Peace Tree

My latest design sort of brings together Earth Day and Mother's Day (which are both right around the corner) and a favorite quote of mine. It is available on this lovely eco shopping bag (pictured), T-shirts for both Mamas and Papas, and some little onesies for the little ones.

Hope you enjoy this original design!

NatureMill kitchen composter

Everybody knows you need compost to get the best tasting, juicy summer tomatoes and why throw this valuable stuff away? Some methods are messy and can even be stinky. For all of you squeamish wannabe composter mamas,check out the NatureMill. It is going at the top of my wish list. It is definitely not cheap, but what a convenience this would be! I am saving my pennies!

Brand New Second Hand

Have you tried swaptree yet? I discovered this cool and FREE service a few months ago while searching for a book.
After the quick sign-up, you can list all of the items (books, dvd's, games, and cd's) that you want, and then list all of the things that you have for trade. Swaptree will do the rest...for free! I traded a DVD I no longer wanted for a new book title I had been itching to read. Swaptree makes it easy to ship out too, by giving you a printable postage label and you can then just drop the item in a blue box. You don't have to use this system though, and they do charge you a small fee for it. I didn't realize that you didn't have to use their labels at first, but it is a lot more convenient than standing through a long line at the post office with a toddler in tow! Another inside tip is, you shouldn't list something that you aren't 100% ready to trade. I turned down a trade and was warned that too many of these could affect my user rating.
I love the idea of this service and it's green aspect as well. Then again, I do love all things second hand, well there are a few exceptions.

Going G

Did you know that it can take a disposable diaper 500 years to break down in a landfill? Just imagine how many tons of this waste alone is dumped every year. It is somewhere around 3.5 million tons in just the US! A lot of families are now looking for alternatives to this gluttonous system. Some are switching to a washable cloth diapering system. Did you know that there is yet another option when it comes to diapering your little one's bum? When our son was born we wanted to use cloth and we did part time, but could never fully manage all that goes along with re-usable diapers. My hat is off to all of you mama's who manage this, some of you with multiple babies in dipes! Last year we discovered a more environmentally responsible diapering option than throwing diapers in a landfill, G-diapers. They have turned out to be a good choice for us. I must admit the real reason I finally gave G's a try, was that Seventh Gerneration suddenly made their diapers smaller and I got stuck with a whole case of diapers that didn't fit my son. After contacting 7th Gen, they basically told me 'too bad'. I thought that was a pretty horrible thing for them to do to their customers. It basically forced everyone to move up a size, and therefore get less diapers for the money. One of those sneaky tactics companies use when they don't want to be honest and just raise the price. But on the positive side, I finally took the plunge and gave the G-diaper a try. With the G, you basically have a cloth outer with a disposable liner. The kicker is that the liner can be flushed down the toilet, or actually composted in your garden (the pee ones only). Even if you do have a really scary poop or for some reason decide you can't flush or compost, you can throw the liner away and it will break down in, get this, 50-150 DAYS! I hear some folks saying that the water it takes to flush them makes them bad for the environment, but to me that is like arguing for disposable clothing. So until we all are using composting toilets, we are flushing our waste for now- but that is another post. For our family they have been wonderful, I won't say that they never leak, but I do think that can be a problem of any diaper type. They have a really terrific website with a lot more information, so check it out www.gdiapers.com
I would love to hear some feedback about your diapering experiences- good or bad.