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Category: Going Green 101

Get Ready for a Green Halloween: National Costume Swap Day

We are… the Electric Mayhem

We are not to throw away those things which can benefit our neighbor.

Goods are called good because they can be used for good:
they are instruments for good, in the hands of those who use them properly.

-Clement of Alexandria
aka Titus Flavius Clemens,
(c.150 – c. 215)

There’s a nip in the air when I walk the kids to the bus stop; I sleep with a blanket at night and I still wake up a bit chilly.

This weekend I’m taking the kids apple-picking.

Know what that means? My favorite holiday is right around the corner!

If you’re like me, you’ve got tons of costumes and accessories hanging around from Halloweens past. And if you’re REALLY like me, you’ve got some that you’d lovingly handmade and can’t bear to throw away because so much effort went into it. (Most notably, an adult-sized Marilyn Manson wig that I threaded EACH INDIVIDUAL HAIR onto. It could be reused for Raggedy Ann or something similar.)

Let someone else love those old costumes, and save cash money on your own spookfest this year! Attend or host a costume swap in your area.

National Costume Swap Day is Saturday, October 8th (fittingly, that is also my 35th birthday. SPOOKY!). According to the website,

Swapping half the costumes kids wear at Halloween would reduce annual landfill waste by 6,250 tons, equal to the the weight of 2,500 midsize cars!

I’m sorry. That’s insane.

Hosting a swap is easy, builds community, saves everybody cash money, and can be a lot of fun. You can find tips on hosting here if you like the idea but don’t know where to start 🙂

Register your swap on the official website (there’s no charge) so your community can find it— it also helps local and national media channels to find and potentially cover your event. Here’s an idea: hold a swap in conjunction with a neighborhood-wide yard sale! How’s that for a win-win?

If you’re not into hosting, you can check CostumeSwapDay.com to find local swaps to attend. Keep in mind that new swaps will be registering every day right up to Halloween.

The National Costume Swap is a partnership with Green Halloween, Swap.com and Kiwi Magazine.

Go give ’em some love for being so dang smart!

Tell me:
what’s the best costume you ever made/wore?

September 13, 2011
Sneaker Recycling (Nike Reuse-A-Shoe)

Happiness is neither virtue nor pleasure
nor this thing nor that
but simply growth,

We are happy when we are growing.

–William Butler Yeats

My kids continue to do me the disservice of growing older and getting bigger, despite my polite requests for them to cut that the hell out.

This puts me out in a number of ways, but the one I’m dealing with this week is the fact that the sneakers that I bought last spring no longer fit, in spite of the fact that they were not worn ALL SUMMER LONG. I swear, not even once. Price per wear and maximum value mean nothing to these children.

They’re also hard on their clothes and shoes— Cass, in particular, has never met a mud puddle she didn’t like— so I wouldn’t dream of dropping their stinky hand-me-down sneaks off at a thrift shop. Trust me, no one wants to inflict these things on their kids unless as creative punishment.

But, I hate to just throw the things away. I tend to hang on to my own old sneakers until they start to fall apart— they start as regular old sneakers, then become “walking dogs in the dark” shoes, then rain shoes, then gardening shoes, then Jeff takes them as cutting the grass shoes or general “dirty job” shoes. (It’s somewhat handy to wear the same shoe size as other family members.) This isn’t a viable option for the kids, though, since they plain ol’ just don’t fit anymore.

We’ve already talked about how you can recycle your Crocs, and after a little research I’ve found you can recycle crusty kicks too with Nike Reuse-A-Shoe. Bring up to 10 pairs to a collection site (or start your own shoe drive, has to be approved by Nike first) and your stinky sneaks will be ground up along with the company’s manufacturing scrap to make “Nike Grind,” used in track & playground surfaces, gym tiles, outdoor tennis and basketball courts, pads for indoor synthetic & wood courts, and some Nike products.

