I was dreaming of a GREEEEEENNNN Christmas!

Hello

My name is bwings and I had a delightfully green Christmas this year.

Some things not shown in the video would be the hot air popcorn popper and a natural loofah as well as a loofah made using recycled plastic. I am not sure if it is common knowledge, but a loofah is in actuality a plant. Just as the marshmallow was originally a plant, a mallow that grew in the marsh. Now it is a sugar creation of pig tendons and flavoring, but it was once a native american favorite sticky delicacy from the marsh.

A loofah, luffa, or lufah is a tropical/subtropical plant of the cucumber family that is harvested before maturity in Asia and Africa and eaten. A loofah that is harvested after it's ripened is dried and used as a plant sponge for bath or kitchen, as a natural remedy for jaundice,  or to make the soles of beach sandals.
I am positively in love with my new loofah, ever since moving into this new place I found my feet got cracked and dry quickly. Scratching against my blankets at night and sending shivers down my spine. With the natural loofah it is more coarse and helps scrub off the dead foot skin *yummy*. I can use it and know that it's from a natural self-sustaining source rather than plastic/pvc created with harmful chemicals and sitting in a waste pile for years.


My hot air popper I have used almost everyday since I opened it. Not good for my diet as popcorn might be fat free but calories WOOOO but that's a discussion for my bridal blog. I have childhood memories of standing the correct distance from our popcorn popper and waiting anxiously to watch the popcorn fly out. I would be mesmerized by this and now so is my daughter. It's a delightful way to make popcorn, easy and PFOA free.

Shown in the video was a gift of Natures Gate shampoo & body wash. Their products have:

• No Phthalates or Parabens
• No Sodium Lauryl/Laureth Sulfates
• No Animal Derived Ingredients
• No Animal Testing
• No Synthetic Fragrance
• No EDTA (at least in the products I received) 

and in addition they, as a company, support Water Aid America which helps communities in Asia and Africa gain access to sustainable supplies of safe, clean water.

Lastly but most adorably the video shows how Asmerus, when wrapping my present, tenderly reused wrapping paper as part of his gift to me. Every year I salvage what I can of the paper to be reused the next year. I'm not anal when unwrapping, I don't carefully pull tape away from the paper so as not to make a tear. But after everything is done I will fold up the less tattered paper and put it in a box to use the next year. I save every bag and have reused some bags in this house since 2007. It would date back further but before 2007 I was between houses for 3 years. Having been nomadic for so long I couldn't sacrifice storage space on a moving trip to bags and paper. Selfish yes, but it was just not realistic at the time. Since 2007 we've been in the same basic location and so I have built up quite the collection of bags and tissue paper. I know Asmerus wouldn't likely reuse paper or bags were it not for my organized storage of such things. Alas I love him that much more for having done it just to make me smile.

The end of the video shows the aftermath and what remains. I am proud to say that of all that paper I removed all tape and recycled what I wasn't going to reuse. I was rather amazed with just how much reusable paper I got out of this years paper. I thought that a lot would have to be recycled based on how small our daughter was shredding them. But I ended up with a full box of reusable paper and not even an eighth of a standard recycling bag full of recycling paper. 3 full bags of cardboard though!!!

All-in-all it was a pretty green Christmas (lack of snow and all)

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That is all from your friendly neighborhood hippie mom for now. 

Water, water everywhere...

Hello,

My name is "Bwings" and I avoid bottled water.

Water, water everywhere, but not a drop for free. Oh, that's not how it goes? Well, it's sure how it is. Imagine, paying for tap water in a polyethylene or  polycarbonate container, the later being the worse. You could simply purchase a nice non-leaching bottle for a similar price and maintain filling it at home before your voyage. Would certainly be more economical considering.

Here goes the, "when I was young I walked uphill both ways" speech, but it is true. When I was younger, only 6 or 7 years ago, you could buy water out of a cooler for $1. I thought it a tad funny but considered myself as buying the container and not, in fact, the water. Although I knew it was wrong to do I'd continue to reuse this container for weeks. Looking back it makes me shiver a little at the frequency by which I used that plastic container as in comparison to the frequency that I washed it. *shiver* However, I digress, now when one finds oneself needing a quenching beverage outside of home, that same bottled water could run you $1.75! Sure 0.75 in 6 years doesn't seem like much....for general food. But for bottled water? Something you'd otherwise have for "free" at home. I put free in quotes of course because it'd come out of our tax dollars etc. but essentially to pay for bottled water, are you not paying for it twice?

That remains my biggest reason for avoiding bottled water. There are however the lovely alternative reasons for not buying bottled water. Some of these I don't buy into myself, no pun intended. But I am here to offer all the criteria for my decisions and so here it is.

1) Regulations - It is possible for your tap water (assuming not well) to be more tightly regulated than the bottled water you bought today. I say possible because not all bottled water would necessarily be as loosely watched as some others. However, tap water, by law, must be disinfected, frequently tested for bacteria and parasites and filtered to remove pathogens. None of this is required of bottled water. That does not mean they don't do it, simply that they needn't do it. Funny isn't it. Isn't it all tap water? Well...except for that spring water, mineral water, and/or water from the glaciers.

That is right, bottled water needn't be disinfected or tested as frequently, nor does it have to be filtered or tested for parasites. Yummy. But again, this doesn't mean they don't, simply that it's not enforced. One could argue that this is because it's tap water and already assumed (by the factory) to be regulated by the government. Why triple test what is presumed to be tested by the government already? Seems folly.

2) The container, that lovely, colorful (although often plain and translucent) container by which you transfer H20 to your body for quenching. It of course is our plastic buddy again. Although I am aware of glass alternatives. I don't likely need to go far into the plastic debate as it's all over the news. But to summerize there are the topics of BPA which is in the polycarbonate options. There are also heavy metals in plastic bottles that over time, regardless of temperature, break down and enter your body through that very source of thirst quenching fluid.

3) The icky studies performed by the National Resources Defense Council found that about 20% of bottled water tested contained known carcinogens or neurotoxins. 20% is a low number but it's a hell of a lot higher than 0%!

The study can be found online straight from the horses mouth. But here are the highlights:

Not even 50% passed! Close, but certainly not 50%

• Where is our water coming from? One alarming discovery by the NRDC was in Massachusetts  where there was a well designated as "spring water" sold under many labels. It was discovered that this well was in fact located IN a parking lot (oh it gets better) of an industrial warehouse facility (worst is yet to come) near a state-designated hazardous-waste site!!!! Did you just spit out your bottled water?! Feel free to dry off your monitor now. There's more. Several chemical contaminants were found in this water, duh, including Trichloroethylene (carcinogen), Dichloroethane and Methylene Chloride. The source was not identified and although contamination was found in 1993 through 1996 the company continued to sell the water! Dry off your monitor, the well is no longer in use thanks to a friendly whistle blower. But for 3 years the contamination was known and never addressed! 

Again, you can see the lengthy study for yourself and make your own judgement calls. I like to take everything I read with a grain of salt, research into it and then form my own opinion. So, in short, I would expect no less from people who read my blog.

However, I can assure you my honesty at all times and in the case of bottled water vs. tap water, I feel water can/will be contaminated regardless of source. I use tap water, filtered through a brita water filter. I avoid purchasing water bottles mostly because I'm cheap and less because of possible carcinogens. I can not deny the compelling study though and so I present it to you for your own judgement call. 

Tis all from your friendly neighborhood hippie mom.