The Bee’s Knees (and lips and feet and hands…)
• “By teaming up with North Carolina Green Power and Renewable Choice Energy, we’ve offset all our operations to 100 percent carbon neutral.”
• “Even in our offices, break rooms now have composting bins, as well as reusable and compostable utensils—they’re made from potatoes!”
• In 2002, co-founder Roxanne used some of their profits to buy “tracts of forest land in northern Maine to preserve them from development. This purchase marked the beginning of a long-standing relationship with The Nature Conservancy, which over the years, has helped conserve 185,000 acres of Maine forest land.”
You can find all this and a lot more on their web site. It’s very thorough and easy to read. For something their site doesn’t offer, here are my top recommendations:
Their Coconut Foot Creme is just short of magical. Even aside from the fact that I am crazy about most things made from coconut, this creme went above and beyond my expectations. After a lifetime of shoeless modern dance and a general preference for barefeet, I had almost resolved that my calloused soles were here to stay. However, when I went to my friend’s Costa Rican wedding in December, I had my first pedicure. It was fantastic, embarrassing, and pretty funny. My mom and I had them done at the same time. The women doing it only knew Spanish, and we knew none. So while my mom’s beautician was finishing her dainty feet, the lady working on me was still grinding away on my leathery hooves. I tried to look sheepish and grateful. I’m not sure what she thought, but I admired her perseverance and straight face she did a great job. After that, I really wanted to keep my feet feeling like feet. This creme has the look and consistency of honey, but is smooth instead of sticky. Because it isn’t mostly water like a lot of lotions, it doesn’t evaporate, it soaks in and truly, deeply moisturizes.
The Almond Milk Beeswax Hand Creme just plain works. No more dry, cracking wintery hand with this stuff. It is top shelf, all the way.
This is Burt’s Bees’ Baby Bee Bubble Bath. (You gotta love a company that loves alliteration this much, right?) I went to the local Skin Care Shop to find some bubble bath for my boyfriend for Christmas. (The boy just loves baths, and anyone who loves baths, needs some good bubbles.) They had three bubble baths. Two were in sleek, design-y bottles and one was for babies. After some deliberation, I bought the baby bath. The bottle was recycled, the ingredients were natural, and it even cost less.
Waste Not
I just found an article about clever uses for food scraps. My favorite suggestion was saving bits and pieces of things for making stock. Have a bag or three in your freezer dedicated to these pieces. When you collect enough, make stock. I think using animal bones for stock is common, but the ideas that caught my attention were making vegetable stock out of the ends of carrots, celery leaves, parsley stems, etc and making seafood stock out of vegetable bits and discarded shrimp tails, mussel shells and the like.
I also really liked the idea of freezing citrus rinds so that when you need some zest, you don’t have to mess up the whole fruit!
The Bloom Box and Hope
I am an optimistic person in general, but I am a pessimistic environmentalist. I will do many things for the Earth and for people, but I don’t have much faith that we will ever sufficiently solve our problems and stop mistreating the planet. I suppose it’s that I love individuals, but mistrust the collective. However, watching and reading about the Bloom box today, I felt hopeful. The Bloom box is a power source produced by fuel cells. Powered by oxygen and fuel (such as natural gas or bio-gas), the fuel cells create electricity. One thin wafer of a fuel cell disk creates enough energy for one light bulb. Stacking them together generates more power. These stacks are the heart of the Bloom box. If you’re interested in learning more, the 60 Minutes video gives a very good overview.
I know this isn’t completely new technology. I know it just recently hit the market, issues have been found, and doubts have been voiced. But I didn’t think about all that. For a few minutes I just let myself believe that it was possible that someone had created a solution — that there was a brand-new energy-producer that would change our lives and the environment right now. I was overwhelmed thinking about it. Maybe that’s weird. Maybe most environmentalists are driven by their hopes for the future instead of their guilt. I hope that is true, but if you’re reading this and you are the type who worries and sometimes feels overwhelmed about the tremendous peril this planet is in, take a few moments and imagine that we didn’t botch this up yet. Imagine a future not of surviving, but of thriving.
