Archive for September, 2009

Halloween will soon be here and there really are ways to make this celebration a green one.  Here we take a look at 5 simple ways that you can make this spooky holiday healthier for your family and the environment.

• Buy your pumpkins, gourds, apples and other seasonal items from a local  farmer’s market.
• Save pumpkin seeds after carving and bake them. Pumpkin seeds are a healthy snack, plus you can help feed the local birds with the seeds that don’t get eaten in the house.
• Make your own costume or purchase a costume from the local thrift store. Also, donate those old costumes to a local children’s shelter or foster home to help more kids have a fun holiday.
• Pass out organic and fair trade candies. These can be picked up at your local whole foods, Trader Vic;s or other health food store.
• Use recyclable bags for collecting candy. Better yet, take some old canvas bags from around the house and decorate them with a Halloween theme. Even old pillowcases can garner new life with some imagination.

Technorati Tags: canvas bags, green halloween, Green Holiday, organic candies, pumpkins, recycle costumes

Part of any great costume for Halloween can be the use of face paints. Whether you are going for that undead look or are looking to get more colorful, there is an eco-friendly way paint up the face.

So, instead of buying some over the counter and chemically created paints try making your own at home with the following simple recipe.

3 tblsps. Cornstarch

1 tblsp. Flour

3/4 cup Karo light corn syrup

1/4 cup water

½ tsp. Liquid food coloring

Mix cornstarch and flour together in a bowl. Gradually stir in Karo syrup and water until smooth. Divide mixture into individual containers as needed and tint each one with the food coloring of your choice. Leave one batch untinted to play with.

Technorati Tags: diy eco face paint, green halloween, make face paint

One way to get a little greener with Halloween is by making some homemade costumes. Here we check out ThreadBanger’s instructions for making your own fairy wings for some pretty Halloween costumes.

Technorati Tags: green halloween, make wings, threadbanger fairy wings

Tying the Halloween holiday into being eco-friendly is not that much of a challenge when you step away from the commercialized plastics and artificially sweetened candies.

One online site GreenHalloween.org is creating and offering simple ways to help us all have a greener holiday.  With sections that cover information for parents, kids and schools this site is a good way to learn about making the Halloween holiday  better for the planet and our children.

Information and links on organic, fair trade candies and costumes are offered in addition to ideas for greening up community trick-or-treating as well.

For more information: www.GreenHalloween.org

Technorati Tags: green halloween, halloween

Six months ago, the EcoExistent house began to activaely go green with the goal of getting as green as possible while living in an urban apartment on a budget.

The journey thus far has been quite  interesting and I thought that today, we would share the things that we have done on our going green quest.

Read the rest of this entry »

Technorati Tags: Going Green, gree apartment

Our camera is currently down at the moment, so no plastic tally pictures but we can lay out the text.

Household Plastic Waste Sept. 7th-13th

6, 2 liters of Mt. Dew

2, 2 liters of Pepsi

12oz bottle of BBQ Sauce

17 sliced cheese wrappers

16oz bottle of Spic and Span

The soda is a large amount of our plastic waste and we are currently working on phasing that out in an effort to make our own pop at home.  Of the plastic waste that was used this week the soda and the Spic and Span were the ones that were newly bought.

We do not have recycling services in our area, so this upcoming week I am going to try and upcycle what plastic I can around the house.

The bigger plan this week is to watch spending on new plastic purchases to start whittling down what plastic items are brought into the house.

Technorati Tags: household plastic waste, plastic waste, platsic tally

Today, we are going to take an overview look of some plastic related news going on around the world.  All news items listed here are in favor of reducing, reusing and even banning types of plastic from headliners so far in September.

Technorati Tags: plastic bag news, reuse plastic bags

We will be doing the fist weekly posting on our own plastic waste for the week this coming Sunday.

Today though, I though it would be interesting to share links on the some of the people who have gone plastic free and or are trying to go plastic free.  The links listed are all personal blogs from people who are sharing their plastic free environmental experiences. Each on is a wealth of information if you are looking into reducing your own homes plastic waste.

Beth Terry: Fake Plastic Fish

Living Plastic Free-Year Three

Life Less Plastic

Azura Skye

Emily’s Feel Good Food Blog*no-plastic

Technorati Tags: plastic free, plastic free blogs

Right, so today we are starting to keep track of out plastic waste as a part of Beth Terry’s Fake Plastic Fish challenge.

At the end of this week, we’ll have a tally and photos of our households plastic waste.

There are some  things that we already do that helps us cut down on plastic usage.  The following are the plastic aware steps that we take now:

• We’ve recycled plastic mix buckets from a local bakery for use as our garbage cans. They have handles, are easily washable and have been re-purposed since they would not be recycled in our area.
• We don’t purchase or use plastic garbage bags, just the buckets.
• We use recycled shopping bags and cloth tote bags to carry items.
• In the event we do get some plastic shopping bags from the store, they are saved for making plarn. (Our plarn rug has not been completed yet but has been started)
• We use bar soaps that come in cardboard boxes, no washes in plastic bottles.

Now, we could be doing a lot more in the way of our plastic usage and we are certainly going to try.  The main component that we are dealing with at the moment is in our budget and in purchasing items that come in plastic wrappings and containers.

Technorati Tags: garbage bags, household plastic, plastic use, recycle, recycled plastic buckets

That’s right, the household behind EcoExistent is taking the Fake Plastic Fish plastic trash challenge.

We’re also going to get a little more personal around here and share what works for us in living green while learning from others who are going green as well. Terry is currently working on a new site design from scratch and I’m working on a new logo design. We are hoping to take things from plain newsy to honest living and still newsy with a dash of more color.

Just to get some feedback, here is one of the logo’s that I’ve come up with. If you could comment or e-mail us what you think, that would be great :)

And on that note, the challenge begins tomorrow. I will be keeping track of our households plastic trash as we go through the challenge and share how we are going to cut back, recycle or upcycle more by reducing our plastic purchases at the same time.

Technorati Tags: ecoexistent and plastic, fake plastic fish challenge, green and personal, new logo, site update, take the plastic challenge