Isn't it funny how much children love dandelions? They can spend a whole afternoon blowing the seeds off into the wind, making wishes and chasing after them. For many adults, though, dandelions are The Enemy of The Perfect Lawn, and that enemy must be stopped with weed-killers. However, in our efforts to have the greenest, weed-free lawns possible, we're also releasing poisonous chemicals into the air we breathe and the water we drink. Chemicals that have already been banned in Canada and Europe because they can lead to various forms of cancer, birth defects, liver damage, kidney damage and more. There are very sobering reasons why you, your children, and your pets are not supposed to set foot on lawns with the little signs warning you they've been sprayed. The problem is that the signs warn you to stay off the lawn for 48 hours, but you are far from "in the clear" after that time period is up.
Years ago, I watched environmentalist Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. on TV, talking about how we all live in a closed system--how you can't just wash things down the drain and expect them to magically disappear. As Kennedy explained, if you spray chemicals on your lawn, the rain washes them into the gutters, which carries them to your local drinking water system, and guess what? Those poisons come right back to you when you turn on your tap. Every year, my town issues the required report from the EPA and the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection on our drinking water, and I'm always shocked by the allowable percentages of chemicals in our tap water.
I
recently interviewed Dr. Claire Gervais, Associate Professor at the
Department of Family Medicine, University of Wisconsin School of
Medicine and
Public Health. Dr. Gervais co-founded the Healthy Lawn Team
in Madison, a group of
concerned citizens out to spread the word about the harmfulness of
lawn chemicals. Said Dr. Gervais, "When I was pregnant with my second child,
I couldn't help but notice
the lawn care pesticide signs that were up at the family practice
clinic, where I was getting my prenatal care. I had read about endocrine
disruptors in Theo Colborn's book,
Our Stolen Future, and was acutely aware of the contradiction between
our health care organization's mission to do no harm and the business mission to attract patients by having a weed-free lawn."
When I asked Dr. Gervais what surprised her most in her research, she replied, "First, that cumulative exposures of
very small amounts of herbicides over time increases the risk of cancers
and other diseases, therefore contradicting the theory that the dose
makes the poison. Secondly, there is no regulation for mixtures of
pesticides that have several
herbicides mixed together, increasing the efficacy and toxicity by as
much as 1000-fold!" Dr. Gervais recommends Environmental Health Perspectives and Beyond Pesticides for further reading on the web; at the latter I found this eye-opening fact: "Of the 30 most common
lawn pesticides, 17 are detected in groundwater, 23 have the ability
to leach into drinking water sources, 24 are toxic to fish and other aquatic
organisms vital to our ecosystem, 11 are toxic to bees, and 16 are toxic
to birds."
Anthony Pascale, President of Natural Turf, a green lawn care company serving Northern New Jersey since 2001 (we've been customers for the past seven years) said, "So many people aren't aware that walking barefoot on a chemically-treated lawn means they're absorbing those toxins through their feet. Even if you wear shoes, those toxins are brought indoors and then are
deposited in your carpet or rugs." Pascale told me that when breastfeeding mothers come into contact with these chemicals, the chemicals can end up in their breast milk. He also added, "Children are four to six times more likely to get leukemia after being overexposed to lawn chemicals (from Beyond Pesticides: Children and Pesticides Don't Mix). Every other country in the world has banned these chemicals. Even Kuwait banned them in 1984."
It's easy to prevent these toxins from entering your home: Stop spraying your lawn with them. Just google "safe lawn care" or "green lawn companies" in your area--you have more options than you might think. And by the way, if you need any proof that chemical-free lawn care works, that's our 100% organic lawn pictured below. Green and clean!
How do you keep your lawn and garden green? (No lawn? Please pass on the safety risks to your suburban friends!)
UPDATE: After I posted, Natural Turf sent me a kind thank-you for highlighting this important health issue. They are offering Joyfully Green readers in Northern New Jersey $25 off their first service. If you're ready to ditch the chemicals and go organic (do you really need further convincing?), follow this link and enter "JOYGREEN" in the Promo Code box. Offer expires 8/31/13. Disclosure: No money was received for this promotion. As I've been a long-time, satisfied customer and am fully committed to organic lawn care, I agreed to post their offer.
