From Envy, to Greed, to Pride, to.... Green?

When I saw my dear sister a couple of weekends ago, I eyed her new shoulder bag with cool envy. It was bright and springy, and the perfect size to carry all my essentials without being big enough to double duty as an overnight bag. I ran my hand over it's smooth fabric. My sister helpfully chimed in "Isn't it great? The fabric is made from recycled water bottles!" Now, of course, I had to have one. You know, to support the economics of the recycling life cycle.

Robyn got her Lilly Bloom bag, made with Karma Bloom fabric, from good old Marshall's - a favorite of ours for "I would never buy this full price, but since it's such a bargain..." retail therapy. To sweeten the deal, I also had a gift card for Marshall's, thanks to the recent return of a gift that didn't fit. 

So, despite the fact that I need another purse like I need a hole in the head, I gleefully came home from Marshall's last weekend with this lovely shoulder tote for a mere $7 of my own money:

It goes with everything!



It's got the perfect sleeve pocket in the back to hold my goes-everywhere-with-me notebook!

For the first couple of days, I was wearing the buzz of an awesome new purchase on my face. This bag made me smile. It was pretty, it looked cute with all my coats, and it was the perfect size.  Better yet, the pleather was just decorative, so I didn't need to worry about the pervasive purse-dooming pleather fraying that has sent more than a few of my fave purses to the heap. Or so I thought.

Wouldn't you know it, 4 days into my Fabulous New Life With My New Purse, the pleather on the sort of helpful/sort of bewildering top handle came unstitched:

Of course it did.

Now I'm debating about taking it back or just snipping the handle off all together. I don't particularly like bags with multiple handle options, but this bag is so light and soft, the top handle was actually kind of helpful for picking the bag up from the floor. Plus it added to its "I'm a tiny satchel bag! Look at how cute I am!" appeal.

The handle failure also serves as an excellent reminder that stuff is just stuff, and it will all end up being discarded eventually. I certainly didn't NEED this purse. I am enjoying it, though, broken handle and all. This whole experience is prompting me to be more structured and methodical about the new leaf of "not buying stuff" that I am supposedly turning over. I'm going to stew over this a bit more and get back to you with a more goal-oriented approach to STOP the madness of my stuff buying.

Cold-turkey has worked pretty well so far with the Diet Coke and the hair dye. Could I dare try to detox from buying things in a similar fashion? Gasp! Man, I'm glad I got this purse before I made that kind of deal with myself.

Graying Along

So it has been almost 2 months without any dye, and here's how the center part is coming along.  It is kind of like watching plants grow. I watch my roots spread in the mirror as though I were tracking the progress of a sprout I started from seed. 

I saw a dear friend this weekend who I hadn't seen in person in a very long time. She's been reading the blog, and told me that she was surprised that the gray was not more noticeable. Then I finger-combed my hair into a center part and tipped my head down for her. Then she saw something more like the picture above. She commended me for taking the plunge, and said she thought it looked great.

Thanks, Rachel dear. I've actually gotten a couple of compliments on the silvery streaks so far. Les wishes I could just halt the process right now and keep my subtle, somewhat hidden stripes along with the rest of my brown hair. I told him that the blogosphere would have none of that.

I saw a young woman with a short salt-and-pepper pixie cut this morning, and I wanted to give her a high-5. She is definitely the youngest person I have seen so far to rock the "I'm under 30 and I'm going gray" look. Honestly, she looked more like 22. If I could pull off the 80s spike, I would give it a try.

Hair color is a big part of our identity, though. When Rachel and I were out this weekend with our other friend Jill, we managed to convince her that she is, in fact, a redhead. Which was news to Jill.  Sort of like Les insisting that he has brown hair.  I'll give him "dark blond", but he does not look like a brunette to me. I guess hair color is in the eye of the beholder too!

I don't think my brown is dark enough to constitute "salt and pepper", so can I just go with "mink" or "silver dusted"?  What do you think?

The Urban Homestead

Well I have been feeling semi-disgusting all weekend due to various allergy-related ailments, so I got to dig into this book that I checked out from the library last week:

The Urban Homestead, by Kelly Coyne and Erik Knutzen, is a beginner's handbook for people who long for a bucolic eco-friendly homestead, but also want to take advantage of all the awesome green-living benefits of living in the city. Think "Little House On the Prairie", but for multi-unit buildings. Coyne and Knutzen encourage us to plug into the real community opportunities the city provides, be thankful for public transit infrastructure and walkability, and then get creative and see how you can make your current space as self-sufficient and earth friendly as possible.

