EcoParents Mtg this Tuesday: Safe Personal Care Products (and FREE samples!)

REMINDER: EcoParents Meeting TOMORROW (Tuesday)!!

Linden Hills EcoParents: Safe Personal Care Products
Tuesday, June 30
6:30-8:30 pm
Linden Hills Park Building (43rd & Xerxes)

Jesse Avery, wellness manager for National Cooperative Grocers Assoc, will speak to us about personal care products, such as lotions, soaps, make-up, sunscreen, etc... What should we look FOR and what should we AVOID, both for ourselves and our families?

FREE SCHWAG BAGS OF PRODUCT SAMPLES DONATED BY LINDEN HILLS CO-OP!! Plus, one lucky attendee will win a gift bag of with some seriously good stuff, including Four Element Healing Cream, SunLeaf Natural RosyGeranium Shampoo & Body Bar, Veriditas Botanical Organic Lavender Essential Oil, Wyndmere Revitilizing Aromatherapy Air Freshener, and Awesome Family Total Skin Care Organic Moisturizer!!

Hope to see you there!!! All are welcome...feel free to spread the word.

It would be helpful if you could drop me a line (via email or Facebook) to let me know if you are planning to come so that we have enough samples. But, even if you don't RSVP, please feel free to come. (If we run out of schwag bags, we'll just do a drawing...)

Freemarket.com - get or give FREE stuff, and keep it out of the landfill!

You know how "One man's trash is another man's treasure?" Well, Freemarket.com takes that into the digital age!

Haven't heard of FreeMarket yet? It makes it so easy to prevent stuff from ending up in the landfill!

FreeMarket is kinda like Craig's List, BUT everything is free! You can put up a listing if you're LOOKING for something, or if you want to get RID of something...big or small. There's no "buying" or "selling," but just "exchanging" of items.

Here's our story: we got a new grill this past weekend, but our old one still worked. It needed some replacement parts and some elbow grease to really get it back in tip-top shape, but all the essential pieces were totally functional. So, I logged on (for free) to Freemarket.com and posted a free listing for it (completely honest about it's condition)...and within 20 minutes, I got a response from someone who wanted it...and 90 minutes later, he came to pick it up! It was that easy. And I can rest knowing that it is getting another life somewhere else rather than in a landfill! Items don't necessarily have to work even...often time, folks are looking for parts or scrap metal.

I've had friends and neighbors use Freemarket.com to get rid of nearly everything - kids stuff, leftover building materials, etc... I even have one neighbor who got rid of her ENTIRE GARAGE - yes, the structure itself! (She was going to build a new one, so put up a listing for her garage doors...and someone contacted her offering to tear down the garage in return for taking all the salvaged materials! So, she got her garage torn down and hauled away for FREE...and the materials were salvaged into another project!)

Freemarket was developed locally and now been expanded to several other metro areas nationwide. The site was developed and is still run locally by the non-profit Eureka Recycling. The goal of Freemarket is simply to keep things out of the landfill. Listings are categorized into useful categories and grouped by location, plus you can search by keyword and even by new listings, so it makes it pretty easy to find if you're looking for something specific. The Twin Cities Free Market does not accept listings for live animals, plants, automobiles, motorcycles, services, firearms, child car seats, garage sales, items for sale, or items for trade. The categories of things they do accept include:

• Appliances (air conditioners, microwaves, washers & dryers)
• Children’s Items (bunk beds, cribs, furniture, toys)
• Electronics (answering machines, cameras, computers, TVs, VCRs)
• Furniture (chairs, couches, desks, dressers, tables)
• Home Decor (carpets, lamps, rugs)
• Home Renovation (cabinets, countertops, lumber, shingles, sinks, tiles)
• Lawn & Garden (dirt, lawn furniture, lawn mowers, patio bricks, wood chips)
• Marine Equipment (boats, sailboats, motors, trailers)
• Musical Instruments (band & orchestra equipment, music stands)
• Pet Equipment (aquariums, cages, dog houses, food bowls)
• Recreation & Exercise (bicycles, camping, exercise & sports equipment, ski machines)

Do you have a Freemarket experience? Share in the comments section if so and let us know about your experience.

Food Waste & Chemical Exposure - in today's Strib.

Two great articles in today's Star-Tribune that might be of interest:

What a Waste, an article about just food waste. According to the article, between 25 and 50 percent of all food produced in the country ends up being thrown out...which actually leads to methane production when it breaks down in a landfill (instead of being turned into great compost)! What a waste...of food, of the resources used to produce & transport the food, and of our $$ to buy the food! Can you believe that 18% of what goes into landfills is actually food waste? The article also has suggestions on how to reduce food waste.

Human Hormones, Chemicals a Bad Mix, an article about the research into the effect of various 'everyday' chemicals and the potential impact on human health. The article also offers suggestions on how to reduce exposure to potentially harmful chemicals. One of the suggestions is to be aware of the ingredients in cosmetics and other personal care products...
If you want to learn more about what to look for in personal care products (and what to avoid), plan to come to the next EcoParents meeting!

Linden Hills EcoParents: Safe Personal Care Products
Guest Speaker, Jesse Avery, wellness manager for National Cooperative Grocers Assoc
Tuesday, June 30
6:30-8:30 pm
Linden Hills Park Building (43rd & Xerxes)

Organic Lawn Care Services

Here is a sampling of some local companies that provide organic lawn care services.

