Monthly Archives: February 2010

I’m an admitted earth lover.  However, that doesn’t mean that I want to sleep on it!  I want to develop a love of nature in my two kids and camping is a great way to do it.  My kind of camping involves rv rentals though.

So the question is, how do I balance my love of the planet with the need to camp in an RV instead of a more eco-friendly method such as tenting it??  Well, try googling eco-friendly RV rentals and you’ll come up with a huge assortment of kinds of RVs that will fit the bill.

Check out this one clad in recycled aluminum cans.  It’s self sustaining, not an eye sore (because it seamlessly blends into it’s surroundings) and contains tons of eco-friendly materials in it’s construction.

There are a whole range of more practical eco-friendly RV units that can be rented as well.  Everything from fuel efficient models to extremely light models to reduce fossil fuel usage to models that promote the earth to units that use recycled materials.

It’s amazing what you can find when you just take the time to look for it.  I definitely recommend checking out all your options before renting an RV this spring and summer!

Continue reading →

Clean lines, bold colors and eye catching graphics are what dominate this line by reiter8.  This company makes a range of bags, purses, wallets, pillows, totes and even Christmas stockings out of used sails.  The company name was chosen because it means to say or do again which is exactly what they are doing with these sailboat sails — reiterating their value.

These are a great eco-chic find for every green design fan looking for something different.  Many of their items feature the original sail seams as part of the design — check out the green stitching on the blue star pillow for example.  Better yet, if you have an old sail taking up valuable storage space, donate it to reiter8 for them to reuse.  They’ll even send you a bag made out of the sail that you send.  Pretty cool keepsake if you ask me!

They’ve got their own Etsy store and blog running which would definitely be worthwhile checking out.  They’ve even got durable luggage tags made out of the small bits of sail left over.  Great practical use for small pieces of the material instead of just wasting it!!

Continue reading →

I’ve never heard of soapnuts until I ran into a giveaway featuring them as the prize on Organic Girl’s blog — you can read and enter the contest here.

They are literally nuts that you use for soap right off of the tree!  This particular company, Superior Soapnuts, uses nuts from the mountains of Nepal.  They are the dried fruit of the Ritha (sapindus mukorossi) tree.  Although other trees are used by other companies for soapnuts, this particular tree apparently has the highest amount of saponin in it which is what gives the nuts their awesome cleaning powers.

They are completely all natural, chemical free and come just as they are seen in the picture.  You put 3 – 5 nuts in a bag provided, hit it with something hard to break them open and toss it in with your dirty clothes.  Nothing else is required.  Not even fabric softener as the clothes will come up naturally fluffy and soft!!

The nuts can be used repeatedly until they are no longer shiny with saponin.  They can be used between 4 and 8 times depending on how hot the water is that is used to wash the clothes.  Lower temperatures are easier on the nuts (lol) and the environment!  They even have recipes using the soapnuts to make other cleaners such as liquid soap.

Financially speaking, these make a lot of sense as well.  A 500 gram bag of soapnuts can clean up to 200 loads of laundry!!  Sounds too good to be true, I know.  I decided to buy their trial pack to try them out.  At only $1.75 + shipping (super cheap btw), you can’t really afford not to!  All natural, chemical free cleaners with muslin bag packaging and all that’s left over is compostable shells.  Definitely a must have.  I’ll re-post after I receive them and give them a whirl.  I definitely do more laundry than you could possibly imagine so these would be a lifesaver in terms of not having to worry about what chemicals are being left on our clothes and linens.

Continue reading →