Back in June we took a day trip to Nantucket to visit the Whaling Museum. It was a great day trip and the Museum and lecture were amazing. Since we were only going for the day we spent the extra money on the high speed Fast Ferry which takes 50 minutes as opposed to 2.5 hours. More pics at Nantucket 07.
Apartment Therapy added a Green Home section recently.
I already found some great info:
The cost of leaving computers on overnight
The other disturbing detail I found out was that Americans go through 2.5 million plastic bottles an hour. Ughhhh!
Daily use of beauty products exposes U.S. women to up to 200 chemicals. Only 10 percent of cosmetic ingredients have been screened for safety.
-SafeCosmetics.org (via Sierra Club Magazine)
After checking the labels and throwing away most of my beauty products recently my shelves were pretty empty. I was discouraged to find some of my favorite products were in the trash category (Kiehls, Bumble and Bumble, Kiss my Face, some Trader Joe’s Products, my sunscreen . . .the list goes on and on). I have been on the lookout for good products that don’t have Parabens or Phthalates because they can be linked to breast cancer. It can be really hard to determine if a product has Phthalates because it is often lumped in with the term “Fragrance” so I looked for products that specified that they didn’t have them or I used some of the resources that I blogged about here. So far, the best candidates to replace my products are Burt’s Bees and Suki, which is carried at Whole Foods.
The more I read about this issue the more I feel that I need to do something. Here are a few downloads courtesy of SafeCosmetics.org with some information/suggestions:
Safe Cosmetics Sheet
Safe Cosmetics Letter
Since I’m not one to organize a rally or anything I think I might start with sending the letter to a few places, starting with Trader Joe’s since they seem to have such a health conscious business model.
We joined the Better World Club for roadside assistance, which is an environmentally friendly alternative to AAA. They donate 1% of annual revenues toward environmental cleanup and advocacy. I’m really excited about all the green perks including hybrid car rentals, discount eco-travel and $40 off of gasoline this year. They even have an auto advice hotline for car problems.
Our latest green investment is a push mower from Clean Air Gardening. We sprung for the attachment to catch grass clippings. We will use some of the dry grass clippings to mulch the beds in the fall and for the compost. It is nice not to have to buy gasoline, and now there is no noise pollution coming from our yard on Saturday. You do have to mow every week, otherwise it is super hard to push.