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Although my little Italian grandmother died decades ago when I was fourteen, I still remember her vividly: always scurrying about, cleaning every nook and cranny, with the scent of chlorine bleach wafting along behind her. (To this day, whenever I'm near a swimming pool, I think of her.) And whenever I find myself scrubbing away in my house (a lot lately, due to Spring Cleaning Fever), she comes to mind.
Since you're reading a green blog right now, you've probably guessed that I try to choose household cleaners that are the most environmentally responsible, but because I'm asthmatic, I also choose ones that are sensitive to people with respiratory issues (i.e., no bleach--sorry, Grandma). These ten products fit the bill:
1) Apple cider vinegar. Great for disinfecting stainless steel sinks and kids' thermoses (with those pesky straws and caps). Until recently, I used distilled white vinegar, but apple cider vinegar smells so much better. (My long-time friend Alex gave me the tip for soaking thermoses in a vinegar/water solution--thanks, A the K!)
2) Baking soda. Mix it with water for mildly abrasive cleaning (for example, on stovetops and teakettles that have built-up grease).
3) Microfiber cloths(or even regular facecloths, in a pinch) for dusting. No extra products needed--most of them just add waxy build-up to your furniture. The cloths are also absorbent and can scrub, so they can really cut down on your paper towel consumption.
4) Murphy's Oil Soap. For cleaning wooden kitchen tables, chairs, and other pieces of furniture that have food or grit on them, not just dust.
5) Seventh Generation Disinfecting Bathroom Cleaner (Lemongrass Citrus Scent). Spray it on, let it sit, wipe it away later. Doesn't smell like heavy chemicals--just fresh and clean.
8) Citrus Magic Veggie Wash. Not technically a house cleaner, but essential in our home for removing dirt, waxes, and pesticides from any produce. (Yes, we try to buy organic whenever possible.) Unlike other produce sprays, we can't taste it, and that's crucial.
9) Natural Choices Orange 100 Cleaner/Degreaser. Best counter cleaner ever--smells amazing and lasts for ages because you add just a splash of it to your own spray bottle filled with water.
10) ECOS Magnolia & Lily Laundry Detergent. This is expensive, so we don't buy it all the time, but it's my favorite scent for a laundry detergent and works great to freshen up clothes.
And one more of my favorite green cleaning methods:
Open all of the windows in the house regularly for cross-ventilation. How free and easy is that? No room sprays necessary, and now that it's spring, the fresh air is blossom-scented!
What earth-friendly cleaning products and methods do you usein your home? Please share in the comments section.
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Kneading
bread dough is one of those activities that you either love to do or hate to
do. People in the former camp croon about how cathartic it is to get out
their frustrations by punching and pounding away at the dough; people
in the latter camp just want to "get on with it" and eat some
fresh-baked bread. I'm in the latter camp. So, I'm beyond thrilled that I
finally found the easiest, best bread recipe, and it requires absolutely no kneading, from Mother Earth News (the recipe is on page 2 of the link). I tried it yesterday, to astounding success.
Honestly,
I'm still a bit shocked at how easy it was to turn out a loaf of bread
that looks like the ones sold in the windows of Paris boulangeries. A loaf
I could knock on for that hard, hollow crack, and slice for
airy moistness and crusty chewiness. In a word: Perfection. Because the
recipe recommends that the final loaf rests an hour before slicing, I
took out my camera and snapped 126 (!) photos of my two loaves. That's
right--I took a crazy amount of photos of two loaves of bread, dressing them up in different dishcloths, placing them on different plates.
I even thwacked my head on the wrought-iron chandelier above this table while I was taking an overhead shot (how's that for a full disclosure policy?). But those golden loaves reminded me of a Caravaggio painting, or a Vermeer
painting...oh, now I'm just going off the deep end, aren't I? Suffice it to say that they were almost too pretty to eat.
Almost.
As I said in my post about making your own organic cookies, if you find a super-easy, super-tasty recipe for a food that's fun to make, what's the point of buying it instead? When you make it yourself, you control the ingredients (which hopefully means you'll make it healthier than a manufacturer would); you save money and gas; and you cancel out the manufacturing, packaging, and shipping processes (except for the ingredients themselves--I haven't figured out how to make my own organic flour yet and it's not high on my to-do list). With this recipe, you basically just need a lot of time--to ignore the dough while you go off and do other things. It takes a good 18 hours between that initial five minutes of mixing time and the getting-it-out-of-the-oven stage. I said previously that "life's too short for flat soda and stale donuts", and now I've got an addendum: "Life is too short for bad bread."
