I recently went to an event where I received a goodie bag with Jurlique’s Citrus Purifying Mist.

Jurliquesources their ingredients from their own self-sustaining biodynamic farm in South Australia.  They are both paraben and cruelty free.

I love the scent and the way it makes my face feel, but I’m not crazy about how it sprays.  For a spray toner I like a wide spray, however this product is narrow and thus after a few spritzes you have to take your hands and gently rub your face to smooth the product all over.  I like it but probably wouldn’t purchase it for myself due to this.  However, I am tempted to try more of their products as I do like the product (minus the sprayer) and the company’s values.

Jurlique is available online or at Whole Foods.

This article is from LiveScience.  Hopefully this idea starts to spread - it’s great to know making beer can be so light on the environment if done right.  Cheers!

By Charles Q. Choi, Special to LiveScience

posted: 21 August 2009 08:54 am ET

After beer is made, the waste from breweries could help generate power, researchers now suggest.

One problem brewers face is what to do with the thousands of tons of grain left over at the end of the brewing process. In the past, they just sold the waste to farmers who either fed it to their animals or spread it on their fields as fertilizer. However, in Europe, given reductions in cattle breeding and stricter regulations on what waste is allowed on land, neither option is as easy anymore.

“We reached a situation in 2000 where breweries even had to pay to dispose of their spent grain,” said researcher Wolfgang Bengel, the technical director of BMP Biomasse Projekt, a German biomass company.

Instead of a headache, Bengel saw a business opportunity. He had previously taken waste from rice and sugar cane and produced energy from it in China and Thailand, and thought a similar process could be developed for brewery leftovers. Such energy could help fuel the breweries themselves.

“Beermaking is energy intensive — you boil stuff, use hot water and steam and then use electric energy for cooling — so if you recover more than 50 percent of your own energy costs from the spent grain, that’s a big saving,” Bengel explained.

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This is the coolest site!  I don’t have a garden so I have nothing to offer, but I can still take advantage of what other people in my area have to offer.  Don’t be discouraged if no one in your community is on the site yet, it is a new site and it would be great for you to be the first in your area to sign up.  Spread the word and others will follow!  I joined today, you should too!  I did a quick search and within 5 miles of my zip code someone has loads of ichibahn eggplants growing on his rooftop garden and available for purchase!  How cool!

Wish you could turn your excess plums into lemons, or maybe
even a little cash? Use this site to find neighbors to swap with
or sell your excess produce to. Or if you specialize in growing tomatoes, find neighbors who specialize in other produce and
form networks to share in the variety. Even if you don’t have a garden, Veggie Trader is your place for finding local food near you.

Everything starts out small, but we believe Veggie Trader can
become an important resource for growing strong local food communities. Be among the first in your neighborhood to list
your excess produce for sale or trade, and then see what
happens… Give it some time and spread the word. We hope
this site will grow and grow, but we need your help!

Please visit our How it Works page for details on how to use
Veggie Trader, as well as information on permits/licenses that
may be required in your area before you use the site.

Bryan Walsh wrote a great article for Time yesterday about food.  I highly suggest you take a few minutes to read it.  It talks a lot about farming but doesn’t get graphic about factory farming so no need to wait until you’re not eating to read it   It is quite interesting how good, wholesome food costs so much more per calorie than junk such as potato chips.   You also may not realize how chemical laden your cheap foods are – the ingredient list will not show them as they’re fed to the animals and sprayed on the produce.  Oh, the the environmental effects are horrendous!

Somewhere in Iowa, a pig is being raised in a confined pen, packed in so tightly with other swine that their curly tails have been chopped off so they won’t bite one another. To prevent him from getting sick in such close quarters, he is dosed with antibiotics. The waste produced by the pig and his thousands of pen mates on the factory farm where they live goes into manure lagoons that blanket neighboring communities with air pollution and a stomach-churning stench. He’s fed on American corn that was grown with the help of government subsidies and millions of tons of chemical fertilizer. When the pig is slaughtered, at about 5 months of age, he’ll become sausage or bacon that will sell cheap, feeding an American addiction to meat that has contributed to an obesity epidemic currently afflicting more than two-thirds of the population. And when the rains come, the excess fertilizer that coaxed so much corn from the ground will be washed into the Mississippi River and down into the Gulf of Mexico, where it will help kill fish for miles and miles around. That’s the state of your bacon — circa 2009.

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Last night I received a fabulous gift from a dear friend – the InStyle Weddings Book.  It is gorgeous – definitely coffee table worthy for the next year as I plan for my big day.  Although the book itself isn’t about “green weddings” the actual book was a green gift.  Karen purchased the book for me from a used book store.  I know that some may shun giving a used book as a gift, but for an environmentally conscious person it is a wonderful idea.  It truly is gently used – you can barely tell it belonged to someone else – if she hadn’t pointed it out I would have just thought the little rip on the cover came from her transporting it from San Francisco to Chicago.  The point is, don’t think twice about giving a gift that isn’t brand new.  As long as it is in good condition it will still be appreciated and will be less of a burden on the environment.  It is a pretty hefty book and probably took many trees to make, so I feel even better about having this particular book over a new one.