I gotta tell you, I am LOVING this book. I may even go out and buy it. I can't renew it because there is a que of other desperate urbanites eager to get their hands on it's treasure trove of very doable ideas.

When I read about it online, I figured all their ideas would be out of my reach. I live in a one-bedroom apartment with zero access to a yard, balcony, or an external fire escape. We can't even have window boxes. I can't build a grey-water system. I can't grow my own fruit trees. I can't raise chickens. I have no desire to install a composting toilet. And I probably can't install solar panels on anything I own.

But guess what I CAN do?
- Collect my "heating up the shower" water to water plants, soak nasty dishes, or gravity-flush the toilet
- Make my own yeast and bake my own bread from scratch
- Grow salad greens and herbs in the window
- "Guerrilla garden" in the alley, or sneakily in the fire escape windows
- Make my own jam, vinegar, vegetable stock, butter, cheese, or yogurt out of things that would usually be dumped in the garbage
- Make a teeny-tiny compost bin to use just for my indoor window boxes
- Make all my own cleaning supplies
- Start making a list of things to look for in a future apartment or house

And this one little book has instructions for ALL of those things, and a zillion more ideas to custom-build your own urban homestead.

I feel really compelled and twitchily excited to try these things.  "Why bother?", You may ask. You can buy perfectly good butter, tasty and healthy bread and salad greens in any grocery. Maybe it is part nostalgia. Pulling radishes out of our garden, snapping fresh peas into my mouth, gathering wild raspberries from the brambles that grew on the edge of our yard, sitting impatiently at the counter waiting for the fresh bread to be cool enough to eat - my childhood was full of this kind of "homesteading" stuff. I watched my mom can vegetables and make home-made bread from scratch when I was a kid, but it never occurred to me that someday I would want to do those things myself.

If I dip even further into the psychology of my urge to homestead, I'd tell you that it saddens me to think that in one generation, we've completely lost the ability to make our own stuff. My mom MILKED COWS. She made butter and ice cream. She drove a tractor, grew vegetables, composted, and knew about crop rotation, darning socks, chopping wood, and preserving food. All of these things were part of daily life on the farm. She brought some of those things into our family life and our little garden. So did my dad, but I never once saw him darn a sock or pick any vegetables. He could change the oil in the car, though, and knew how to repair just about anything that crumbled or broke around the house.

I, on the other hand, do not know how to keep a basil plant alive in a pot on the windowsill. And sadly, I don't have the chance to learn about those things from my parents. Thank God for the internet.

I don't have an expansive yard. There are no wild vines growing anywhere near our micro-home on the third floor of this prissy courtyard building. But I do have a kitchen, some creativity, and a hubby who will support my ridiculous trial-and-error attempts to bring the simple life up to our little corner of the world.

So stay tuned, good readers! I have a whole list of projects to try out for you. Grow my own yeast culture? Don't mind if I do!


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Friday Faceoff: Time vs. Money vs. The Planet

Today's Friday Faceoff is more of a pondering than a definitive contest. But I've been thinking about this a lot this week - How do you decide between these three things?  Are you generally consistent throughout your life and home, or do some decisions lean towards time, some towards money, and some towards Green?

I'd love to say that I always choose The Planet. Obviously, that would be a lie, or I wouldn't be sitting next to a small hill of used tissues when I could have used a handkerchief. But who uses a hanky? Is it even sanitary? Most people, even very earth-gentle people, will not blink about using disposable tissues (especially during allergy season) or TP (thank heaven), but what about other things?

Open my freezer, and you will see 2 frozen pizzas. Les and I love frozen pizzas, and thankfully, there are some very tasty options for around $5. They save time and money for sure, but they come in a cardboard box and are wrapped in their own little plastic shrink-wrap. They were shipped around the country and kept at freezing temperatures for their entire lifecycle. Our little pizzas have a pretty big footprint. Do I care? How much should I care?

I actually HAVE more time to put into things like cooking, composting, recycling, and general greening. Some of those things save money, even though they take a lot of time. Sometimes, though, it's a heckofa lot cheaper to buy a $5 tasty frozen pizza from Trader Joe's than to buy all the ingredients to make one. And then you have the chopping, and the inevitable food scraps. Hm.

I'm going to surf around and try to find an InfoGraphic about this. I'll let you know if I find a handy flowchart... But in the meantime...

