I don’t subscribe to many magazines (I’m pretty reformed, but our magazine bin is always full to capacity). But as much as I read on-line, green or otherwise, I do like to keep things on hand for browsing or reference that I don’t need to turn on my computer for. KIWI is one of them. KIWI Magazine is a bi-monthly, family-centered publication with a focus on natural and organic lifestyles, but like the fruit, is sweet and many shades of green. KIWI focuses on every aspect of eco-wellness, from health to food to clothing and the fun stuff. KIWI shares the desire held by all parents to create a safe, happy environment for our children that promotes growth and well-being.
The on-line KIWI experience is just as rewarding and brings the magazine even more to life. There’s an awesome recipes page, articles on everything from safe pregnancy to endangered species, a great blog and podcast and KIWI kids funpages to print out and keep your little ones busy all summer. There are also a bunch of newsletters for KIWI in your inbox, with coupons, green tips, and the new cooking club for kids newsletter (there’s no link, but a neat little box where you can enter your email address).
This week, one lucky winner will get a year subscription to KIWI! The rules are the same, as always. Please leave a comment here with an answer to this question - what’s your favorite aspect of KIWI Magazine? You have until next Monday, July 28th at midnight, PST to enter! Good luck!
I hope everyone had an amazing Mother’s Day! We were lucky enough to spend most of the day outside, enjoying the beach and family. As my older daughter told me when I kissed her goodnight, “Every day should be Mother’s Day” (no really, she did!), I remind myself how my healthy, curious, enlightening children have become the best reason to help the planet, even through this little blog.
As many of my days wind down, I end up thinking about parenting, which eventually leads to thinking about writing and being green and on and on and on (insert smiley face here). I guess since I advocate for nature above all else, I talk to my kids a lot about planting trees, which leads me every time back to Eco-Libris, the green business that works with publishers, bookstores, even readers, to help the book industry balance out its paper use.
In April, Eco-Libris teamed up with Kedzie Press, an independent, “green” publisher that prints all books on post-consumer, chlorine-free paper, for Kedzie’s Million Tree-A-Thon! Kedzie Press is aiming to plant one million trees by December 2009. All you do is purchase any Kedzie Press title from their website, and Eco-Libris will match each purchase with a tree, and a pre-printed sticker on each title. Use the code “milliontrees” for 10% off any book!
This week, I’m thrilled that Kedzie Press is so generously giving away 10 copies of their latest release, The Green Parent. The Green Parent is a comprehensive guide to help ease your family into being cleaner and greener. It tackles topics such as money-saving, practical efforts for eco-ing your home; educating your kids and how to teach them to spread the eco-word; and green products you can use (and afford!) For each copy of The Green Parent sponsored for the giveaway, Eco-Libris will double the trees planted. This means a total of 20 new trees from this giveaway alone are going into the ground! So, get those thinking caps on, and enter - this contest will be open until midnight, PST on Friday, May 16th. Please leave a comment with an answer to this question - what do you think is the most important eco-tip to share with your children (or grandchildren, nieces and nephews, etc.)? Good luck, and I hope the winners enjoy the book!
As a self-professed book nerd, ‘green’ books can be both fascinating and highly informative. Unfortunately, too many of them say the same things, for a too-general audience, and give very basic, watered down advice. Not so with a book I have been referencing and carrying around with me for the past couple of weeks. Big Green Purse: Use Your Spending Power to Create a Cleaner, Greener World by Diane MacEachern, is an invaluable guide not only to going and staying green, but how to do it wisely and without breaking your wallet. More important, it’s an empowering look at the influence of women’s spending (MacEachern estimates that “women spend .85 cents of every dollar in the marketplace”), and how we can use this clout to sway the market to providing healthier, greener products and services for our families. MacEachern, a renowned environmental writer and public speaker, launched Big Green Purse in 2007, and has been a forerunner in green education. Her comfortable writing and engaging, timely topics makes greening your family and home lively and, dare I say, worry free.
In Big Green Purse, MacEachern examines a variety of topics, with eco-alternatives, label explanations, and what goes on under her own roof. MacEachern explains what organic really means, and how to shop for sustainable food; “Car Talk,” or, advice on saving gas; even the best coffee, tea, and chocolate products on the market. A distinct difference from other go-green books (and something I feel needs to be stressed even more than opening up your wallet) are the addresses and phone numbers of companies not holding up to sustainable promises, encouraging readers to make some noise and let big business know changes need to be made! Be sure to sign up for “Purse Alerts” on the website to have tips and tricks delivered to your mailbox so you don’t miss a green beat.
This week, I am super excited to give away not ONE, not TWO, but FIVE COPIES of Big Green Purse to my loyal readers. Leave a comment here with an answer to the following - what would you consider to be your most important green shopping principle? This giveaway will be open until next Friday, April 11th at midnight, PST. And be sure to sign up at Hot Moms Club and join the teensygreen group, for a more in-depth discussion of the principles behind Big Green Purse. I look forward to seeing you there and hearing what you have to say about spending green! Good luck!
