Odds and Ends

First of all, I learned today at a bridal shower for my good friend J. that Macy's packing peanuts are made of starch, so you can put them in the sink and they'll dissolve, so no leftover toxic styrofoam mess. Isn't that cool?

Next, dear sister C, I finally thinned my garden. A ton of rain has brought out the slugs, so I got a bit more beer and I now have lots of radishes, a few skinny little turnips, and a lot of radish and turnip greens. Why waste them? C, they're totally OK to eat, right? I also hung up the Irish Spring soap to ward off the deer. I'll let you know how that one works. C, why isn't my lettuce growing? The arugula's awesome but the regular lettuce is weak at best. Suggestions?

Thirdly, doesn't this cartoon pretty much sum up...a lot of relationships, high school or otherwise?


Whoops, I just killed a mosquito. Perhaps PETA will issue a statement.

Happy Earth Day!

Well, I've tried to make my little changes, with the help of a lot of people and sites, including Green as a Thistle, 1BagataTime, Ecobags, ReusableBags, Gaiam, Fair Indigo, Crunchy Chicken, Freelance Farmers, a possible CSA near me, the local farmer's market, and numerous friends. I ranted a bit to my students today about getting water bottles like my Sigg (if any of them were to imitate me, they'd just need the water bottle and glasses) and reusable coffee mugs-- so many of them are Tim Hortons freaks. The company just had a "Roll up the Rim to Win" contest where you could win a prize (a free coffee, a gift certificate, a car) by rolling up the rim of your coffee mug to see what it revealed. This, to me, just generated tons of trash--the thousands of coffee cups that got thrown away in the mad dash to win a prize saddened me as a budding environmentalist.

Anyway. I'll stop ranting. A little. My sister C helped me create a great vegetable garden, and this summer I'll try to can what's left over so I don't waste anything. The compost pile's coming along, and I'll make more of an effort to ride my bike now that the weather's warm enough. I bring my own bags wherever I can, buy organic when it's not too pricey (I do have to think of my wallet, unfortunately), and have attempted to buy organic, fair trade, or local whenever I can.
Have not been able to break the husband of using paper towels, but if I buy the recycled kind, I'm pretty sure I can throw them into the compost pile. We rarely use the dryer, and I've switched to organic detergent.

I know I've made a few more changes and have lots to go, but I think if I and others can improve a bit every year, that will make a difference. Anything you've done to green things up? Policies you know of? Any suggestions? I always love to add to my list!

Celebrate Earth Day and make it last. Greenie, signing out.

Consumer news

Why I like Fair Indigo:

Some food for thought & discussion from your friends at Fair Indigo.

Old Jeans Insulate a House

Last year, Fair Indigo’s jean recycling program provided enough recycled denim to insulate an entire house! The New Orleans chapter of Habitat For Humanity built a house using insulation made from the 550 jeans submitted to us by eco-conscious customers like you. Stay tuned. We'll be kicking off our second drive soon.

Think Outside the Box

Here's an amazing fact: In three years of business, Fair Indigo has yet to throw away one single receiving box from our warehouse. How is this possible? By partnering with another local eco-savvy business, Just Coffee (the supplier of our delicious fair trade coffee), we give them hundreds of our empty boxes every season and they reuse them to ship their coffee around the nation.

Joobles Make an Impact

Since their debut last year, our line of Joobles™ 100% organic cotton fair trade toys has been winning awards. The latest? An Oppenheim Toy Portfolio Gold Award – plus, iParenting chose them as a "Best Toy." While it’s fun to be noticed, the real winners here are the fine people who hand craft Pip and his friends in Peruvian fair trade cooperatives. Each purchase helps change lives by providing jobs, school supplies and hope to hundreds of impoverished families.

Spread the Word

People are talking. If you'd like to join the conversation, post a comment to our Facebook Page, message boards, or forward this email to a friend.

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Also, a local shoestore, Shoefly, got a nod in Oprah magazine! I know a lot of you aren't exactly in the area, but I wanted to give the store its due: I know the owner and she works incredibly hard. She makes it very easy for me to buy local! If you look at the other shoes, you'll also see it's one of two pairs featured that costs less than $100. The other seven go a little out of my price range.

Happy Friday!

Google's saving energy

Just found out about this from my students: Google has a new search engine called "Blackle": It's a black background with white lettering, which saves wattage energy every time you use it.

Not quite sure what it'll do in the grand scheme of things, but I'm attempting to use less energy in my appliances if I can and it looks pretty cool.

My continued green quest

In checking out old Green as a Thistle posts, I came upon a few finds for clothes:

Better World Shopper has a list of the most environmentally and socially responsible large companies (not just for clothes, either!):


It's based on "Data...collected over the past 20 years from a wide range of nonprofit sources on the social and environmental responsibility of more than 1000 companies", according to the site. I'll have to peruse the site more thoroughly when I have time. I'd never heard of some of these companies, but I just got a long sleeved t-shirt from Maggie's Organics, on sale. They don't have a ton of choices, but it saved me from going to Old Navy, where I'd planned to get said shirt. I'd like to buy more locally made clothing, too, and we have some great secondhand places around here that I'll have to check out. American Apparel has some good things, too. Will I give up my Ann Taylor Loft? Probably not yet, if I'm being honest, but I'll try to make more conscious purchases. Baby steps.

p.s. Sam's Club may be hard to avoid, too....