When I was thinking about a reasonable way to make choices about these things, I had an idea to make a "Green Budget". Sort of like a monetary budget, but for the environment. The idea goes something like this: Determine all the positive things I'll commit to do every month/year and put them in one column, then put all the things I'm willing to wiggle around about, then list all the things I am not in a position to scrap or start doing in a third column. The goal is to make sure that the positive column is at least longer than the third column, and to start moving things from the middle column over to the first.
Like this:

Green Commitments
Change all the light bulbs to CFLs or LEDs
No more paper towels or napkins, except to clean up dog-related messes
Meat-free diet
Only local, organic eggs
Soy or almond milk, freeze leftovers before expiration date
Switch over all cleaning products to some combo of baking soda + vinegar
Use only bar soaps with little/no packaging in bathroom
Make my own laundry detergent
Let my gray hair grow out!
Walk or take public trans as much as reasonable
Use only reusable grocery bags
Recycle everything I possibly can
Stop buying ANYTHING new unless it can meet some stringent criteria
etc, etc....

Wiggling, considering
Trying again to grow our own herbs in the window?
Get a bike?
Community composting?
Selling and/or donating a LOT of our stuff?
Clothing swap?
Sewing up all the holes in ALL of my socks?
Handkerchief? Maybe?
Only replacing clothes items as they wear out, and trying to source organic cotton as much as possible?
Not buying ANY new plastic?
Sell one of the cars?
Limiting any food that comes in a package?
Try canning seasonal produce this summer?

OK to take a pass on...
Home-made/uber green dish washing detergent, until one that works is developed
Giving up the dog pee-pads in winter and just mopping the floor every single day
Trying to eat truly seasonally in Chicago in winter
All-natural deodorant
Upgrading to bamboo or organic cotton sheets, at least until the new wedding sheets have deteriorated
Going full-vegan
etc, etc....

Maybe that is a lot more trouble than it's worth. But for me, making a list of the things I am doing and/or commit to start doing helps me feel more "OK" about using a paper tissue or buying a frozen pizza. It can be helpful to see that you've already made some progress, and get an idea of things you're willing to try. Maybe that's just me. Thoughts? How do you make decisions about stuff like this?

Didn't miss it after all

So I had some Diet Coke on Friday. It was my first soda (pop, to my fellow Rockfordians) in about a month and a half. Les and I were out for our Friday Pizza, and we gave up alcohol for Lent, so we were both feeling a bit lost in the beverage department. Gooey pizza with a glass of water never really feels quite right. So, I took some friends' suggestions and decided to have my Diet Coke, since it was from a fountain (no cans or bottles) and could be considered a "special treat".

After I placed my order with the waitress, I leaned back in the booth and imagined what that fizzy, diet-cokey deliciousness would taste like when it finally arrived. When the waitress set it down on the table in front of me, I drew the straw up to my lips and took a luxurious slug of pop and savored it for a second before swallowing. 

But guess what? 

It did surprisingly little for me. I enjoyed it, don't get me wrong. And there's nothing quite like pizza&pop. But I didn't wake up in the middle of the night and ponder sneaking out to the 7-11 for another fix.

So, anyway, the moral of the story is that I'm reassured that pop can be a "sometimes treat" without re-wrapping its tentacles around me. Or, maybe the longer I go between Diet Cokes, the less and less I will want it. Wonder if it works that way for all my vices?

Friday Faceoff: Tom vs. Joe - Natural Toothpaste Showdown

About a month ago, Les and I tried out Tom's of Maine natural peppermint anti-cavity toothpaste, which I bought from Whole Foods for about $5. 

Tom's of Maine touts itself as a socially responsible company (there are pictures of Tom's of Maine employees planting trees together in matching t-shirts right on the box) that uses healthy, natural ingredients. I felt pretty good about this purchase, even though it cost almost twice as much as a tube of Crest Multi-Care for half the amount of actual toothpaste in the tube. Despite the price tag, I felt better about getting started with naturally flavored dental care. And bonus - It tastes deliciously minty and has a pleasantly smooth texture.

I really thought I had found our new toothpaste on the first try.  But not so fast..... My post about Sulfates prompted me to read the ingredient list more closely.  And wouldn't you know it - Even squeaky clean Tom's of Maine uses Sodium Lauryl Sulfate in their toothpaste.  Blast.

Luckily for this experiment, our 5 oz tube of toothpaste only lasted us a few weeks. So when I was in Trader Joe's last weekend, I ducked into their tiny personal care section and snagged a tube of Trader Joe's natural toothpaste.