This contest is now closed! Thank you all so much for your wonderful responses - congrats to all the winners! I hope you can all get a chance to take a look at this great book and add it to your green library…
I love singing the praises about yoga - anyone can do it, and there’s never enough that can be said about the benefits to the body and mind. With information constantly being put out there about getting kids outdoors, turning TVs off, obesity, and alternative ways to get kids active, yoga may be the key to kid’s physical success. It’s an indoor or outdoor activity, that’s especially fun when it’s with a parent! It’s amazing to see my girls immediately mimic my yoga moves (that sometimes take a little more time for me to get right!).
One book that we love at our house is My Daddy is a Pretzel, written by Baron Baptiste and published by Barefoot Books. Giving simple visual aids to basic yoga poses, My Daddy is a Pretzel gives kids (and parents unfamiliar with yoga) a gentle start to yoga. It also helps kids see yoga in everyday life, as the poses reflect nature and animals around them. Paired with a PVC-free, non-toxic, and biodegradable kid’s sized yoga mat from Lotuspad, your kids will be pretzel-ing in no time! I’ve written about Lotuspad before, and can’t get enough of how durable and accessible these mats are - not only for yoga, but as a great protective activity mat.
We took a giveaway break last week, but this week we’ll celebrate with two winners - each will win one copy of My Daddy is a Pretzel along with a Lotuspad kid’s yoga mat to help your little yopi get a healthy start to a lifetime of healthy habits! As usual, please leave a comment here with an answer to this question - what’s your favorite Lotuspad yoga mat carry strap style? This giveaway will be open until next Thursday night at midnight PST. As an aside, please note that all comments are moderated, so there’s no need to leave comments over and over - they will be posted! Also, please limit your entry to one per household. Thanks, and good luck!
This contest is closed! Thanks for entering, and check back for the winners!
I have an extra-special giveaway this week, sponsored by another blog I run called The Letter Green. The Letter Green blog is an on-line supplement to the quarterly print magazine of the same name my family and I have created. The first green magazine in English and Spanish, The Letter Green focuses on Latin American green news, innovations in green products, news, and much more. You can read the print edition here, or sign up for a free subscription - our next issue comes out in about a month!
To that end, we’re giving away a copy of one of our favorite ‘green’ books, Cradle to Cradle: Remaking the Way We Make Things by William McDonough and Michael Braungart. The idea behind Cradle to Cradle is a revolutionary one. The authors call for products and processes not to be ‘less bad,’ but efficient to the maximum. Just as ants or trees take away from the earth, they also give back, to be positively good for the environment. ‘Waste is food’ is the principle - by making products that can be composted, or can be used again without degrading them or the environment, we can acheive true upcycling where the need for more and more and more resources are lessened even further. Much of the book shows how the authors, as consultants, have put such principles into action for large companies, product development, even neighborhood design and actions. It is a true manifesto for change, and an inspiring read!
Aside from Cradle to Cradle’s revolutionary ideas about eco-design and practices, the book itself is innovative as well, and it a true testament to the author’s ideals. This is no paper-shredding piece of literature you’re holding. Cradle to Cradle is a “DuraBook,” a patented, synthetic, tree free, waterproof, tearproof book that is made entirely of plastic resins and inorganic fillers that can be melted and reused over and over again, without toxins or added chemicals. It’s upcycling in the palm of your hand!
Just leave a comment at the post (comment button is at the TOP of the post) for your chance to win your very own copy of Cradle to Cradle! You have until Friday at midnight, PST, to enter. Good luck!
As a huge booknerd worm and former book publicist, I can honestly say that books are my life and always will be. The problem is lately, besides not being remotely close to a normal bookstore, I have felt a bit, well, guilty, about buying books. Notebooks, paper, you can find beautiful things in recycled form, but books published with post-consumer paper is tough. In fact, according to the organization Eco-Libris, 20 million trees are cut down each year to use as ‘virgin paper’ for new books published in the US alone, and book publishers print only a tiny amount - from 3% to 10% - of their titles on recycled paper. Ouch!
Eco-Libris is helping to solve this paper problem on many fronts. You can balance out your book buying through ‘buying’ trees to be replanted with one of three Eco-Libris partners - Sustainable Harvest in Central America, RIPPLE Africa, and The Alliance for International Reforestation, also in Central America. Each tree is only one dollar, and you can buy a minimum of five - that’s five trees for five bucks! I asked Raz Godelnik, co-founder of Eco-Libris, why plant in these areas? He explained, “these trees are planted in high ecological and sustainable standards in areas when deforestation is a crucial problem, and planting trees not only helps to fight climate change and conserve soil and water, but also benefits many local people. Latin America and Africa are two regions that are losing their forests at the highest rates.”
