The Most Wonderful Time of the Year

Does anyone remember the funny Staples commercial?  It makes me smirk every time, and now  at Christmas when I hear the original tune, I think of the commercial ;)

Well, the "most wonderful time of year" when the kids head back to school and hit the books, is just a few days away.  So why not send them back with a few eco-friendly school supplies?  One of my favorite green pens is the Pilot Bottle 2 Pen or B2P.  It's the "world's first pen made from recycled bottles", writes nice and smooth, and the kids can brag that they are using a pen made from 89% post-consumer recycled plastic bottles.   

It's hard to believe but my youngest is about to begin his last year of elementary school.  A few things almost all elementary school teachers ask children to bring are crayons, colored pencils, and markers to school.  For years my top pick has been Crayola.  Not only do I like Crayola's products, but I'm thrilled with their green initiatives.  Crayola is committed to using renewable energy, reducing waste, and "helping protect the environment, so children have a cleaner, greener planet".   Crayola's initiative to harness the power of the sun, and build a 30,000 panel solar farm on 20-acres of it's land is impressive.  According to Crayola, the panels produce enough power to make 1 billion Crayola crayons and 500 million markers a year.  Not only are their markers made with solar power, but they are manufactured with re-ground plastic scrap from marker production.  Although the entire marker is not recyclable, the #5 plastic caps can be recycled, and if the tip and reservoir are removed, the marker barrels can also be recycled.  Finally, Crayola's colored pencils are never made from endangered or rainforest wood, but are made from reforested wood; for every tree used, another of the same kind is planted. 

When it comes to paper, there are many eco-friendly options as well.  Staples sells Eco-friendly composition books and wirebound notebooks made with 80% sugarcane waste and printed with "eco-conscious vegetable-and-water based inks."  Other options, available at Target are the trendy and cute Greenroom products made with soy inks and recycled paper; recycled paper notebooks, recycled 3-ring binders, tree-free notebooks made from banana paper, recycled file folders, and recycled journals.

Even pencils, a staple for the school-bound, are now more eco-friendly.  For precision pencils, there are Pentel EnerGize-X Mechanical pencils made of 84% recycled plastic and making them more eco-friendly is the fact that they are refillable.  For traditional pencils think "green"...not only are the Paper Mate Earth Write pencils green on the outside, but they are also green on the inside and made with 100% recycled wood.

So send them back with some guilt free eco-friendly products and as they board the bus and you wave good-bye, go ahead and smirk as "The Most Wonderful Time of the Year" commercial plays in your head.  

recycling on the road

Well, it's been awhile, but we are still thinking and doing green deeds even though it's summer!  We're just back from a trip to the Jersey Shore, we had great weather and fun on the boardwalk, rides, at the waterpark and of course the beach.  Too bad we had obnoxious teenage neighbors above us who disturbed our sleep each night at horrible hours!  But we didn't let them ruin our fun :)  

So while we were on vacay we continued to recycle the items that NJ recycles such as cans, bottles, and glass. However, it just didn't feel right to toss out the cardboard and paper goods, juice boxes that need to go to Terracycle, and aluminum foil from our lunches on the beach...so we brought them home and recycled them here!  I drew the line at the compostables though and they did not make the trip home :) 

Eco Friendlier Bubbles!

Today when we open a pack of Wrigley's gum, we discovered that they have switched to paper wrappers.  This saves about 850 metric tons of foil from going into landfills each year, which is equal to 60 millions cans each year!  That's wicked cool that a small change, such as a tiny foil gum wrapper vs. a tiny gum wrapper, can add up to be such a major impact.  Babysteps all around and congrats to Wrigley's for making the change!  http://www.wrigley.com/global/our-commitment/global-sustainability.aspx

I'm smiling thinking that we are chewing gum that has eco-friendlier bubbles....and yes, I recycled the tiny paper wrapper as did Rosebud :)

Incensed about the Census - Day 19

Ok, I'm INCENSED about the Census mail we received today...let me just say that I am not against the Census. I understand that it is important to collect data to help decide the allocation of federal funding, etc. But, what I don't understand is WHY we received a letter today telling us to watch for the census in about a week!!!! WHAT?!!!!! The government wasted one sheet of paper, one envelope, postage for about 307,000,000 Americans, and let's not forget the impact of delivering all the mail. The greenhouse gases contributed by the planes and mail trucks to deliver the "pre-census letter" is a horrible shame.

The "pre-census letter" has already been recycled at my house, but what percentage of the pounds and pounds of paper will be recycled? Unfortunately, much of that paper will end up in the landfills. How much money did that mailing to tell us they would be mailing the census cost the taxpayers? There are already commercials to let everyone know that they should fill out the census and why (and don't forget those commercials cost the taxpayers money too!)

Bottom line, the letter from the Census today is WASTEFUL, contributes to pollution, and global warming, and I doubt it will make any difference in the outcome. If the government wants to have an impact, they could have a positive green impact by not wasting trees, money, resources, and preventing green house gases.