The label checked out - no sulfates. Plus it only cost $2 and some change for a 6 oz tube. Bingo! There was, of course, a catch. You can instantly tell that it is "all natural" because it tastes like what you might expect some home-made toothpaste to taste like. Baking Soda with a hint of mint and chalk. But it seemed to work well enough in the breath department, and it was a lot cheaper than Tom's, so again I made the mistake of thinking I had found our new toothpaste.

Time to check in with our good friends at The Good Guide and Skin Deep.

Tom's gets an impressive 8 out of 10 on the Good Guide. Healthy, enviro-friendly, and socially responsible to boot. Skin Deep gives it a 3 out of 10 for toxicity. I'm kind of surprised, considering it contains SLS, but I guess it is in a small enough concentration that it doesn't knock it out of low-risk range. Other Tom's toothpaste varieties got a 4 or even a 5 for toxicity, so it's better to check out the specific formula before assuming it is free from compromising ingredients.

The formula of Trader Joe's toothpaste I bought didn't show up on either the Good Guide or Skin Deep, but overall even Trader Joe's "natural" lines of personal care products averaged around a 6 out of 10 on the Good Guide, scoring high for health but low for environment and society. 

So it looks like the winner of the Friday Faceoff is gonna be Tom's of Maine! Despite it's price tag and SLS inclusion, it looks like the better bet overall. Which is good for my mouth and taste buds, but sad for our budget. I'll check out other stores for deals on Tom's toothpastes. 

I should note that the Skin Deep toxicity ratings for a couple of Tom's of Maine products were startlingly high. So, again, it's a good idea to peruse the ratings before assuming that their wholesome corporate culture makes up for potentially problematic ingredients.

Healthy Lunch FAIL

It only looks tasty.

Les came home with a 1LB package of soba noodles (Japanese buckwheat noodles) last week, and their addition to our pantry inspired me to dig through my ideas-torn-out-of-magazines binder for the soba noodle salad recipe I had saved from Women's Health a few months ago.

It has all kinds of good things in it, including orange juice, edamame, carrots, and sesame seed oil. I picked up an orange and some scallions at the grocery store last week, and looked forward to what I thought would be a quick toss-together healthy meal. Plus, it made 4 servings! Plenty to eat for dinner, save for work lunch, and give some to Jackie and/or save for Les.

I started prepping around 7 last night, snacking on string cheese with Auggie and nibbling carrot nubs as I shredded 5 carrots into wispy strips. By the time I was done shredding veggies, whisking dressing, cooking noodles and edamame, grating orange zest and then juicing the orange, I was famished. And it was 8:30. And then I read these dreaded words, which I apparently missed when I scanned the instructions the first time: Allow to chill at least 30 minutes before eating for the flavors to mingle.

Grrrrrr.... I toasted an English Muffin and shoved the covered bowl into the fridge. Cheese and muffin for dinner it is!

So I was really REALLY looking forward to tucking into my hard-earned superhealthy lunch today now that it had had 16 hours to mix and mingle.

I dove in, started chewing, and waited and waited to taste something.  Here's what I tasted: Wheaty, chewy noodles with orange juice and soy sauce.

Gross.

I picked out a few dainty edamame, stirred it around again, and gave it a few more bites. But it was a no-go. And now I am lunch-less and hungry, so I will have to go out in search of edible food. AND I have a big bowl of leftovers in the fridge that will sadly end up in the garbage.

The soy-milk/whole wheat/oatmeal/blueberry muffins I made this weekend fared much better. They look pretty stumpy and weird in photos, though, so they didn't get their own post. Win some/Lose some.

This time, a Rave

I am generally reluctant to cop to my love/hate/fascination/repulsion relationship to Martha Stewart in mixed company. Partly because she's fallen from her pedestal as the Domestic Goddess of upwardly mobile America and become more of a character and a brand than a creative maven. And partly because she's kind of anathema to my newly sprouted "Less is More" shifting. But I gotta love her for reuniting people to their glue guns and inspiring millions to try DIY. Even when the project is so ridiculous you have to use her name as a verb to describe it. As in, "Oh my gosh, my roommate is a total Bridezilla. She is expecting us to Martha Stewart 300 handmade escort cards with embossed butterflies and paper-cut flowers for her reception."

Anyway, all that to say, I too have replaced aspirations of Martha Stewart-style LIVING with dreams of simplicity, gentleness, and far less stuff  (hand-made or otherwise). So I was skeptical of her revamped "Whole Living" magazine (formerly "Body and Soul"). But, the covers were pretty and I had cancelled all my other magazine subscriptions this year in a bout of frugality and waste-reduction. And I missed them. So when an email promo told me I could get one year of Whole Living for $10, I bit the bullet and subscribed. Because blogs are great and reducing waste is super, but man, I love me some magazines. Real paper magazines, with pretty pictures and pages that fold over at the corners.

