Dirty Dog
Date: November 12, 2008 | Category: Pets, The Home
Dirty Dog Organics fur freshener is strong enough for a man, but made for his best friend.
From the founders of The Grapeseed Company, this 100 percent paraben, sulfate and phthalate free spritzer is a non-greasy solution to every pet owner’s problem of DO (that’s Doggy Odor, folks). While mainstream chemical-filled pet care products often leave canines suffering with skin irritation, Dirty Dog Organics fur freshener is made with pure essential oils and organic aloe for a quick pick-me-up that doesn’t weigh fur down. With sweet hints of lavender, rosemary and mint, pups can put a fresh foot forward, or paw as the case may be.
Reverse World - Gardens that Eat Insects!
Date: November 12, 2008 | Category: Cleaning, Featured, Kitchen, The Home
Managing pests like flies in the kitchen has been a challenge for more than one eco-minded housekeeper. If you have a fruit bowl, at some point you will likely have fruit flies buzzing around your kitchen. The flies are harmless but, frankly, watching them land on your beautiful farmer’s market finds can be a minor bummer.
The Insect Eating Garden from Gifts that Bloom is a Venus fly trap that makes a meal out of the little buggers. For just $12.99 it is about the same price as bug spray but without any harmful chemicals. Just add water and sunshine and at least one problem will be history. (more…)
Giving Water a Voice
Date: November 6, 2008 | Category: Events, Food & Drink, Kitchen, Lifestyle, Stores & Resources
Water’s been getting a bad rap lately due to its connection with the wasteful plastic bottle industry. Last week, ecofabulous attended an event in New York where PŪR gave water a voice by inviting a panel of experts to discuss the effects of the water bottling industry and release breakthrough technology in the field of water filtration.
While many of us have adopted the recycling regime, an astonishing 38 billion plastic water bottles are still thrown away each year. Even if we reach the point where we are recycling 100% of the plastic bottles, the production process still requires a huge amount of energy. The U.S. requires more than 1.5 million barrels of oil each year in order to meet the bottle-making demands of Americans – that’s enough to fuel 100,000 U.S. cars for a year. (more…)
Green Eggs and Pan
Date: November 6, 2008 | Category: Kitchen, The Home
Hate to ruin your appetite, but unfortunately for all of us, the non-stick cookware that made your eggs slide so easily onto your plate likely contained PTFE, which is toxic at high temperatures. And PFOA, a chemical involved in non-stick production, has been deemed “likely carcinogenic” by the EPA.
Enter Green Pan, a Belgium-based company that has developed a line of cookware that’s PTFE-Free and PFOA-Free in manufacturing. As a plus, the company is able to forge the pans using half the energy required to produce a pan with a PTFE coating. Coining the term “constainable,” they are developing products that blend convenience with sustainability.
Rejoice, eggs are back on the table!
Art for Little Whiskers
Date: November 5, 2008 | Category: Pets, The Home
Think of it as fine art china for your cat. The Whisker-Wide Bowl for cats is handcrafted in the USA, using 100 percent recycled glass. The bowls are shallow and wide, so they won’t disrupt your kitty’s whiskers while she is eating, and they are attractive enough that they won’t disturb your décor when she isn’t (if that is your look).
The bowls are made by Big Shrimpy, a company that emphasizes manufacturing products that reduce the amount of natural resources withdrawn from the Earth. Big Shrimpy also uses sustainable practices in the company’s day-to-day activities and donates a portion of its annual product sales to a non-profit organization that works to encourage environmentally-friendly business practices.
The dish’s outer dimensions measure 5″x7” and the bowls retail for only $24 each. Is your feline elegant enough to appreciate this gift?
Finally, Good News from the Stalk Market
Date: October 30, 2008 | Category: Food & Drink, Kitchen, Lifestyle
If the only thing more depressing than reading about the state of the economy while you eat your lunch is the plastic cutlery you’re using to chow down with, check out these 100 percent compostable knives, forks and spoons by StalkMarket.
StalkMarket is a line of tableware and packaging made from sugarcane waste recovered from sugar refineries. The crushed stalks, which are normally disposed of by burning, are taken to a processing plant where they are converted into paperboard that is completely safe for your food.
The lines includes a wide array of plates, bowls, serving trays, to-go containers, sandwich boxes and cups all made of the sweet material. All of the products are said to be microwave safe and can handle boiling liquid.
StalkMarket can be purchased by the case at Branch Home or in stores nationwide. So while the news from Wall Street may not bring a smile to your face, maybe your lunch will.
It’s for the Birds
Date: October 30, 2008 | Category: Featured, Garden, Pets, The Home
Even if ornithology isn’t your thing, it’s hard not to be lured by colorful fluttering outside a window.
Outdoor birds can provide hours of watch-time (for both you and your cat) so why not provide them with digs that are just as green as your own? Check out this birdhouse from Doctors Foster and Smith, which is made of 100 percent recycled milk jugs and suitable for any small bird to nest in. Particularly perfect for wrens and chickadees, the roof can be opened for cleaning and the house comes with a wire hanger to dangle from branches.
The recycled birdhouse retails for $19.99. Certainly less expensive than investing in the indoor alternative and guaranteed to be better for all!
Jar O’ Sun
Date: October 29, 2008 | Category: Home Furnishings, Lifestyle, Tech
Need a night time pick me up? Try a Sun Jar. No, it’s not a new cocktail, sorry.
Made with a traditional Mason jar packed with a highly efficient solar cell, a rechargeable battery and low-energy LED bulbs, when the jar is placed in sunlight the solar cell creates an electrical current that charges the battery over a few hours. This energy is then used at night to light the jar, which glows in either blue or orange. The Sun Jar makes a great nightlight, or can be used outdoors in the garden, or as part of a camping or emergency kit. Better yet, tell trick-or-treaters that there is ghost jelly in the jar.
Dining with the Haute Hounds
Date: October 29, 2008 | Category: Featured, Kitchen, Pets, The Home
The Bambu Diner from the Haute Hound has clean sophisticated lines and is handmade using solid bamboo, with a water-resistance finish (of course your dog is far too classy to splash when lapping up agua but still nice for wash time).
The bowls are stainless steel and hold up to 1.6 cups of food or water, big enough to reward even the hardest working rescue dogs. The dining unit measures 14″L x 6-1/2″W x 4″H and retails for $79.95, a small price to pay for making your canine connoisseur a legit eco member of the family.
Or for the mutt on a less extravagant leash, go for the bamboo-less version, ironically from Just Bamboo.
Branch Into Olives
Date: October 24, 2008 | Category: Featured, Food & Drink, Kitchen, Lifestyle
If you’ve ever daydreamed about owning a Tuscan olive grove, well, we can’t really help you out there. However, we can offer the next new thing in culinary staycations! Adopt one of Nudo’s Italian olive trees for a year, and you’ll receive all of its luscious produce. Imagine dunking your bread into your very own oil harvested fresh from a Mediterranean hillside.
For about $85, you’ll get an arboreal adoption certificate along with all the intimate details a loving parent wants to know about their baby’s history. Over the course of the year, you’ll receive two more care packages from abroad, one in the spring and one in the autumn, each containing the oil made from your tree and the olives of 50 of its closest friends and neighbors.
So if a family trip to Italy is not in the offing this year, why not welcome a tasty Italian visitor instead!