• Organic Bob - our guest speaker last month, 952-240-0814
• Green Guardian - "If you can't say it, we don't spray it!" 651-646-2900
• Rainbow Lawn Care - a division of Rainbow Tree Care, 952.922.3810

Each one is a little bit different, so check out their websites and/or give them a call. In the past, we have used Green Guardian services.

Please leave a comment if you have experience with one of these service providers...or if you know of others.

Donate your used toys...for a good cause

Totally Kids in Bloomington is accepting toy donations to benefit the locally headquartered "Parents United Against Austism." They accept any and all gently used toys, including puzzles and games, which are especially helpful for children on the autism spectrum.

A great way to prevent your toys from filling up a landfill...and know that your toys are benefiting children with along the autism spectrum!

Totally Kids is located at 7876 Portland Ave S in Bloomington; 952-881-2425.

Safe Personal Care Products - June 30 EcoParents

Ever wondered what's REALLY in all that stuff we slather on our bodies & faces? What's good for us, what's innocuous, and what's potentially concerning? Well...we've confirmed a fabulous speaker for the next EcoParents meeting to help us understand!

Jesse Avery, wellness manager for National Cooperative Grocers Assoc, will speak to us about personal care products, such as lotions, soaps, make-up, sunscreen, etc... What should we look FOR and what should we AVOID, both for ourselves and our families? He needs to be in the know since he advises co-ops on what to offer to to their customers, and he is going to share his expertise with us!

Linden Hills EcoParents: Safe Personal Care Products
Tuesday, June 30
6:30-8:30 pm
Linden Hills Park Building (43rd & Xerxes)

Mark your calendars now...

Nine Mile Creek Watershed History Lecture - June 15 (FREE)

Upcoming free event of note:

Nine Mile Creek Watershed District 50th Anniversary Publication: Preserving Heritage & Environment, by Deborah Morse-Kahn

Public Lecture & Conversation
Edina Public Library
5820 Grandview Square, Edina
Monday, June 15, 6:30
FREE & OPEN

Deborah Morse-Kahn is a public historian and photojournalist who has written extensively about people and places in the Upper Midwest. She holds a masters degree in American Regional Studies, and brings the skills of archaeology, sociology and archives into her daily work. Ms. Morse-Kahn lives in Linden Hills and has participated in various LHiNC initiatives, helping us to keep an eye on historic preservation issues in our community!

A Green 1st Birthday!

We happily used our Linden Hills Co-op catering gift certificate (thanks EcoParents!) and had fun thinking up ways to green-up the party! Here's the scoop...

• I bought re-usable, bamboo party streamers from the Linden Hills Home Store.
• All other decorations were things that I already owned, such as candles, carriage lights, a re-usable table cloth, potted flowers, etc.
• We had a bonfire in our backyard after the party, and instead of purchasing wood, we burned leftover scrap wood from a house project.
• We purchased the birthday cake from Whole Foods, which does not use artificial flavors, colors or preservatives. They also use all natural ingredients and no hydrogenated oils.
• Invitations were sent via email. This was hard for me, because I wanted a paper invite to put in her scrapbook! So my compromise was to create a photo invite, and just print one for her book. Then the 'real' invitations were electronic, with a picture slide show attached. I thought this was a good compromise. It felt silly to create a 'fake' invite, but she'll never know the difference.
• We purchased whole fruit and cut it up ourselves (melons, etc) instead of buying pre-cut fruit in plastic packaging. We normally do this, but it's especially important when serving large quantities. Plus it's fresh and cheaper!
  
• We had paper bags for recycling next to the trash, and they were clearly labeled. I've put bags out at parties for recycling in the past, but have always been frustrated that people don't use them. Well der...labeling them helped a lot.
  
• The thing I'm most proud of is that we successfully accomplished NO GIFTS! I went to my neighbor's one year old birthday party recently, and the invite had said 'no gifts' but everyone showed up with a gift anyways! I was baffled and concerned that the same thing would happen to me. I didn't want a bunch of (excuse my language) plastic-crap-from-China. So I used a little humor in the invite, and said...

"Now listen up...NO GIFTS. For real, we mean it. If you ignore this and bring something, you're going to make all the other guests feel bad. Seriously. How else can I emphasize this... NO GIFTS NO GIFTS NO GIFTS! Thanks."

People thought this was pretty funny. At the same time, they realized that I was serious. Only one person brought a gift, and she justified it by letting me know that it was from a garage sale. Which I actually thought was a great idea! I think I'll try asking people to bring only hand-me-downs or 2nd hand gifts next year!

Overall, I think we did well. There is always room for improvement, but hey...I've got many more birthdays ahead to practice!

Reminder: Non-toxic lawn care mtg TONIGHT!

EcoParents: Non-toxic lawn care with Organic Bob!
Monday, June 1
6:30-8:30 pm
Linden Hills Park

Bob will talk about some of the health and environmental dangers associated with chemical-based lawn care, then present us with non-toxic alternatives for both lawn care and pest control, including do-it-yourself organic options. (He also provides organic lawn services.)

See you there!