I've gotten three issues so far, and I have to tell you that I've dog-eared so many pages, the designation has become rather pointless. Especially the issue I received yesterday. Seriously. I'd tell you to go out and buy it/borrow it/steal it from your acupuncturist's waiting room, but if you did, I would have far fewer interesting blog posts to write because Whole Living stole at least 7 of my blog post ideas in one stinkin' issue. I guess that makes my job easier, because they've been kind enough to do the research for me. So now I don't have to look up each cow milk substitute one by one to see the calorie, fat and protein content OR look for recommendations of how to use each. They put it all into one handy table. Which I now have to decide if I will plagiarize and/or how to properly site the info on the blog. This issue gave a how-to for indoor composting, using avocados as moisturizers, and making the transition towards veg or vegan. All that info for less than a dollar AND a zillion beautiful pictures to tear out for my cheesy vision board? WIN!

The only real caveat I see of the magazine is that you have to read it with the fact that they ARE trying to sell you stuff very present in your mind. And remember to cross-check every product they recommend with the Good Guide and Skin Deep rather than relying on the biases and preferences of Ms. Stewart's marketing people. If you can wade through the BUY ME! mulch nestled in between all that great general information, it's a fun and useful read.

Of course, I should say that I am in no way compensated for this or any of my product reviews, and no one is sending me anything for free (I WISH they were, but alas). So these ramblings are purely a product of my opinion and experience. Your results may vary.

A quick and quiet rant.

I'm feeling totally overwhelmed by all the awful things in the news today. Earthquake devastation - like total apocalyptic, worst-nightmare-nuclear-Friday kind of devastation. A farm house in PA burning down with 7 children inside. A guy being sentenced to prison for lighting the family puppy on fire in front of his children. Seriously. Too much terrible news.

The handful of photos of things like a Japanese rescue worker beaming down at the 4-month-old baby he just pulled from the wreckage and the adorableness of Cuteoverload notwithstanding, I truly feel like I might start dry heaving from intolerable levels of World Wide Terrible.

I've been pondering the pros and cons of a media fast. No news, no Huff Post, not even Dogster (so sooooo many sad stories of animal cruelty, I just can't take it anymore). Technically I guess that means I should shun Facebook as well, since so many people post news stories on their wall. Is that the best solution?

Give me (healthy, live) puppies and rainbows! I can't take it anymore!

Every time I feel overwhelmed by the suffering, pollution, pain and apathy in the world, my first inclination is to pack up and move to some yet-to-be-determined idyllic place where I can grow my own veggies, run in the grass with Aug Dog, and read and cook and write with Les. From that platform of peace and calm, I will begin to recruit other community-minded peeps to come join us. Not a utopia. Not a big barn-raising self-sustained farm town per se. Just a cluster of dear ones where we could really be IN each other's lives and families. Sharing things. Celebrating. Carrying each other's burdens.

Les and I were hanging out with some dear friends this weekend and we started talking about our wedding last May. Jessie and Eric (and many others) had done an enormous amount of work to help prepare for the wedding and even more work the day of. I thanked them again for all their help, and Eric reminded me that usually the bride's family is left to scurry around and quietly make sure everything goes off without a hitch. "And, in your case, that is us". A simple, beautiful statement about what we can and should be for each other. Even when the world feels like it is coming apart.

So anyway, who's with me? Location recommendations gladly accepted.

Word Nerd: Sulfates (Or Sulphates, if you are British)

Sodium Laureth Sulfate (SLES) and Sodium Lauryl Sulfate (SLS) are ingredients that clean things and make nice foamy suds. Unless your shampoo, body wash, or toothpaste label exclaims that it is "FREE!" of those particular sulfates, it probably contains them. They are cheap ingredients, and they work.

So what is so bad about them? I like clean things (like teeth and hair) and I also like some nice foamy bubbles to prove to me that my cleaning agents are cleaning. Is it just me, or have we all really convinced ourselves that lather means something is "working"? Would you want to use a shampoo that didn't produce any suds? I think it would be weird. Anyway, back to the investigation...

The good folks at Snopes.com looked into the claims that SLS and SLES are cancer-causing, and came up with ziltch. In fact, they trace the sulfates-cause-cancer scare to a shampoo contamination back in the 1970s that found that some shampoos contained trace amounts of carcinogens. But sulfates were not the culprit, and the two malevolent ingredients have since been removed from shampoo. Now, I'm not as eager as Snopes to get behind the "If the FDA allows the ingredient to be used in personal care products, it must be perfectly safe!" sloganeering, but maybe these sulfates-of-doom have gotten a bad rap. Let's keep reading....  

