Ecominded Mama

An eco-friendly Halloween?

I had hoped to make my daughters' Halloween costumes (in whole or in part), both to save a little money and to make them more unique, but the request for costumes this year stumped me: mermaids -- matching mermaids. I considered sewing costumes for about 5 minutes, then remembered that my sewing skills are pretty pathetic (I'm working on that, though). I looked online first and found several contenders, but I wanted to be true to my eco-values and shop locally. The problem: None of the stores near me (independent stores or mega-chains) had matching mermaid costumes in their sizes. So after all that driving around, I ended up ordering the costumes online. Not exactly a shining environmental example! I'm making up for it a little by having the girls carry their Halloween goodie bags that I bought at a local store and that still look great after two years of trick-or-treating. It's something, right? Right.     

The DivaCup

I started looking into organic tampons and maxi-pads a few months back because I was worried about the bleaching process used in the manufacture of conventional tampons and the dioxin in tampons (a known carcinogen) that's a by-product of that process. (The FDA says there may only be trace amounts of dioxin in tampons, but it still concerns me.) The environmental aspects -- adding however many tampons and pads to landfills each month, as well as all of the manufacturing associated with making, packaging, and shipping tampons -- was also a concern. I was astounded by the cost of organic tampons -- $7.69 for a box of 16 on Drugstore.com. Then I considered buying reusable cloth menstrual pads (there are lots of funky ones available on my beloved Etsy.com), but I can't deal with more laundry and the idea of hand-washing them grossed me out.

I decided to try the DivaCup. Inserting it takes some getting used to, but once you get the hang of it, it's simple. I love that I only have to worry about it twice a day, and I've had virtually no leaks once I figured out how to insert it correctly (a sure sign that it's not inserted correctly is if it's leaking or it's uncomfortable -- you shouldn't feel it at all). I've used it for two cycles now, so I feel confident in recommending it and can say with equal confidence that I will not go back to using tampons or maxi-pads. I bought my DivaCup on Amazon.com, but Drugstore.com (and I'm sure other vendors) also sells them. If you have more questions, the message boards on MenstrualCups.org are fantastic.

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P.S.: Check out the article Flow and Tell on Grist.org for reviews of the Diva Cup and other eco-friendly menstrual products. I was happy to see that the cup is the most eco-friendly menstrual product of all since it requires very little water to clean. [added November 21]      

How to Recycle Anything, Part 2

I posted a link to Real Simple magazine's How to Recycle Anything article a while back, which included items starting with letters A through M. Here's N through Z. 

One of the most surprising tips is related to the manila (or "goldenrod") envelopes that are common in offices. They are not recyclable because they (as well as dark or fluorescent paper) are saturated with dyes that are hard to remove. One of the experts quoted in the article, Marti Matsch, says "It's what we call 'designing for the dump,' not the environment." It never occurred to me that dyed paper would be impossible or cost prohibitive to recycle. I'm only going to buy white envelopes and paper from now on. 

Goodbye clothesline, hello second indoor clothes rack

It's gotten downright chilly where I live, so I decided to put away my clothesline until next summer. I've read that you can dry clothes outside even when it's cold (in fact, as long as it's not below freezing), but after one load was only partially dried after being outside all day I decided it was time to buy another indoor drying rack.

I bought a new one from Target, but I wish that I had done a little research first. I debated in the store about the wood one versus the metal one, and decided to give the metal one a try. It was twice as expensive as the wood one ($20 -- oddly, the price online is higher than it was in the store), but I figured it'd be more stable. It works fine, but it's essentially no different than my wood one. And now those negative reviews on the Target site are making me worry that I'll have to buy another wood one anyway. Grrrr. My recommendation: Buy a wood clothes drying rack.

No longer a one-car family + car-buying research sites

I was very proud of the fact that we managed to live our suburban lives with only one car, but today we broke down and bought a second car. Our first was becoming increasingly unreliable, and after the car had a cooling-system malfunction and my husband and the girls were stranded we decided that we needed to buy a second car. Our first will now be the "station car," the car my husband drives to the train station on days when he doesn't walk there. If we put 1,000 miles on it in the next year, I'll be amazed.

Our starting criteria for buying the new car were simple:

1. Seats 5.

2. Has high fuel economy.

3. Ideally under $30,000. 

I desperately wanted a Prius, but it's too small for us (we rented one while on vacation and loved it, but it was cramped with two gigantic car seats in the back; plus we needed room for our dog). Two sites were infinitely helpful in our search: MyProductAdvisor.com (which asks you a series of questions, then recommends cars that meet your criteria) and Edmunds.com (which gives you all sorts of technical information, reviews, pricing information, and advice). We narrowed our list to four cars that we test-drove, the Subaru Outback, Subaru Forrester, Saturn Vue Hybrid, and Honda CR-V. And today we bought (drum roll, please!) the CR-V.