I think making your own bread is one of those things that seems really daunting and you just need to dive in and do it. Have you ever tried to bake your own bread? How did it turn out? Have you ever surprised yourself by making something that seemed difficult before you gave it a go?
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As much as I'd love to tell you that composting came naturally to me, it just didn't. It takes some trial and error to figure it out, and it also takes a really good composter. Unfortunately, it took us five years and three failed composters to arrive at one that actually does what it's supposed to do--break down food, without breaking down. I know a few people who simply chuck their food scraps in a big pile in the backyard and cover it up with mulch, and if that works for you--great! However, we happen to live in black bear and coyote country, and we don't want our backyard to turn into a buffet for the wild kingdom--it's important to us that the compost stays well-contained. So, here's my official review of composters (all without worms, for you squeamish types).
Back in the summer of 2008, determined to divert our food waste from landfills (mostly due to my obsession with garbage and desire to create less of it), we ordered the NatureMill composter (this model appears to be an updated version) through Williams-Sonoma. It seemed like a revolutionary product because it was an indoor (!) composter, able to do year-round composting. We kept it right in the kitchen and we didn't smell anything. (Sometimes, my husband said it smelled vaguely of mushrooms, but he doesn't like mushrooms, and I didn't smell it, so I don't know what to make of that critique.) It was also able to compost things that are not recommended for other composters--meat, fish, poultry, dairy. However, it jammed up three times within the year that we owned it, and since it was relatively new to the market, customer service at NatureMill (although quick and courteous) seemed to be using us as guinea pigs to figure out their glitches. I had to go through the extremely unpleasant task of emptying out the contents (that's a nice way of saying "scooping out disgustingly stinky, dripping-wet food, well on its way to molding and rotting"), and my husband had to install a new circuit board, which helped--for a couple of months, until it broke again. And again. After the third strike, it was out--we sent it back to Williams-Sonoma and got a full refund. It's worth reiterating that NatureMill has updated their models to address previous problems, so maybe their new line works better (but we're not going to be the guinea pigs).
Onto our next model: the Sun-Mar Continuous Use Composter, purchased from Gaiam. This one didn't jam up, but the stand warped and the tumbler fell off its spinner. Also, it was a favorite playtoy with the neighborhood raccoons. We saw one little guy balancing on top of it--sort of like a circus clown on a barrel--and he was able to rip off the door, twice. Gaiam replaced it in a flash--we didn't even need to clean it out or send it back (their customer service rep recognized how incredibly gross the task was, plus the photo of the broken composter was enough proof for them). However, the replacement composter also warped and fell off its spinner. Gaiam promptly refunded us due to their (totally excellent) unconditional guarantee. So, that ended well--except for the two big, plastic composters that ended up at the landfill, badly defeating the whole purpose of using a composter to reduce our waste.
Just when we were about to throw in the towel on composting, we came upon the Joraform Compost Tumbler (pictured above) on Amazon*. It's been nearly two years, and the only problem we've ever had with it is that it arrived via UPS in a damaged box so the screws fell out en route (another reason for me to break up with the UPS man). The seller on Amazon (The Composting Warehouse) sent new screws and we had our handyman put it together for us (the instructions seemed a tad complicated, but we are just not that techy, despite our brief tenure as NatureMill technicians). It's a good size, with two chambers, and secure latches--wild critters cannot get into it. Whenever we add food scraps, we add a layer of dry mulch, spin it, and add more mulch. No smell at all. The compost turns out exactly as it should--like rich, aerated soil, with no real evidence that it was once food.
So that's my recommendation to you--and to my friend, Jennifer, who lives on a farm and spends
a good deal of time shoveling sheep manure, and yet the concept of composting "completely grosses
her out." Jen, I promise you, it's not bad at all--when you have the
right composter.
Your turn: Tell me about your composting trials and tribulations. Qualms? Questions? I'm all ears!