The main health problems associated with these ingredients are skin/scalp irritation and diarrhea if you ingest too much of it (thus the warning labels on toothpaste). I read elsewhere that they can also promote brittle hair/split ends, which the conspiracy theorist in me bets is a kind of cyclical marketing: The product you use to prevent something actually causes MORE of it, leading you to buy more product... But that's just my ramble.

Skin Deep Cosmetic Safety Database give SLS a 3 out of 10 on the hazard scale, but still lists quite a scary array of possible toxic effects, including: cancer, neurotoxicity, organ system toxicity, skin irritation, and a handful of "lesser or emerging" concerns about this ingredient. Snopes may have determined that sulfates are not related to cancer, but I'll take "One or more in vitro tests on mammalian cells show positive mutation results" as a flag that perhaps they are best avoided.

Skin Deep gives SLES a 4 out of 10 on the hazard scale, with the main concerns being skin irritation and organ system toxicity.

If you decide you'd like to try to avoid SLS and SLES in your home, better start reading labels. I was pretty distressed to discover that even my Tom's of Maine toothpaste has SLS in it. Grr....

According to this page of NaturalHealthCentre.com, there are all kinds of things that contain SLS or SLES:

Soaps
Shampoos
Bubble-baths
Tooth paste
Washing-up liquid / dish soap
Laundry detergent
Children's soaps / shampoos
Stain Remover
Carpet Cleaner
Fabric glue
Body wash
Shave cream
Mascara
Mouthwash
Skin cleanser
Moisture lotion / Moisturiser
Sun Cream

Bottom Line: Sodium Lauryl Sulfate and Sodium Laureth Sulfate may not be foaming you into an early grave. But on the other hand, they may be. For my future purchasing decisions, I'm going to tread lightly, look for low concentrations, and try to avoid it if at all possible.

Do "New Sandals + Free Shipping = Joy"?

I got an email from Zappos yesterday with the subject line "Sandals + Free Shipping = Joy", and for the first time ever, this type of marketing messaging gave me pause.

What really gives me joy? Sandals? I think if I'm honest with myself, I would have to say yes. Sometimes, new sandals (especially if bought on sale) do bring me some joy. That buzz of a great, cute, thrifty find does make me feel light and airy and jubilant from time to time. There is a reason why it is called Retail Therapy; for many people, scoring a good buy elicits a real feeling of happiness. At least for a while.

Read an interesting take on whether the happiness of purchasing something is the same as the happiness of possessing something on The Happiness Project blog. It's written by a non-shopper, so maybe it is less bias than my "Yay!!!! Pretty Dress! It's mine! All mine!!" attitude.

The G3 experiment is already starting to prompt me to question whether the little happinesses of buying stuff is really the kind of happiness/joy I want to cultivate in my life. I don't know if I'll ever be able to turn down a really good deal (um, Jackie and I scored some GREAT thrift store deals last weekend, both of mine were worn today, in fact, and I am very much enjoying them), but I think it is valuable to put more thought into what I choose to buy. Mindfulness is not an easy thing to grow, but you have to start somewhere.

So, maybe new sandals do bring about some flutters of JOY. I don't think there is anything inherently wrong with that, as long as your/my budget priorities are straight. But with a little more mindfulness, I'm hoping to draw my heart back to true Joy in my spirit, and true Joy in Jesus rather than in stuff. But, come to think of it, He wore sandals too! I wonder if he had to buy them, or if people just gave them to him? Hmm....

The Great Coffee Mug Debacle of 2011

Oh, for the love of Pete. I can hear your eyes rolling in your head. "Really? Really, she's going to write about coffee mugs again?"

Yes. Yes I am. Because apparently, I am no longer authorized to operate a travel mug containing hot liquid. I spilled on myself/my belongings/the car not once, but twice yesterday. Les demanded that I buy a new 4-star rated travel mug immediately, before I give myself 3rd degree burns or destroy my cell phone or something.

This is the mug that I have decided will solve all my life's ills:

Contigo 16-Ounce Double Wall Stainless Steel Vacuum Insulated Tumbler

It is made of stainless steel, and it gets the highest ratings on Consumer Research. And, it comes in pretty colors. But it costs $20, plus shipping, etc. Which just seems dumb. I guess in a cost-per-use calculation, it does pretty well, but I'm skeptical about it's actual awesomeness due to my inherent inability to use a travel mug properly. Can it really be that great?