Eco-Libris is also becoming a strong voice for changing paper practices with book publishers. Just this month, Simon and Schuster announced it will increase the amount of recycled fibers within its book paper, and about 140 other publishing houses have also made this commitment. That sounds like a big number, but it’s only about .18% of US publishers! Eco-Libris will also help you green your Book Clubs!
Finally (these guys are really busy), Eco-Libris is putting together a “Holiday Green Book Gift Guide”. This week, yours truly is featured! Check out my pick, The Tiny Seed by Eric Carle. What are your favorite ‘green’ books for kids?
Writing about being green and many other green-related topics to the blogosphere is fairly easy - when my five-year old daughter, however, asks me “what are going to write about today and why do you keep talking about the planet, Mommy?” - well, then it gets difficult. At five, she’s too little to really truly understand many concepts, but we’re trying to start her on the basics. Turn off lights when you leave a room. Don’t leave the water running when you brush your teeth. Hurricanes don’t happen all the time (we lived in Florida during the big 2005 season).
We decided to try out some books, since we’re all bookworms here. We started with The Down-to-Earth Guide to Global Warming by Laurie David and Cambria Gordon, and This is My Planet by Jan Thornhill, mainly because they are brand spanking new titles. Laurie David was a producer for An Inconvenient Truth - so you have to give her some credit on knowing the topic. The book lists the appropriate reading ages as 8 and up, and I can see why. Snarky writing and a lot of pop culture references gives it a tweeny feel, although it has piqued my daughter’s interest - she’s in a big animal phase right now. Broken down into four major chapters - “It’s Getting Hot in Here,” “Weird, Wacky Weather,” “Extinction Stinks,” and “What You Can Do to Stop Global Warming,” The Down-to-Earth Guide to Global Warming also has a great glossary of global warming terms, a directory of careers for future green crusaders, and many resources for kids to help make their voices known about how much they care about the planet.
Amazon.com says This is My Planet is for kids ages 9 and up, but it was a much easier read for us at first. Award winning Canadian children’s book writer and illustrator Jan Thornhill provides information in small, concise boxes with a ton of beautiful photos. Thornhill breaks down her book discussing the Earth in general first, then through three specific environments - the ocean, land, and polar regions. Neither book shies away from the seriousness of the subject - this is why I think they brand the books towards older kids. We do, however, take the time to explain that yes, polar bears can’t live in warm weather, but no, the Antarctic is not going to turn into Panama anytime soon.
What does this all mean for you? It’s a lot of information to take in, so I thought this week I would sponsor my own giveaway, by offering one copy each of The Down-to-Earth Guide to Global Warming and This is My Planet to two different winners. You can also purchase these books through the teensygreen Eco-shop. Simple rules this week - leave me a comment and my five-year old future green builder (she’s going to work with Daddy, she’s already decided) will choose the winners at random! You have until Thursday night at midnight, PST, to enter. Also, if you have suggestions for other books, please let us know! We love expanding our library, and I hope you will too! Good luck!
This giveaway is now closed. Congrats to Blythe for winning “The Down-to-Earth Guide to Global Warming” and Jennifer Barr for winning “This is My Planet”!
While you’re out celebrating Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows with your kids tonight, feel better knowing that the 12 million copies printed in the US will be the most eco-conscious books to date. After a major campaign by Raincoast Books, Potter’s Canadian publisher, and eventually J.K. Rowling herself, the novel with the magic to keep kids reading will contain 65% paper produced in an environmentally and socially sustainable manner; and, at least 35% will be made from post-consumer waste paper. That’s huge, considering the last book, which Scholastic printed about 10 million copies of, had no recycled paper whatsoever. It will save about 130,000 trees, and, combined with the 15 other Harry Potter publishers around the world, will save about 200,000 trees - the equivalent of 2.5 Central Parks! And if you enjoy reading it IN Central Park, well, the trees thank you…
via lime.com
Since I live in a far-away place, my daughters are in the middle of their school year (luckily, they are both too young to really care that their friends in the US are frolicking in the pool and doing arts & crafts at camp…their days aren’t much different!) Right now, my Pre-K daughter is learning about recycling. This is very interesting, considering there is no country-wide recycling program to date here…only private, expensive services. I won’t complain, however. Learning about recycling can be fun and motivating for kids to help out…
The book my daughter’s class is using to explain recycling is Where Does the Garbage Go? by Paul Showers. The book outlines what people used to do with their trash, ie, bringing it to the ‘dump’ or incinerating it, then explains the recycling process and how recycling happens in school or at home. It has great illustrations of a landfill, how trash (doesn’t) break down into the earth, and gives tips on what kids can do to help. The most amazing tidbit about the book is it was originally published in 1974! The author actually had to revise it 20 years later to integrate recycling!
I’m also loving Ecoart!: Earth-Friendly Art and Craft Experiences for 3-To 9-Year-Olds by Laurie Carlson. This book has a broad age-range of crafts, which is great for families with children of different ages in the house. Materials include natural items such as twigs and pebbles, and moves on to recycled products like plastic bottles. A great starter book for crafting with your kids…