This was an unusually intimate post. If you didn’t like it or can’t relate, just know that someone tonight felt very good about humanity, and that includes you!
Emotionally, Stephanie.
Winter Games
I just got back from a trip to Toronto. Visiting in February hadn’t sounded like the best time, but it ended up being great. One reason was that there was unusually little snow, as you can see in the photo. My Canadian boyfriend wants to move back to the area for grad school. In response to my concern about moving to a colder climate, he’s consoled me time and again that it is just a little colder, but snowier. I hope you appreciate the irony that this was my first visit to the area and there was approximately 3.5 feet less snow than there is in my current backyard.
Another factor that made the timing perfect: the Olympics. Not only is all of Canada pumped about the games, but also I don’t have a TV in my house so staying in houses and going to restaurants with television was a treat. Absolutely every TV I saw for 5 days was glowing with the winter games.
If you’ve been watching, you may have noticed that the medals look a little more organic than in years past. This is reflecting their recycled nature. Each medal includes a bit of recycled end-of-life electronics known as e-waste. The medals remain mostly pure, but a small amount of other metals is added to harden the medals. E-waste was sourced to reduce the amount of waste going into landfills. Teck, makers of the medals say, “The process involves shredding, separating, and heating of the various electronic components to recover a variety of metals.” Unfortunately, only very small amounts of recycled materials went into the medals. Perhaps if the reaction is favorable enough, they’ll use more in the future!
To-Go Ware
I recently had the idea that I should put some cutlery in my car or bag to use on the rare occasion that I have take-out…or on the much more frequent occasion that I buy delicious yogurt grocery shopping and can’t wait until I get home. This is a good solution for my lifestyle, but if you don’t want silverware weighing down your bag or picnic basket, check out these bamboo sets from To-Go Ware. Here are some of my favorite excerpts from the FAQ:
“Bamboo is extremely durable and can withstand a great deal of use without damage. It’s stronger even than oak, and when laminated, bamboo is nearly as strong as soft steel.”
“Bamboo is not a tree — it’s a grass, and it grows like one. Many species of bamboo can grow two feet or more a day. When it’s harvested, it need not be replanted, because it will grow a new shoot from its extensive root system. So bamboo renews itself readily, unlike hardwood trees, which, once cut, are gone forever. Bamboo is an endlessly renewable resource.”
Eco-Friendly Ski Resorts
That’s a picture of my car. I took that after the first storm. Needless to say, I’ve had snow on my mind. I always enjoy the beauty of snow, but right now, it looks less beautiful and more just plain ridiculous, like a winter designed by Dr. Seuss. It has, however, made me start daydreaming about snowboarding, skiing, and tubing. The wonderful Green section of The Huffington Post featured an article the other day for just such daydreams: Top 10 Eco-Friendly Ski Resorts.
Pura Vida!
“Pura Vida” is a phrase used a lot in Central America. It’s Costa Rica’s national motto and can be heard more frequently than “freedom” in the US. The phrase “pura vida” literally means “pure life”, but the meaning is closer to “full of life,” “purified life,” “this is living,” “going great,” or “cool!” An organization by the same name teaches villagers to compact clean, dry plastic trash into used plastic bottles, thereby converting waste into easily-storable and transportable “plastic bricks” for construction. Below is an image of these plastic bricks creating the insulation/foundation of a building in Guatemala.
Basically, they collected used plastic bottles and stuffed them full of assorted other plastic waste — from plastic shopping bags to snack wrappers — then stacked them within a wire framework. The spaces between bottles were stuffed with more plastic bags, then cement was smeared over it all, creating a surface similar to any other wall. The best part, of course, is the massive amount of waste used. In one project in Granados, Guatemala building a small schoolhouse, they couldn’t find any more plastic waste in the community and had to go to neighboring villages to collect some of theirs!
