Product Fail #847,656 and #847,657

Ugh! Today I inspected a jar of Skippy Natural Peanut Butter, on the off chance that it was a decent product. The second ingredient is sugar, and the third is palm oil. (Palm oil is one of the most environmentally devastating ingredients in processed foods.) Thanks, Unilever. That product stayed on the shelf, and I will continue to buy the most excellent Vermont Peanut Butter, which is sublime.

And then I accidentally bought a"taco meal kit" instead of just the taco shells. My usual spicing for taco meat is chili powder + cumin + coriander + fresh onions and minced garlic. And that works fine. But I decided to try the "spice pack" that was included with my shells. And here's what stuns me: they managed to put some partially hydrogenated soy bean oil in a simple spice pack. Why, God, why?

If you want something done right, you have to do it yourself. Thankfully, tossing spices into a frying pan does not a big task make.

The Most Inspiring Thing

This video is humbling and inspirational. I wish every kid having a day full of "first world problems" could see it.

Today's Green Washing Perpetrator: Faber-Castell

This is just not cool.In a craft that one of my children received as a gift was this card which raves about the eco-consciousness of the art supply manufacturer Faber-Castell. "100% of our children's pencils are made from re-forested wood," it shouts. "100% of our erasers are PVC and latex free." 

Isn't that great? There's only one problem. The card which carries this info--as well as that photo of a baby seedling about to be planted--is laminated so thickly that I cannot even tear it in half. There is a plastic coating on both sides. 

If a company prints its Eco praises on a non-recycleable piece of... paper? (It's hard to say what this is.) Then how devoted to sustainability can they really be? 

I'm not buying what they have to sell. Literally.

What I Learned About Chickens on my Summer Vacation

No, really. These are not edible.Our chickens are nine weeks old, and it's been a lot of fun so far. There have been a few startling things I've learned in the process, which I thought I'd share:

1. They really are "chicken."

They startle at the slightest noise, including the sound of a garden hose, a motorless reel mower, or a nine year old practicing his cello. To save themselves, they will run into a huddle behind their water can.

2. Instinct is amazing.

We raised these baby chicks from one day old, in a cardboard box. At one or two weeks old we began to offer them various foods to try, most of which were initially rejected. And just like a toddler, they will have a sour reaction to some foods, actually wipe their beaks off on the ground if a food displeases them.

But the first worm that my husband fished out of the compost heap for them inspired the most amazing reaction. It was as if Willy Wonka's Golden Ticket had just been dangled over the edge of the box. That wiggling shape set off a primal riot of desire, and one chick grabbed the worm, then ran all around the box looking for a place to eat it in peace. She was attacked by her neighbors, who took turns grabbing the worm and running in circles. Eventually it was pulled apart and gobbled down.

I'm told that spagetti will set off similar ardor, but I have not tried it yet.

3. They will peck at toenail polish! 

Note to self... wear shoes.

No Goodie Bags, No Peace!

A Giveaway That Won't End Up In the Trash. We Hope.Last summer, the season that my boys turned 6 and 8, I told them we were done with goodie bags. "I just don't want to perpetuate the plastic junk," I told them. "We're going to give everyone a book instead."

There were, unfortunately, grumbles.

In order to ban goodie bags, it is important first to understand why they hold such appeal. The joy is all in the discovery. When those small hands first hold that bag, anything at all could be inside. Oh, the variety! The discovery! But one day later (and sometimes sooner than that) all that treasure is on the floor of your home. And unless mucho money is spent, the things in that back are sub-standard. There may be an underwhelming box of crayons, or a bouncy ball, or a molded plastic figure. Or candy.

So to try to capture a bit of this magic, my turning-8-year-old I bought a stack of "Choose Your Own Adventure" books. They are published by a little Vermont company, and many of the titles are the same as when I was reading them.* We wrapped them in different papers, and nobody knew what title they were getting until they opened them at the end of the party. 

My younger son was trickier, because not all the kindergarteners read (including my own.) But then we happened to find a paper airplane book to give away, and peace reigned in the kingdom.

This year, I stuck to the same No Goody Bags policy. My now-9-year-old and I chose sketchbooks. I found a dozen fancy-feeling hardback books at Blick.com. We personalized them with each child's name on the title page. 

Et voila! A gift we can be proud of.

*Dating myself! Again. 

Thank you to Megan at http://www.sortacrunchy.net and Your Green Resource for linking to this post! I adore Your Green Resource.

Staples Recycled Paper...in a Plastic Wrapper

I take the trouble to buy 100% recycled paper. (Printing is an occupational hazard. Typos which are invisible on the screen seem to leap off the printed page. Weird but true.) 