I just discovered on Josie Maran’s blog that she has a new argan oil product that I’m super excited to try!  It looks so versatile – perfect for tossing in my handbag and using on my face and body in a million different ways!

From her blog:

Josie’s best-selling Argan Oil now comes in a stick form! This multi-purpose balm offers all the benefits of the nourishing oil, which includes anti-aging ingredients rich in fatty acids and vitamin E. A head-to-toe spot treatment for dry areas in need of moisture, this soothing balm conditions and repairs skin as it hydrates. Use it to moisturize chapped lips, soothe dry skin, tame fly aways, alleviate itching and stinging from insect bites, moisturize dry cuticles, relieve chafing skin, soothe stretch marks, calm sunburn, soothe waxed skin, and much, much more.

As you all know, I absolutely LOVE Josie Maran Cosmetics.  I found this review of her Argan Oil and wanted to share it with you.  I have a little sample of it that I haven’t tried yet, but after reading this I’ll be using it tonight!  Can’t wait!!

From TiffanyD:  One girl’s thoughts on all things beauty

So this is a more “hardcore” review… almost 2 months in the making!
Over the past few months I’ve been using a new product that I’m so excited about. I had heard of Argan Oil, but I wasn’t really sure what to do with it. In my mind, it was simply a body moisturizer. Got plenty of those. Nothing I thought I needed. So when I first got the Argan Oil by Josie Maran Cosmetics, it honestly sat on the shelf for a few weeks. It was something new that I wasn’t quite familiar with and had no plan on how to use it. When I started experimenting with it and read up on it’s benefits, I realized that it is truly a multi-use product. So first of all, I started using it as a body moisturizer. I used it around areas that tend to get really dry like my elbows. It absorbed super quick and left no residue. Then my mind started working— CUTICLES. Yes!! I would try it on my cuticles. So I did and I was completely impressed. As with a lot of typical products as labeled as actual “cuticle oil”, I get great moisturization and results, but it takes a little while to absorb. With this, it absorbs super quickly so I can literally apply it right before walking out the door, rub it in quickly, and get on with my life without oily fingers. Best part is that I get the same moisturizing results and my cuticles are lookin’ super healthy.

Keep Reading!  There is MORE!

I just found this on another site and wanted to share.  I rarely purchase bottled water anymore, and by rarely I’d say it would be a stretch to say I purchase it as frequently as one bottle a month.  I have to be rather desperate as I always pack my own stainless steel bottles when traveling.

posted by Mel, selected from Food & Water Watch Aug 10, 2009 3:08 pm

Tap water is regulated by the EPA as well as state and local governments, but bottled water is only checked by the Food and Drug Administration. The FDA doesn’t even get to most food plants every year, with some plants going five or ten years between inspections. Though the FDA is supposed to test bottled water at the same standards as the EPA, FDA guidelines are years behind the EPA’s. Here are some of the more disturbing examples:

• Municipal water is not permitted to contain E. coli or fecal coliform bacteria. FDA rules for bottled water include no such prohibitions.

• Municipal water from surface sources must be filtered and disinfected, or it must have strict pollution controls. There are no filtration or disinfection requirements for bottled water at the federal level. The only source-water protection, filtration or disinfection provisions for bottled water are delegated to the states, and many states have adopted no meaningful programs.

• Cities must have their water tested by government-certified labs. No certification requirement exists for bottlers.

• Municipal tap water must be tested for coliform bacteria 100 or more times a month. New York City takes 500,000 samples of its water per year. That’s nearly once a minute all year long. Bottled water plants only have to test once a week.

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Over 300 million golf balls are discarded in the United States each year. That is enough golf balls to stretch from Phoenix to London!

I think this company is great!  Their balls are fully recyclable, they have a great recycle program and will even accept other brands!

Dixon Golf gives a $1.00 ball for ball credit towards the purchase of Dixon Earth golf balls for every Dixon ball recycled in a Dixon Golf Recycle Center located at a participating retailer. Dixon Golf gives a $0.50 ball for ball credit for any other brand of golf ball recycled in a Dixon Golf Recycle Center.

So many paper products are now labeled recycled – which of course is wonderful and always exciting to see.  But – how truly recycled is that paper?  There are two phrases you’ll see – Post Consumer Waste and Pre-Consumer Waste.  The latter is really just left over bits from the manufacturing process which immediately gets re-used – that’s great but they should do that anyway!  Post-Consumer waste is the stuff we toss in our recycle bins after its first life and then gets re-made into something in its second life.  This is the type of recycled paper you should be using.  Pre-Consumer recycled paper is really a joke – of course they’re going to recycle the wasted bits from processing their paper, it makes complete sense – they’re not making  much of an effort there!  The point is – when buying recycled paper products read the fine print and make a responsible choice!  If only Pre-Consumer recycled products are available then that’s an easy choice but otherwise go with Post-Consumer.