*If you decide to order the Joraform composter (or anything else you see
linked on this site to Amazon.com--such as the green books for kids and
adults), please click through the link I've provided to buy them. It
puts a few extra pennies in my pocket when you buy things that I
recommend, and it keeps this blog advertising-free (for now). While I
can't guarantee that you will love what you buy, I will never recommend anything on this site that I don't personally own, use, and love.
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2013 by Joy Sussman/JoyfullyGreen.com. All rights reserved. Photo and
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Because I'm on the tinier side of the height spectrum, all my life, well-meaning folks have been telling me, "Good things come in small packages!" I didn't always appreciate it, especially when I was a kid and my pesky neighbor, Cliff Paininthebutt (who was only slightly less small), called me "Mini-Wheels" (I was speedy as well as tiny) and my parents tried to tell me that he liked me. Even these days, decades later, one of my eco-colleagues calls me "The Little Green Dynamo." (I sort of like that nickname.) But I digress. This is a post about switching from buying things in earth-unfriendly packaging (that will hang around forever in landfills) to buying things in little to no packaging (best), or earth-friendlier packaging (next best).
For example, pictured above is my new favorite passion: pomegranates. Sure, they have a thick skin, but since it's biodegradable and compostable, the "packaging" is null and void. If there is a more beautiful fruit anywhere else on earth, please tell me about it right this second, because to me, the pomegranate is a veritable work of art. What other food delivers layer upon layer of glistening rubies to you? They're juicy, crunchy (you can eat the seeds), and loaded with anti-oxidants. Bonus: Eating a pomegranate is super-fun for the kids (who should wear bibs or red playclothes--poms can get quite squirty and messy).So, that's your best bet on the packaging front: unprocessed fruits and vegetables, purchased loose or in reusable produce bags.*
Here's my second choice, above: buying products with low environmental impact. I just found this laundry detergent from Seventh Generation at the supermarket today, and I was really impressed with the innovative packaging. The outside layer is recyclable or compostable cardboard (there's an inner plastic bag--it's recyclable in limited areas), and the label says "this bottle uses 66% less plastic than a typical 100 oz. 2X laundry bottle and washes the same number of loads." The tissues are from True Green Enterprises and are "made from sugar cane by-products and quick-growing bamboo, reed or grass." The carton is made from 100% recycled material. Two green thumbs-up for both of those products. But now...(big, exasperated sigh)...
...massive thumbs-down to these organic foods for kids. Sure, it's sort of good (said in a begrudging tone) that various companies are making organic fruits and veggies which are convenient for parents to grab and go, but this type of packaging makes me cringe. One of them had the nerve to say that the plastic cap is recyclable--as if that's ever going to happen! It's not even coded for recycling, in the off-chance that somebody will try to do it. The thing that pains me the most about these single-use packages is that the companies are trying to portray themselves as "good for the earth" due to the organic products within (and granted, they're skipping pesticides and all of the problems those entail). Some of these companies advise you to send the empty packages onto other companies who will "upcycle" them into other stuff (imprinted with their brand name on it), but why not just have more responsible, easier-to-recycle packaging in the first place? As I learned when I was reading Garbage Land, Germany has their act seriously together on this front--they've enacted laws for extended producer responsibility (EPR), which means manufacturers must take back their unrecyclable packaging at the point of sale--and that means they avoid the cost and hassle by using earth-friendlier materials at the onset. Why are we so behind on this point?
It's enough to make me want to go lie down...or eat another pomegranate.
Your turn: Which things (if any) do you buy in the name of on-the-go convenience? Are there earth-friendlier things you can substitute for your current single-use, disposable items? What products out there get your green thumbs-up or thumbs-down?
*If you decide to buy these reusable produce bags (or anything else you see linked on this site to Amazon.com--such as the green books for kids and adults), please click through the link I've provided to buy them. It puts a few extra pennies in my pocket when you buy things that I recommend, and it keeps this blog advertising-free (for now). While I can't guarantee that you will love what you buy, I will never recommend anything on this site that I don't personally own, use, and love.
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Just
a few short years ago, I was proud of
myself if I could grow my own basil without it wilting. Eventually, though, I started
to feel embarrassed that it was the only thing I was growing.