Look at my sister!

First of all, I lost a bunch of my widgets when I changed layout, so I'll have to put those back in. Boo. But I do like the new look.

Second, and more importantly, my sister E. and her boyfriend J. are FAMOUS. OK, well, they have an article that J. wrote on the Slow Food Nation blog, and I hope it gets them lots of publicity and work. They're trying to make creating small vegetable gardens in people's homes a business, and frankly, I think it's a good idea that will hopefully take on. Click here to go directly to their website. Just look at the pictures if you want. I think I'm going to ask E. to help me can a bunch of stuff--it's one way I can think of to keep this great local produce around for the winter and utilize it, and it won't take up all the room in the freezer.

Oh, and another green tip: I found a stapler that doesn't use staples. Cool.

Continued greening efforts

So I promised I'd blog about my green updates as well as my renewed dislike of plastic bags. If you really need convincing, go here to see what got my blood boiling. I had no idea that it cost so much more to actually recycle plastic bags than it does to create them. Plus they're made from a polymer that comes from oil, a rather hot commodity right now, so if we can use fewer plastic bags (or NONE), use less (foreign) oil, and go a little greener, where does the harm lie? I'll tell you all again that I get my bags from www.1bagatatime.com, and www.ecobags.com sell a variety as well, including small cotton bags that work for getting your produce and bulk items at the grocery store. That was my Waterloo for a while but I use the cotton bags now (they barely weigh anything on the scale) and feel much better. Plus they have organic cotton if you like.

On that note, DH and I finally cut the downspout so we fill our rain barrel with actual rain from the house drainpipe instead of drop by drop and tossing in the water I boiled eggs with. With the rain we've had, the thing's already overflowing. I wouldn't use it for drinking water, but it will water my garden and the lawn nicely. Yay!

And did I mention that my lovely garden became deer food? I came out one morning to check on the progress and found deep hoof prints and chewed off tomato and pepper plants! FYI: Deer do not like lavender, so that has remained untouched, and they didn't seem to like the onions or the basil, either. Thus I put up deer fencing, giving myself a foot of space around the entire garden. This means that 1) I can get in and have a foot of space around the garden to work, and 2) the deer cannot simply crane their heads over the fence and chew away. My sister C, the organic farmer, also suggested dried blood, which you can get at garden supply stores. Gross thought, but she pointed out that the deer, herbivores, dislike the scent so much that they won't go near the garden, so you just sprinkle it all around. I may try it; I'll let you know. I just can't yet get over saying, "Hi, do you sell dried blood?" at the store like I'm some Satanic worshiper looking to supply her bizarre rituals when all I want are some good beefsteak tomatoes.

I think I'll start the compost heap this week as well. I've got the particulars from C. and I can't stand throwing food in the garbage any longer. Any suggestions on a small container in the meantime, since I can't always run immediately out to the far backyard to put scraps in? Williams-Sonoma has a ceramic compost pail for $32, but if I can find something even less pricey, I'll take it. It's all about budgeting, people. Plus we did crazy yard work this past weekend and have plenty of twigs and bark to throw in. Our front shrubs are dead on the bottom, so DH and I (ok, mostly him) hewed them down and made them look a lot better. The end ones do look like ugly green ice cream cones, but it's better than overgrown, brownish-gray, sad branches on the bottom. It's really nice to take care of your own space, yes?

I'm off...DH doesn't feel well and I need to minister to him. Pictures of rain barrel and garden with its sad little chewed plants will follow!

Memorable Memorial Day

Well, I couldn't have had a better Memorial Day weekend, in my opinion. Friday I graded (gross but necessary) and got in some quality plunking time (on the couch, in bed with a book, etc.). Saturday we went whole hog and had Mom and R. out to help us with our backyard--R. brought a chainsaw and shovels, so he and T. did many manly things with cutting down tree limbs and unearthing an old stump that became our new fire pit. DH is VERY excited about this, as well he should be.

Here's how economical and green we did things: We used the organic material from the stump as one level of dirt for my new, tiny vegetable garden! We had a bunch of old tree trunk parts to use as the border, dug up the soil, laid the organic stuff on that, add a dash (OK, a lot) of peat moss and cow manure, add plants and water, and hopefully I'll send future shots of my gorgeous little tomatoes and peppers. Either that, or I'll send pictures of my brown and dead efforts, lamenting the fact that I didn't put the garden in full enough sunlight or something. Seriously, the four of us had such fun weeding and cutting and creating. As Mom says, gardening works so well because it's instant gratification: When you weed, you immediately see a difference. She directed me and we did quite a good job, only flinching after R. pointed out that we had poison ivy growing near one of our trees. Thus, I am saving money for the future, AND I got the plants at the farmer's market, so it goes from pretty local to backyard-local. Plus we used all the weeds and sticks as fuel for the fire. Not bad, I say.

