Green Patchwork

Jonah and I had a VW Jetta TDI last year that we ran on bio-diesel and got incredible gas mileage with, but most of the time the car just sat in our driveway while we rode our bikes around town. It was an expensive luxury that we decided we could go without so we sold it last fall. Since then we’ve been biking, bussing, and using his parents’ extra vehicle when we have lots of errands. (more…)

I have had a lot of people looking at my posts about felted sweater crafting, and realize that I should include a post about recycling the actual wool sweater for the yarn. Quality wool yarn is pretty expensive, but if one were to buy a nice wool sweater at the thrift store for about $7 and unravel it you could potentially get about 2 pounds of yarn which would cost almost $80 new at the yarn stores. (I’m basing that on a 3.5oz.  skein of Irish wool yarn I bought recently for $9.50.) (more…)

I just stumbled upon an interesting link for fair trade condoms. French Letter condoms are made in the UK under the same fair trade conditions applied to products such as coffee, chocolate, and bananas. Now workers in rubber plantations can enjoy the benefits of fair wages and good work conditions while you enjoy the benefits of French Letter condoms.

For those of you who live in Madison and want to eat meat, but without all the antibiotics, steroids, growth hormones, and anything else that goes into an animal before and after it is slaughtered, there are many retail options to find organic or naturally raised meats. I haven’t been to Artamos’ Specialty Meats and Deli yet, but I have eaten some of their products and think their store is a conscious carnivore’s delight. “All the organic meats featured at Artamos’ are free-range and raised without hormones, antibiotics and steroids. In addition, the animals are fed an all-organic vegetarian diet (no animal by-products), which is particularly important. (more…)

You may be wondering what healthy teeth has to do with sustainability and the environment and why I would write about them. I am writing about healthy teeth because sustainability is also about human health and the increased awareness of protecting our bodies against harmful substances. Just as we want to protect our global natural environment we want to protect our individual bodily environments for a healthy and long life. A healthy mouth is just as important as a healthy body or clean air and water. (more…)

Next time you get something in the mail that is packed with packing peanuts don’t just throw them away. And definitely don’t burn them in your trash! Polystyrene packing peanuts are not biodegradable and will not decompose in the landfill for a very very long time. Instead, reuse them when sending outgoing mail or bag them up and bring them to your local UPS store or Mailboxes Etc. These stores will gladly accept your peanuts, because it saves them money, time, and resources. (more…)

After a Capri Sun juice drink is drunk the container gets thrown away and sits in a landfill for decades or centuries. When I was a kid I loved these juice drinks and their convenience, but I never thought about what happened to them once I threw them away. Kids love these drinks and I bet if we went to a local elementary school we would find tons of these empty containers in the trash.

A women’s cooperative in the Philippines has found a useful solution for these bags and created a business out of it, called Doy Bags. They collect, wash, sanitize, sort, and sew these drink containers into functional bags that are also stylish and fun. The cooperative uses the bright colors and designs of the drink containers to their advantage by sorting and sewing them accordingly.

Wild Child kid’s clothing store on Monroe St. has a good selection of Doy Bags if you would like to have a look at them up close and see for yourself how unique they are. Renee at Wild Child uses her personal oversized Doy Bag totes for grocery shopping.

After a long search for affordable 100% recycled office paper for my home printer I discovered that Staples office store has 100% recycled paper and they are committed to finding ways to be more environmentally responsible. They also take empty ink cartridges and recycle them.

At Earth 911 you can enter your zip code and search for a recycling center for whatever you would like to recycle, i.e. batteries, ink cartridges, paint, light bulbs, carpet, or automobile oil.

I recently posted about Canada’s oil fields and the major pollution being caused by it. But now I would like to write about something closer to home, right here in the U.S., and literally right in people’s backyards. In Brooklyn, NY., particularly Greenpoint and Williamsburg, there are neighborhoods of people living right next to major oil spills, buildings full of garbage, and nuclear chemicals. About fifty years ago there was a major oil spill larger than the Exxon/Valdez, but it was not taken care of and continues to be a problem today. If you have about 45 minutes to watch the whole series, Toxic Brooklyn on VBS.tv, you’ll be just as surprised as I was to find out how much our oil companies are getting away with.

To find the show, scroll through the ride side bar to find Toxic Brooklyn.

According to Caboodle Cartridges’ website, it takes approximately 3.5 quarts of oil to manufacture one printer cartridge and it takes about a 1000 years to decompose. When ink cartridges are thrown into landfills toxins from the inks and chemicals used to make the cartridges seep into the groundwater and soil and cause more pollution. Instead of throwing your cartridge away have it refilled. I started taking my printer cartridges to Caboodle some years ago and I discovered that along with not polluting the landfills I am also saving money. When I take my empty cartridges to Caboodle I exchange my empties for new ink cartridges that are compatible with my printer and I pay about the half the cost of new cartridges. You can read more about Caboodle’s cartridge procedures at their website.

Madison’s Caboodle store is located at 2858 University Ave in the University Station plaza, next to Dairy Queen and the old Magic Mill.

Not every city has a Caboodle, but there are other companies recycling ink cartridges. Just do an online search to find your nearest retailer. A little time and searching is worthwhile in the long run, don’t give up and throw out your cartridges. Think about the future generations everytime you throw something away.