So, I branched out. Last year, our "crops" included tomatoes,
strawberries, blueberries, raspberries, rosemary, oregano, mint, Italian
parsley...and the trusty basil. I like to grow the things we eat the
most, partly because I can't stand buying produce in those little plastic
clamshell containers. (Even if they're recycled, they still create a lot
of pollution in the manufacturing and recycling processes.) Plus, I
can't always find organic produce, so I'd rather grow our own and know
that it hasn't been sprayed to the brink of death with pesticides. Last
but not least, it's a great lesson for little ones to learn that food
doesn't grow in the supermarket. (Added bonus: They seem more likely to
eat it if they grow it!)
Even with the occasional snow flurries lately, I can still feel spring on the way, which makes me excited to start growing our own fruits and veggies again. Naturally, I'm all for growing things seasonally and locally, but sometimes, I like to try growing things that don't usually grow in the northeastern U.S. Citrus trees fall into that category, and last spring, I bought three. Meyer lemon (pictured above), seedless lime, and mandarin orange. By
late spring, we should have some of our first Meyer lemons ripening.
Not enough to make lemonade every day, but enough to spritz on fish or
slice for salads, I think. Since the citrus trees I bought are dwarf varieties, it was (relatively) easy to drag them into the house at the first sign of frost. I can't wait to drag them back out onto the deck once spring is here to stay.
Your turn: What did you grow last year? Successes? Failures? What's on your planting agenda this year?
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When my family was relocating a few years ago, we needed to do the prerequisite sprucing-up-and-clearing-out drill before putting our house on the market. At that time, we had a toddler with a lot of toys and baby gear, plus our own snowballing amount of baggage that we'd toted from college to first apartment to next apartment to last apartment to first house. Instead of making the big decisions necessary to clear it out and find new homes for it, we took the quicker route of purchasing eight "junk trunks" of various sizes--big plastic bins that we could stow the stuff in and stack in the basement while the house was on the market.
The junk trunks worked--the house looked remarkably neat and tidy. We had two prospective buyers battling it out, and we sold the house above the asking price after two weeks and a day. (Mind you, this was before the real estate market crashed.) One of the realtors touring the house even took me aside and whispered, "Your closets look like something out of Real Simple magazine--you're the most organized person I've ever seen!"
But in reality, instead of having a clutter-free home, all of that stuff was just tucked away, "out of sight, out of mind." And the junk trunks came with us to our new house, the contents pretty much untouched since. That's the trouble with "deep storage" systems. Once the stuff is in, it rarely comes back out. It becomes a massive undertaking to dig through it all. Also, since you've either forgotten about the stuff or can't easily get to it, you end up buying more of the same stuff to replace it. It's a very slippery slope. So, my advice is to avoid the container stores altogether. Instead of buying more things to contain your stuff (especially big plastic things that take a toll on the environment from cradle to grave), declutter first, and then get off the shopping treadmill.
I read a lot of blog headlines every day, but this recent one from Treehugger has to be my very favorite one ever: "Family Cleans House, Finds Pet Tortoise Missing Since 1982." That's right; for three decades, a family did not deal with their stuff in storage, and one unbelievably resilient tortoise lived to tell about it. We can all collectively shake our heads at the sheer ridiculousness of it, but how many of us also thought (with tiny, nervous voices), "I wonder what's hiding in my closet?"
As I said in My Green Year in Review, this is the year I'm finding new homes for old things. It will be a spring cleaning to end all spring cleanings, with the goal of ending the year with less stuff than I have now. To keep me on track, I'm going back to two of the very best books I've ever read on organizing and decluttering, both by the same author, Cindy Glovinsky (a certified psychotherapist and professional organizer): Making Peace with the Things in Your Life and One Thing at a Time: 100 Simple Ways to Live Clutter-Free Every Day. Although I'm not yet clutterless, Cindy Glovinsky has been a godsend to me, changing the way I view acquiring things and storing them. Probably the most important lesson she taught me was to stop tearing out magazine and newspaper articles, because any of the information I think I'll need someday is available on the internet (just search the publication's online archive). She even cured me of my magazine-buying addiction--I don't subscribe to anything anymore; I get magazines from the library and read newspapers online. This has cut waaaaaay down on papers scattered around the house.