Collection sites appear to be mainly outlet stores (full list here) and if you don’t have a collection site near you, you can mail in too.

I sort of love when I find out I can recycle things I hadn’t before. Know of any other shoe recycling programs?

September 4, 2011
CLOSED: “Recycle for Rewards” with Kashi & Recyclebank (plus Giveaway!)
And the winner is…

Comment #35, Barbara M.
Congrats and thanks to everyone who entered!

Kashi Company, the premier natural food and lifestyle company, and Recyclebank, the company that rewards people with discounts and deals for taking everyday green actions, have developed a new way to reward people for learning about sustainability.

Recyclebank came to Delaware just after we moved into PA (of course), offering special recycling carts which are weighed each week when recycling is picked up. The weight of the recyclables in your cart is translated into Recyclebank points, which are redeemable for rewards like gift cards or discounts.

I KNOW. That’s super awesome.

Sadly, I live on the most inconvenient stretch of road imaginable for big ol’ recycling trucks, so even though my waste company does pick up recycling it never seems to pick up mine. So I suck it up and take my recycling to community bins, and get no pats on the back for all my conscientious hard work. Sniff, sniff.

What I didn’t realize is that even I can earn rewards! Recyclebank offers reward points for everyday green actions other than their (incredibly smart) physical recycling program.

For example:

From now until December 31, 2011, if you purchase any of these seven Kashi cereals:
1. Kashi Autumn Wheat
2. Cinnamon Harvest
3. Island Vanilla (organic)
4. Strawberry Fields (organic)
5. Kashi Honey Sunshine
6. Berry Blossoms
7. Golden Goodness
you’ll find a “Recycle for Rewards” callout on the side panel of the box. Enter the code online as a pledge to recycle your cereal box (even if you have to drive it to the recycling center yourself like me), and you’ll earn 50 Recyclebank Points per box! These points are redeemable for rewards from local and national business partners, including coupons for Kashi products.

AND, if you watch the following video about the lifecycle of a cereal box— from original purchase at the grocery store to gaining a second life at the recycling facility (embedded below, RSS and email subscribers may have to click through, sorry)— and then answer a few questions, you’ll earn 25 bonus points.

Recycling paperboard is a big deal, and I’m not sure that most people are even aware that they should be recycling it! About 2.7 billion packages of cereal are purchased each year, and most of it can be recycled. Little steps add up to big changes, folks, and if everyone made this small change we’d be diverting an enormous quantity of paperboard from our dumps, and saving copious quantities of energy and natural resources to boot.

The video also mentions one of the points that I love to drum into people’s heads, so here it is again: it is so important to close the cycle and buy products made from recycled content (extra snaps for products with a high post-consumer content, meaning that it’s material that actually passed through a consumer’s hands into the recycling bin). Create the demand for recycled products and packaging and the companies will follow— and be sure to support early adopters like Kashi who have already taken the sustainable route.

GIVEAWAY!!

I’ve only tried the Strawberry Fields and the Honey Sunshine thus far, but one lucky reader gets to try all seven cereals involved in “Recycle for Rewards” (listed above). These cereals are natural, minimally processed and free of highly refined sugars, artificial additives and preservatives.
- Just tell me what you recycle, or one way you reduce paper waste, for your chance to win a sample pack of seven Kashi cereals.
- For a second entry, you can follow me on Twitter and leave me an additional comment letting me know you did. (If you already follow, leave me a comment saying so!)
______________________________________

For more info on Kashi:
- Join the Kashi community online
- Check Kashi out on Facebook
- Visit on YouTube
For more on Recyclebank:
- Register and start earning points
- Find them on Facebook
- Follow on Twitter
This giveaway will close at midnight on Wednesday, July 20th. One winner will be selected at random the next morning from all entries and contacted via the email provided on the comment form. Winner has 48 hours to reply before a new winner is drawn. US mailing addresses only, please.
July 14, 2011