful bacterial can grow. When it's time to fill up, consider silicone instead. Silicone trays have zero chance of chemical leaching, and they come in a variety of fun shapes and sizes to make pretty cool ice cubes, too.