But back to the junk trunks. Glovinsky recommends purging deep storage areas first. Yes, it will be tedious and time-consuming--she even coined the term "Thing Nausea" to describe that feeling you get when you're thoroughly disgusted with all of your stuff--but I will deal with the junk trunks head-on, Thing Nausea and all, and I will conquer them. Because I'm not buying more stuff unless it's essential, and the junk trunks are just a hindrance to being truly clutter-free. I want to have lots of free space...and no hidden tortoises.
Food for thought: What's your Achilles' Heel when it comes to shopping? Shoes? Books? Toys? Can you tame the beast and stop the endless buying cycle? What's your biggest roadblock to getting your house decluttered and organized?
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If the kitchen is indeed "the heart of the home," then our home was in dire need of a heart transplant. Thanks to the previous homeowners, our kitchen made us shudder the very first time we walked through it with the realtor, and the chill never went away. It was like a bad 1980's concept of what "The Future" was supposed to look like, complete with high-gloss laminated cabinets, formica countertops, and rounded corners everywhere. This was a custom-designed kitchen that (most likely) cost the previous homeowners a pretty penny, but it just never fit the way we live or our own personal style. It didn't even fit the style of the house, as we live in a transitional Colonial. So, while we liked pretty much everything else about the house when we bought it, the kitchen left a bad taste in our mouths. Sooner or later, we knew we would need to deal with it. It turned out to be later--six years after we bought the house--when the appliances began to break down one after another, like some sort of culinary conspiracy, driving us toward a renovation.
It might seem that the most earth-friendly thing you can do is not to renovate at all. Just keep all of the old stuff if it's still semi-functional, right? However, in May 2011, as chair of our school's Green Team, I participated in a webinar run by Greenfaith and the Jewish National Fund, entitled "Energy Conservation Strategies for Synagogues & Schools." I was surprised to learn that keeping old appliances--or even passing them onto others who are less fortunate--doesn't make good green sense because the energy standards of older appliances are much lower and they eat up a disproportionate amount of non-renewable resources to run them. According to Greenfaith, if the appliance is older than 2001, give it to the delivery service from the appliance store, if they responsibly recycle old appliances. (Most major chains, such as Best Buy and P.C. Richards, provide this service.) This is how we handled our old appliances for our renovation.
As for the cabinets and countertops, our plan was to find a new home for them. They were still in very good condition. Two separate kitchen design companies took a look at our old kitchen and told us it wouldn't be a problem. After all, even though the old kitchen didn't match us, it might be the perfect match for somebody else. Or not...
At the advice of both design companies, we contacted Green Demolitions and emailed them four photos of the kitchen. They got back to us within one day, telling us that they appreciated the offer, but they couldn't accept contemporary-style kitchens because the overwhelming majority of their customers want a more traditional look (just like we did). I appreciated the speed and courtesy of their response.
Then I contacted the local Habitat for Humanity ReStore, via phone and the web, where I sent them the same four photographs of the old kitchen, one of which is below:
Even though we had heard from several sources that Habitat ReStore is notoriously picky about donations, we personally had a good track record with them. A couple of years earlier, they had gratefully accepted from us an entire truckload of unused carpet rolls, shelving, hardware, and light fixtures that were left over from the previous owners--all items that had been just sitting in our basement taking up space.They even filmed a video for YouTube in our driveway as they hauled away all of the stuff (although I never found the finished piece online).
This time, we weren't as fortunate. It took about two weeks to finally get some communication with an actual person at Habitat, but after those two weeks, we were told that YES, they would indeed accept the kitchen. Success! Or not...
Habitat for Humanity does not remove the kitchen for you except in extreme situations (e.g., the house is in foreclosure, being demolished, etc.). So, we needed to pay a kitchen cabinet installer to "de-install" our cabinets. Extra time and money right there. Then, when the truck for Habitat showed up as scheduled, the volunteers took one look at all of the cabinets and countertops, which by then were in our driveway, and told us right away that they could not sell laminated cabinets in their ReStore locations. They ended up taking one small cabinet (throwing us a bone, I think) and the double wall oven. I was fuming at the wasted time and expense for us, not to mention that we had counted on the tax deduction for the sizable donation of several cabinets and countertops. I told them that while I could appreciate the fact that they didn't want the old kitchen stuff (after all, neither did we!), they sorely need better communication between the people in their office who accept the items and the people who actually pick them up. The driver said they're all volunteers, so they can only do so much. Again, I understand their plight as a charitable organization, but communication gaps between their office and their pick-up staff just waste their own resources (gas, time, staff).