We have 3 or 4 travel mugs in our cupboard, but I have never made it to my destination without getting coffee all over myself with any of these mugs. Like, ever. Not once. They leak from the seal, they leak from the mouth opening, they leak when they are full, they leak when they are supposedly empty. It drives me crazy. And it has made me very reluctant to carry one on my person, or to brew my own fair trade coffee + oat milk + raw sugar in the mornings because I don't want to end up wearing it by the time I get to the train stop.

But despite Les's insistence that I go ahead and order the darn mug already, I began thinking up other cheaper, less "go forth and buy stuff" options. And I came up with this:

The brilliant glass bottle with plastic screw-top lid that I got with Argo tea inside at Whole Foods. Pretty good seal, very drink-able mouth. But it's made of glass, so it probably won't stay hot for too long. Which is OK, because I can take off the lid and re-heat it.

Which would burn my hands, right? Well, not if I could insulate it somehow....

I'm pretty sure Les will not want to be seen with me if I walk around the city with an errant sock as a coffee mug snuggie, but whatevs. I'll give it a try this week and let you know how it does on the Travel part of the "travel mug" designation. I just carried it around the apartment this afternoon. I'm sure I could find a more attractive sock, if this dingy brown one is just too stupid.

Makes me laugh at myself as I remember that I once went to a church in town (that some of my dear friends later attended and now call home) that I decided was "way too crunchy" for me.  A judgement that was based on my observation that several of the congregants arrived to church drinking hot tea or coffee out of mason jars, and would screw the lids back onto the jars when not in use. I could not handle that kind of green-ness at the time. I bet they would laugh at me with my bottle-in-a-sock. Deservedly.

Naturally-flavored coffee

OhMyGoodness, I am SO Excited! I came across this post today on Design Sponge, and the hair on the back of my neck stood up... it was like someone in the blogosphere has been READING MY MIND!

After much hand-wringing and head-scratching, I have been a bit vexed about how best to enjoy my needed caffeinated jolt and the marital benefits of sharing a morning coffee habit with my hubs, while cutting out the artificial flavor crap and loads of sugar I still need to make it drinkable.

I haven't always been a coffee drinker. The first time I ever went to Starbucks more than twice a year (one pumpkin-spiced latte and one non-fat, no-whip peppermint mocha) was in grad school, when my clinical supervisor at the hospital liked to treat me to a "hot beverage" every once in a while. She loved Starbucks, and I really wanted to go on these casual little field trips with her, so I had to start being more adventurous with the menu. I was afraid she would be unhappy if she paid $3 for me to drink a hot tea I could have made myself for free in the break room. I started branching out into flavored latte land on our little coffee breaks. Soon, I was hooked on the "skinny vanilla latte" - espresso, skim milk, and sugar-free vanilla syrup.

It's not that espresso is so bad for me. Or skim milk, really, even though I am now moving my way into almond milk or maybe even oat milk (watch for a future post about the various "non-milk milks" out there). But the syrup. Oh, the delicious syrup that makes all that burnt-coffee bitterness so drinkable. I have tried plain lattes, without the syrup, and I just end up dumping packets of sugar into them. Not a great swap.

The whole global coffee/fair trade/social justice considerations of a java habit will have to wait for a future post. But for now, let's just rejoice that someone else has taken the time to figure out some natural flavor options for your daily cuppa.

Now I have even MORE incentive to get a proper travel coffee mug: I can mix up my home-brewed flavored concoction, pour in some almond milk, and take it with me every day. Genius. I am so excited about this.

And when I get home from work today, I'll post this week's Friday Face Off. Just as soon as I decide what to write.

Silver-Haired Boys Have it Easy

I was walking to the train from my office this afternoon and a handsome 30-something guy crossed my path. I'm very happily married now, so I can honestly say that the only reason this guy got more than a glance is that he had glorious salt-and-pepper hair (mostly salt), and I was wracked with jealousy. He didn't look old - he looked hip! He looked fashionable and confident. And I wanted to punch him right in his face.

It is hard for me to imagine rocking the salt and pepper. I like my dark hair. I like that my highlights remind me of caramel syrup drizzled on a hot-fudge sundae. But it has been about a month now since I got the highlight foils, and the demi-permanent dye used on the rest of my head is beginning to fade out. Here's a look at my scary center-part, and a reminder of why I part my hair dramatically to the side that has the lowest concentration of gray so far:


See, I wasn't kidding.