Costa Rica
Last month, I was lucky enough to visit Costa Rica to attend a friend’s wedding. Costa Rica is wonderfully progressive environmentally. In 2007, the Costa Rican government announced plans to become the first carbon neutral country by 2021, and the New Economics Foundation considers it the greenest country in the world! I witnessed this environmentalism stemming from three things: constant warm climate, bountiful water, and low-income.
With a consistently warm climate, buildings were more of a convenience than a necessity. (I noticed this with just a touch of bitterness having come mid-winder from icy cold West Virginia.) In the rainforest, where we spent most of our time, roofs were necessary, but living spaces, offices, and shops — where possessions needed to be protected — were basically the only structures with four walls. I don’t think I went to a single restaurant that was more than a fancy pavilion. No storm windows, no insulation, no radiators…it was remarkable to think of how much weather affects how we live.
One scene that I remember that combined all three causes was in a shack on the side of a road. There were a few shacks, each with three walls and open in the front, that vendors had set up to sell goods. I saw one vendor take a plastic grocery bag to the ditch beside the road that was flowing with water. She scooped some up, and I saw it dribbling out of holes worn in the bottom. She took it up the embankment and splashed the water on the floor of her shop. I watched the dust clear out and the water trickle back down to the ditch. I was struck with how completely reasonable that was and yet how foreign! I feel wealthy societies get to the point where they feel they can afford to be wasteful, but environmentally speaking, of course, no one can afford to be wasteful.
I spent most of the time at the foot of Volcano Arenal, at a ridiculously cool resort. What made it great: more than a dozen hot spring pools, beautiful landscaping, and wonderful architecture. I admit that the architecture that tied together the pools, the gardens, and the structures was due only to visionary designers and execution, but the hot springs and vegetation would be there, resort or not. It felt luxurious to be in a beautiful and warm outdoor pool, but if there’s one thing a rainforest has plenty of, it’s water…and if there are two things it has, another would surely be an abundance of plant life. So even a resort, which just the word generally smacks of excess, was ecologically sound. One morning there was a strange noise from behind my family’s room. It was the sound of the outdoor sink, and I saw a staff member washing something plastic. I realized at once that this was their solution to something I had noticed earlier. Out front of each room were waste, organic waste, and recycling bins, lined with plastic bags. I’d been delighted to see the bins but thought the plastic bags were a bad system. However, the staff member was washing out the bags to reuse them. What are the chances that would happen in the US?
Eco Etsy
You may be familiar with Etsy.com, an online collection of individuals who sell handmade goods, but have you heard of Etsy Earth? It’s a team of sellers who are “committed to sustainability, aware of current eco-issues, taking responsibility for making the best, well-balanced choices for their shops with the safety and quality of their products in mind.” Their list of shops includes: Personal Care, Clothing, Baby Items, Accessories, Household items, Stationery, and Garden. Pictured above are plantable cards (from a seller GoGreenGal’s personally loves), darling upcycled slippers, and a super swanky little black dress.
Another part of Etsy that I love is that you can search your area. You can support your community, connect with crafters near you, and cut down on shipping – maybe even saving a few dollars at the same time.
Green Drinks
Every month people who work in the environmental field meet up at informal sessions known as Green Drinks. Last night, January 21st, Green Drinks of the Eastern Panhandle met up at Shepherdstown’s wonderful Stone Soup Bistro, hosted by GoGreenGals and Pinnacle Enterprises LLC.
Though I make efforts in my personal life and try to incorporate ethical practices into my business, I don’t technically work in the environmental field. However, absolutely everyone there is very welcoming and genuinely wants to know all about me and my work. I’ve been to many different networking events before, but Green Drinks is by far the most enjoyable. Every time, I am inspired by the other guests, and I always leave with a few business cards from organizations that caught my interest and opportunities for myself or someone I know.
Simply being around so many people who are so accomplished and completely into what they do is very motivating. If you’re interested in attending, you can contact Karen at info@gogreengals.com to be put on the mailing list, and I hope to see you at the next Green Drinks!
Go Green Gals 