After a few more unsuccessful inquiries to personal contacts who might accept the kitchen, we spent an additional $1,800 for the unwanted kitchen to be taken to the dump in two truckloads. (Insert heavy sigh here.) This was exactly what I didn't want to happen, as one of my hottest green buttons is the landfill crisis in this country. It was especially painful to see our old kitchen island chainsawed in half to fit on the truck. So much for our 100% green renovation. Photo below: There goes the backsplash...
Well, since this blog is called "Joyfully Green" and not "Depressingly Earth-Unfriendly," I'll move onto the successful parts of our green renovation. Here's what we did accomplish:
We switched out old, energy-hogging appliances for Energy Star rated appliances.
We used paint that contained zero volatile organic compounds (VOCs). Nearly every major paint company today will sell you eco-friendly versions of the colors you want, without the toxic fumes and chemicals that you and your family would otherwise breathe in for years.Sherwin-Williams (which we used this time) and Benjamin Moore (which we've used other times) both offer these options, the former with their Emerald and Harmony lines, and the latter with their Natura line. The added bonus with these eco-friendly paints is that you can eat or sleep in the same room on the same night you had painting completed, because there is very little--if any--paint odor.
We installed under-cabinet LED lights (light-emitting diodes) for the perimeter counter space. This was an expensive initial outlay, but it quickly pays off because LEDs are long-lasting bulbs that don't require much maintenance, are more energy-efficient than any other bulb, and they don't pose the mercury problem that CFL (compact fluorescent light) bulbs do. As our CFL lights die out in our recessed ceiling fixtures, we're going to switch in LED bulbs there as well. (You can safely dispose of your CFL bulbs at big box stores like Home Depot and Lowe's. Don't just throw them out in the trash, due to the mercury hazard.)
We kept the flooring. While we might have preferred wood flooring, the existing tiles were in excellent shape, a classic style, and still compatible with our new color scheme.
We didn't change the footprint of the kitchen, so no new construction was necessary.
We kept the dining table, chairs, counter stools, window treatments, and pendant light for the table, as we had changed to all of these options when we first moved in six years ago, and had given the previous owners' pendant light and window treatments to our painters.
For the cabinets, we chose wood that was certified as responsibly forested.
We chose quartz countertops over granite. Mark, the owner at Stone Surfaces in East Rutherford, NJ, reinforced for us the many environmental advantages of quartz countertops that we had already read about: (1) Quartz rates higher on the hardness scale, so it's more durable. (2) Unlike granite, quartz does not require any regular maintenance or sealing. (3) It's non-porous, so it resists staining as well as pathogens. (4) It has no invisible cracks just waiting to split open. (5) Unlike granite, quartz is not quarried directly from the ground. Quarrying is, generally, not an environmentally friendly operation. (6) Quartz was less expensive than granite and looked very attractive. (Unfortunately, we could not say the same about the recycled glass countertop samples that we saw--it was just as expensive as granite and didn't fit our aesthetic.) Concrete is another earth-friendly option, and amazing things can be done with it now. (For example, some concrete countertops were designed to look exactly like wood--they fooled us, as well as our kitchen designer.) However, depending on what you choose, the cost can run high. Quartz won out for price, looks, and eco-friendliness.
So, in the end, we weren't able to do a 100% green kitchen renovation. But we tried our best, given our budget constraints and the resources available to us, and we're thrilled with the results. The heart of our home is now healthy and happy.
Our kitchen renovation was handled by Sage Design Studio (www.sageds.com) in Chester, NJ, and their whole crew was exceedingly professional and pleasant, from the designer (Tom Kehoe), to the contractor (Pete Aiello), to the electrician (Anthony Pantiliano of Jade Electric). Best of all: the entire project was completed in just a little over two weeks. Now that's cooking!