Once a stump, soon to be a fire pit

See what I mean?

My wee garden!

Sunday must have rocked, because I can't even remember what we did--oh yes, nice, slow day doing more puttering in the yard and getting full use of the new hammock. Oh, and while I biked around town (exercise, no gas, no emissions--can you tell I feel a little proud of this? I do. I totally do.), DH went and bought me a present: A red wheelbarrow ("So much depends..." for you William Carlos Williams fans out there). It's not every woman whose husband buys her a wheelbarrow that she'll actually use. I did get excited: This is one of many reasons why we're together. DH got to use his fire pit that very night as we entertained, and I have to report there's something very satisfying about sitting around enjoying something you created, no matter what that something is. Life doesn't get much better than this, my friends.

Monday I did a bunch more grading (again, gross) and that evening we went to Mom and R.'s for an absolutely delicious dinner that we did not have to cook, although I did ring in summer officially by making gazpacho. Just cutting up the cilantro and parsley made me decide to have a small indoor herb garden when winter comes: I loved the smell of fresh cut greenery!

Connections

A thought, which Feather Nester just commented on and it's so weird that she did, that I had to post about it: Have you ever thought of a person, a song, a movie, etc., that you haven't thought of in months or even years and suddenly it pops up in your life about three times within the span of a week? Why does that happen? How does it happen? As I wrote on FN's blog, I think it's just the universe's way of checking in and giving its two cents. Still, quite a phenomenon. It makes me feel connected somehow, though I'm not sure to what. That same universe? Who knows. I meant to post this on Saturday and do a Six Senses Saturday, but I didn't get around to it. :-)

Speaking of connections, I had a great girls' night out with my friends D and H on Friday night-- we went out to dinner and talked about EVERYTHING and laughed until we cried. I'm sure the waitstaff lurking near our table had a more interesting evening; I feel pretty sure they listened to everything we said. My mom did the same thing last week for her birthday (Happy b-day again, Mom! My friends said to tell you the same. Call me and I'll tell you which ones) and they had a blast. We get so busy and it's so important to make that time with our friends, to reconnect. Even if it seems they've gone off in different directions than we have, we can always call them up and get together. And if that doesn't work for whatever reason, well, we do find new ones to laugh and dish with, though it may take time. I guess this little blog does something similar by keeping me connected with friends and people I love, and it introduces me to new people and them to me. I like that.

Happy Mother's Day a day late to all those mommies and mother figures out there--you mean so much to all of us! It's all about connections, people! Call! Write! E-mail! Visit! Blog! Let them know what's going on and that you're thinking of them.

On a completely unrelated note (and that's my M.O., folks, it keeps you on your toes), I found another way to fill my rain barrel: When I let the water get hot for my shower, I put a bucket under the tap and then pour it all into the barrel. Laugh as you will, but it cuts down on waste and fills it up. We haven't gotten the drain pipe on the gutter to filter into it yet, and filling it drop by rain drop doesn't quite seem to work, though with all the rain lately, I have the makings of a mean herb garden going.

I think I'll go home and tend to Penny and my tired husband, who had a regatta this weekend in Saratoga and didn't get home until 11:15 last night, so they both need attention in their own ways.

Happy Monday!

Getting greener every day

I just went paperless with my credit card, and here's a site where you can go to eliminate the catalogs you receive all too frequently: http://www.catalogchoice.org/. This other one's for junk mail: http://www.directmail.com/.

Experiment

Inspired by Green as a Thistle (Thanks, Ouiser and Feather Nester!), I have started an experiment this month. As we went through our finances recently (taxes--ech), I saw we had a pretty high gas bill, which includes the dryer. Thus I have decided that for at least the next month, I am not going to use my dryer, except for super heavy stuff, like a load of towels. I'll even try to avoid that. I didn't know if DH would jump on board, as he sometimes gets slightly exasperated when I try to green up the place. He cares about the environment as well; he just takes a more practical view and doesn't like buying $5 organic apples that tend to dwarf the average "regular" one, and the like. However, I believe he got on board, partly because it may save us money. Yes, I knew how to pitch it to make it sound good. Teachers and salespeople know their audience, especially since we usually pitch a product that our audience doesn't want.

I'm also considering organic shampoo and conditioner. I like the Avalon Organics products, and we can also get Jason products at our grocery store. And since the latter has the same name as my awful ex-boyfriend, that just shows my commitment to greening it up. ;-) The handkerchief route still grosses me out a little, but I'll consider it. I think that's all I can handle for now, but as Bill Murray pointed out in What about Bob?, it all starts with baby steps.

The back has improved. Fortunately I have a husband who makes freezable gel packs for a living, so I have one propped up between me and the chair right now. This little hiccup may keep me out of our charity faculty basketball game, but I play so poorly, it may help my team....

Have a great day!