The only guy I sort of know personally who is young, hip, and has an infuriatingly cool mix of black and white hair actually IS a rockstar. Like, plays in a very cool band. Lucky punk. The chances are quite high that I will NOT look like a rockstar when my hair grows in gray.
Can you think of one woman celebrity under the age of 50, other than Storm from X-men, with silver hair? Men have Anderson Cooper and a wealth of good-looking bald guys to support their decision to go with the natural gray flow of their prematurely aged hair. Women have a comic book character, and a handful of other older, wiser movie stars who can also afford fabulous hair cuts and even more fabulous clothes to keep them looking young and vibrant. It's going to be a bit trickier for me.

Les and I peered at my spreading gray last night and I made him promise me that he would still love me if I let my hair grow out all the way gray AND that he would tell me immediately if the gray really bothered him/turned him off. We pinky-swore, so as least I'll have his honest feedback as I continue into the great unknown.

Last night I had that sinking feeling like I could not do this. That it was not worth it, even as an experiment, to look like an old lady. But then I remembered that I have told a bunch of people now that I am growing out my gray, and I can always dye it back. That is my new mantra. I can always dye it back. I will convince myself to think of it as an adventure, and experiment, and a public service. And then suck it up and remember that the whole reason I decided to gray in the first place is to let my body de-tox and to save the planet some of my chemicals. Maybe I can make it cool. Maybe I can "bring it" and not care what other people think. Maybe. I'll keep you posted.

Investigating Your Stuff: The Makeup

So the other day I let you take a look inside my shower so we could investigate the relative goodness/badness of my shampoo and soap and stuff. There were some surprises in there, including some Whole Foods shockers, but my bath products are flowers of purity and rainbows compared to some of the stuff I have in my makeup cabinet:

Let's go through the highlights reel first:

Physician's Formula pressed powder:  6.7 from the Good Guide, and only a 2 out of 10 for toxicity. Bonus - it comes in a refillable, bamboo compact with very little packaging. Dig it.

Physician's Formula Organic Concealer Stick: not listed in the Good Guide, but a tiny little 2 out of 10 on the SkinDeep ratings. Works pretty well, too.

Bare Escentuals loose powder foundation: No info on the Good Guide (weird, considering it is one of the best-selling product lines at Sephora), but only a 3 on the toxicity ratings which I consider excellent for foundation. Hooray! No problems keeping it, since it's expensive and lasts a looooong time.

Burts Bees Blemish Stick: 7.7 on the Good Guide, 2 on the SkinDeep toxic ratings. Works pretty well.

And now for the morass of petroleum-based, organ system toxic, highly inflammatory carcinogens otherwise known as "the rest of my makeup"....

Tarte cheek stain: only a 5.5 on the Good Guide, and a 4 out of 10 for toxicity. Tarte now has an eco-line that scores slightly better. Bummer. I've had this stick for a long time, and it works pretty well. I'll probably keep it, since I use so little of it...

Cover Girl Eye Shadow: 5.1 on the Good Guide, and 5 for toxicity. We all know those colors are not found in naturally occurring substances, right?

Olay Regenerist moisturizer: 5.1 on the Good Guide, 5 for toxicity. This made me heave a big sigh. It really does work SO well. But a few months ago, I decided to try out Burt's Bees moisturizer, because it HAD to be better, right??

Burt's Bees Moisturizer: The one I bought is not specifically listed in the Good Guide, but similar products score around 7 (Pretty Good!) BUT, SkinDeep still rates it as a 4 for toxicity. Better than Olay, but not a ton better.

Rimmel mascara: not listed in The Good Guide, but gets a scary 6 out of 10 on SkinDeep.

So, what else is in that mess of a cabinet? Mostly lipglosses. Tarte lipglosses were iffy, with a 6.8 on the Good Guide and a mediocre 4 on SkinDeep. The other odds and ends include items that I couldn't find in either of the listings or didn't use often enough to really ponder. I'll take an "after" picture to let you know what is left after the Big Purge.

The only things left in my bathroom to scrutinize are the medicine cabinet items like toothpaste and deodorant. Both of those could get their own thrilling post, what with all the scary crap they put in toothpaste to make your teeth whiter, your breath sweeter, and your insides slowly melt. And don't get me started on deodorant! We might be rubbing breast cancer into our armpits every morning! Well, we may be. I don't know. I'm going to look into it for us.

In the mean time, get over to www.skindeep.com and www.goodguide.com and take a look at your makeup. I'm beginning to think that the "anti-aging" gimmicks are actually effective just because we are smearing preservatives so faithfully into our faces every morning.