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Alison Inches: I Can Save the Earth!: One Little Monster Learns to Reduce, Reuse, and Recycle (Little Green Books) "One little monster learns to reduce, reuse, and recycle." That's all good, of course, but my own children laugh out loud every time they read how Max the Little Monster (before his attitude adjustment) clogs up the toilet with too much toilet paper, yelling "Hungry Toilet!" Kids...they just love the potty humor. Made from 100% recycled paper.
Julia Rawlinson: Fletcher and the Falling Leaves This book is incredibly sweet. A sensitive, little fox named Fletcher cannot understand what is happening to his beloved tree at the onset of autumn, and he tries everything in his power to keep the leaves on the tree. When he wakes up one winter morning to find his tree covered in dazzlingly beautiful snow crystals, it chokes me up every time. Although it's not about saving the earth, the book is a lovely tribute to nature and its seasons.
Diane Muldrow: We Planted a Tree I love how this relatively new book (published in 2010) is charmingly illustrated in the same style as those Little Golden Books from the 1960's. In simple prose, the book explains what happens when you plant a tree and watch it grow, while enjoying the benefits of fruit, shade, budding flowers, and cleaner air.
Dr. Seuss: The Lorax (Classic Seuss) This book is a classic for a reason. As I was reading it for the first time to my children, I could see the shock and sadness on their faces when the very first Truffula Tree was chopped down. Unlike the progression of The Curious Garden (see below), things just keep getting worse--all in the name of "progress." It ends with a powerful message: "UNLESS someone like you cares a whole awful lot, nothing is going to get better. It's not." Great for generating conversations with young children about caring for and protecting natural resources. Printed on recycled paper.
Peter Brown: The Curious Garden First, I have to admit it: As a mom, I'm *slightly* bothered that a little boy is walking around a creepy city all by himself, and "stumbles upon a dark stairwell" which he decides to head up. However, this book is simply magical, so I'll chalk it up to "willing suspension of disbelief" and let it go. With each page, as Liam grows from a novice gardener into a Green Thumb Extraordinaire, the dreary city in which everybody stays inside becomes a green utopia that everybody enjoys. Liam helps the whole city to bloom, and changes the mindsets of its citizens, simply by taking the first steps and sticking to his mission--without any preaching whatsoever. My favorite parts are the multiple spreads with no words at all, which depict how the gray, dirty city is growing greener and cleaner with the passage of time, thanks to our hero. Printed on recycled paper.
Lewis Blackwell: The Life & Love of Trees Hands-down, this is my favorite photography book of all time. The collection of photographs, from close-ups of leaves to forest vistas, is simply breath-taking. It sits on my coffee table at home, and whenever I need a breather, it's there for me with its exquisite portraits of trees, accompanied by some poetic food for thought. I do find it odd that this, of all books, wasn't printed on recycled paper, but perhaps the publisher felt the photographic quality would be diminished? In any case, I forgive the transgression, because this book is a heart-breakingly beautiful ode to trees.
Richard Louv: Last Child in the Woods: Saving Our Children From Nature-Deficit Disorder I feel like I grew up with Richard Louv. His childhood was so similar to mine, with a neighborhood full of children all outside, playing together, and exploring from morning until our parents called us home for dinner (and then back outside again after we ate). Louv makes some very compelling arguments for limiting technology and reintroducing your children to the powerful, healing effects of nature.
Henry D. Thoreau: Walden: A Fully Annotated Edition Like many other Americans, I read this book in high school English class, but it means much more to me now, as an adult. Living in our "More! More! More!" society, it's always a good reminder that you can, indeed, exist quite happily with just the basics. I chose this edition for the interesting annotations, but also because the cover photograph of a small house in the woods is so tranquil, simple, and pretty--it sits on my coffee table to inspire me.
Ed Begley Jr.: Living Like Ed: A Guide to the Eco-Friendly Life Ed Begley, Jr. is a pioneer in the green movement (he's been eco-conscious since 1970), and he's one of my heroes. I can't live exactly like Ed (which I'll detail in another blog post in the future), but I love his approach: "You don't climb Mount Everest in a single day." He groups all of his suggestions into "Easy Changes" (which he calls "the low-hanging fruit"), "Not-So-Big Changes" and "Big Changes" (in which the biggest pay-offs require some up-front investments). You can pick and choose what you want to try. Have I mentioned that Ed is one of my heroes? Printed on 100% post-consumer recycled paper.
