"How cute are these boots?!"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mS_fc5XVjkc

     The 2009 Gap Christmas Commercial was always something that caught my attention. Now, in 2009, I was clearly not the age of those little girls, but their cute cheerleader-like attitudes, and adorable boots made me wish I was their age so I could run home to mom and beg her to take me to GAP. I feel that the overall message of this commercial was to convince parents to but cute, comfy clothes for their kids. I see it being more for young girls, because there are no young boys in the commercial. I think that GAP's purpose was to grab the attention of young girls, and their mothers and get them to go out and buy their comfy sweaters, and cute boots. As a young girl, I recall hating those girly dresses! I love Grandma and all, but did I really have to wear the sweater with a stocking on it? In the commercial, the girls are cheering and/or singing about how they are not going to wear those dresses anymore. The audience I see is to parents, aunts and uncles, grandmas and grandpas, cousins, brothers and sisters, but more importantly, it is to catch the attention of little girls. The actresses in the video portray ample amounts of fun and excitement. I can easily see why girls their age would love to own that comfy sweater and those cute boots! Not only is this commercial made adorable with little girls full of attitude and spunk, but they come up with a cheer/chant that gets embedded in your brain. When christmas time rolls around, it never fails to get stuck in my head, and my mom never fails to comment on me singing it ALL THE TIME.

Mama Earth

Whenever I hear the word “footprint” I obviously think of walking down the beach and seeing an indentation of a persons foot in the sand. I think it is safe to say that the majority of people think of an indentation a foot makes when they hear the word. Now, when I hear “ecological footprint” everything changes. I begin to think about how much of an impact I am making on Mother Earth. How many water bottles I drink a day, what I can recycle, but am too lazy to do so, how much I drive my car, how much meat I consume. After calculating my lifestyle in a footprint calculator, I discovered that if every one lived the lifestyle I do, we would need 4.6 planet earths, and 20.6 global acres of the earth’s productive area. Before knowing all of this, I thought I was leaving a small little footprint. Not taking crazy long showers, I am pretty good at refilling a water bottle numerous times, and I try my very best to recycle any time I can. Knowing what I now know, I better understand how people use a calculation like this to measure and interpret life choices. Like my mom always said: “wants and needs”. Do you want to fly to Europe, or do you need to fly to Europe? Flying causes serious damage. As of Wednesday, July 6 2011, I Megan Freel, will try my absolute best to decrease my ecological footprint. I found that my biggest issue is using products that are not natural. Eating a lot of foods that use less packaging, and or eat more food that comes in post-consumer packaging. Since that Wednesday, I have used one water bottle and have refilled it multiple times, I have searched for foods that come in post consumer packaging, such as water bottles.  I am still always trying to cut down on my driving and shower times, always turn the water off when it is not being used. I offer to take the recycling to the proper place, and I am trying my best to get my roomies involved. Together we can make the world a better place!