But I'd like to know why Staples, which claims to make things "eco easy" cannot simply wrap their 100% recycled paper in a paper sleeve? They even have the nerve to print: "every package for Staples brand paper is recyclable." And that's technically true... for those of us who have easy access to #5 plastics recycling. Which I do not.

But recycling paper and recycling plastic aren't the same process, with paper recycling the much more efficient and cost effective of the two. 

Oh my goodness, but this post sounds so grouchy and negative! Wait... let me change that. Reader, you're looking rather nice today. Did you change your hair? 

Truly, I'd rather applaud steps taken than disparage failures. But when a product brags about its eco sensitivity, it would be nice if it were actually true. Not long ago, all paper reams came in paper wrappers. Was that really so prohibitive? Really?

Can Crunchy Laugh at Itself? Yes, Yes It Can

Although my sympathies are very much in line with all that is ecologically conscious and green, I often find the discussion to be too serious. It's true that important topics require weighty discussion, but even eco-nerds like me require a little humor. To that end, Julia's Child is a funny book. But this video, if you haven't seen it already, is simply hysterical. Can Crunchy laugh at itself? Absolutely.

You'll Get Nothing And Like It

Last year I wrote this post for the wonderful Sorta Crunchy blog, about how our family bought no "stuff" during January. It was terrifically freeing, even if the lessons learned were not the ones I thought they'd be!

By Sarah Pinneo

“We’re not going to buy anything in January except food,” I announced at the dinner table, just before New Years.  I’d been feeling overrun with holiday excess.  January would be a perfect month to streamline—to acquire nothing, to refrain from indulgence, to fully appreciate just how fortunate we are.

This decision was met largely by yawns.

“What about ski lift tickets?” asked my seven-year-old. 

“Oh honey,” I reassured him.  “We’re still going to ski.” Or Daddy would rebel. “And buy food, and gas for the car.  Just no stuff.  We just got so many new things in this house, we’re going to take a break.”

“What is January?” my five year old asked.

“Thirty one days,” I told him. 

He waved his Mickey Mouse fork dismissively.  “That’s not so much days,” he said.

And he was right.  It was nothing at all.  My exercise in restraint was petty by any measurement.  Many of the world’s people don’t have enough money for basic necessities.  And even among those who do, there are far more dramatic experiments than mine.  There’s theAtlanta family who gave away half their net worth, and environmental activists who choose to give up even toilet paper.

Baby steps.  Baby steps.

I knew I was going for a smaller statement—I just didn’t realize how small.  Only one item even came up—my seven year old needed a black felt tip pen to complete an art project.  Though I was sure we owned four million art supplies already, no black felt tip or marker could be found anywhere on the premises.

Aha!  A teachable moment.  “I guess you’ll have to use a colored pencil.  Or buy it with your own money.”

No fool, my son.  He asked his grandparents to lend him a pen.  But that led me to explain my quirky experiment to my mother, who immediately assumed the worst.  “Honey, if you’re strapped for cash…” she began.

“No, no,” I assured her.  “It’s an experiment in delayed gratification and ingenuity.”

But it was in many ways a failed experiment.  My son’s ingenuity led him to pry art supplies from grandpa.  The rest of the family failed to notice at all—except for my frightened mother.

It wasn’t until the end of the month that I noticed all the benefits that had accrued to me.

I’d had no idea how much time my silly plan would save me.  The typical four weeks’ onslaught of catalogs went directly into the recycling bin.  “There will be more catalogs in February,” I reminded myself.  Even better—the email address that I use for commerce was opened only to stay on top of all the deleting.  Oh look—a coupon from Borders, 40% off?  Delete without opening.  Take 30% off sale prices at Lands End.  Delete.  J. Crew, Talbots?  Delete, delete.

I’m not much of a shopper.  I rarely buy much from these places.  But what I didn’t realize was how often I opened the messages anyway, and then needlessly lost a half hour of my precious time.  Eureka!  An entire month of deleting junky emails prevented me from dithering over L.L. Bean turtlenecks in size 6x-7, or trolling Replacements.com for teaspoons to replace the ones which mysteriously disappeared since our wedding 12 years ago.

It wasn’t money or closet space that I saved in January.  It was time.

And I put that time to good use.  I wrote two magazine articles, two new pitches, and 12,000 words of a novel.  I made pumpkin pie from scratch.  And not once was I lured by the promise of free shipping, or Exciting Spring Fashions.

When January ended, so did the moratorium.  But I continued to delete and recycle with glee.  At least I did until the moment my older son informed me that both his boots and his shoes were getting tight.  (This from a child who barely notices shoes, so it must be true.)

Then I wasted a perfectly good half hour on shoe sites, only to remember how hard it was to judge things from a pixilated photo.

The boy and I will just have to head to an honest-to-God store soon, when we’re both good and ready.