My challenge of trying to be sustainable, chosing organic and lightening my environmental footprint has somewhat relegated to “must do tomorrow” but the elephant in the room has had enough of being ignored!

Thankfully to coincide two things have renewed my enthusiasm.

• The first is the book What’s Mine is Yours – The Rise of Collaborative Consumption by Rachel Botsman.  I’m a quarter of the way through and completely inspired.  I’ll share in another post the gist of the book.
• The second is visiting again the fabulous Reverse Garbage centre in Marrickville (see my previous blog post about this great resource).  This time, my daughter and I went crazy digging in great vats of bins filled with scraps of fabric with a mission to find dusty pinks, shocking purples, muted yellows and all the hues that little girls love.  We ended up with a bag full to the brim all for $5.  So both landfills and my wallet were happy.  And the end result…. A very happy little girl and a renewed enthusiasm from my part..



Just one more – Whilst not an organic wine, Organic Planet Wine is in environmental packaging and the Sauvignon Blanc is delicious.

Take me to Mexico pronto!  Vintage dress from Purple Deer Vintage just dreamily divine for throwing over a bikini and heading off to the beach

Love love but need a new house to fit!  Lichen encrusted boulder photograph by Bob Brown – leader of the Greens political party – (yes it surprised me too that he was a photographer!)

Hello there – I think  you belong on my feet.  Boot by Novacas who are committed to providing animal-friendly, environmentally-friendly, and worker-friendly products

It feels such a waste to just throw them away – after all they weren’t used for that long a period.  I could list them on Ebay and secure a little cash for them (nursing bras are quite popular it seems on Ebay!) but I have discovered a really nice way to pass them on and gain a little charitable glow by donating to upliftbras.org

upliftbras.org are an organisation that provides women in 3rd world countries with 2nd hand bras.  The organisation was borne out of aid workers & tourists in Fiji being asked for 2nd hand bras – often Fijian women would not even have one bra resulting in health & dignity issues.  The program has since spread to other Pacific Island nations and to the Phillipines with over 300,000 bras distributed. Nursing, mastectomy and size 18+ bras are in high demand.

It is such a great, practical concept and I encourage you, particularly if you are a larger size or have been pregnant recently, to have a look through your underwear draw to see if you can donate anything as well.

So what to do? Break my experiment buying new clothes and contribute to landfill with the old, or find an alternate means to attain some “new” clothing.

Thankfully the parameters of capitalism have undergone a shift recently providing a number of ways to secure & pass on clothes without a financial transaction.  Here are some new ways to do so.

• Freecycle – I’ve blogged about this service before – likening it to a secret society.  A fantastic no cost way to offload old clothing.  You do have to be very patient though in terms of securing what you’re after and logged in at precisely the right time something is offered as people snap things up pretty quickly.
• thredup.com – no I haven’t spelt that incorrectly!  I really like the look of this site – easy to navigate with every conceivable question addressed.  It costs $5 to secure a box of preloved clothes to cover admin costs on the site plus shipping. Similar to Ebay, descriptions reflect brand and appropriate season for the clothes.  The downside – they only service US residents at present.
• babyswap.net – US site that looks initially promising but I couldn’t find any clothing for swapping once I did a search?  Perhaps it requires registering but as a US site I would have preferred to browse first, see if there was anything interesting before registering as shipping costs might negate the benefit.
• swapitbaby.com.au - GOLD!!  An Australian clothes swap site utilising a points system – you earn points for items you successfully swap and can redeem those points for clothing.  There is no joining fee.
• shopandswap4baby.com.au – This Australian site merges a swapping system with discounts off items in their “store” and involves both cash & credit.  There is a $20 joining fee.
• mumswap.com.au – A barter site that covers services as well as clothing.  I’ve just registered so will be hopefully doing some swapping in the near future.

Are there any methods I’ve missed?  Please feel free to share.

It is Summer in Australia.  The mercury is soaring, cicadas are singing, BBQs are cranking and icecream stands are making a brisk trade.

Summer is also the season of festivals with promoters capitalising on clear skys to host large scale outdoor events.  Next week, it is the massive Big Day Out touring festival’s turn as it makes a 2 day pit stop in Sydney exciting music lovers with fantastic music spread across 9 stages and 13 hrs/day.  Along with 50,000 others, I’m looking forward to going and hopefully not getting too tired – old lady that I am

Festivals can be all about convenience (ie. disposable) and ultimately fun so sustainable practices are usually far from the mind when going.  But here are some ideas of how you can have fun but also be considerate of the environment.

• Buy a green ticket – In the case of Big Day Out for a teeny tiny additional cost you can offset your carbon via funding the planting of Eucalyptus trees.
• Getting there – Go easy on carbon emissions and take public transport.  Apart from the environment thanking you, it is a great way to soak up the pre-buzz of a festival and maybe have a chat to others about which bands are on their must-see list.  For public transport timetables – http://www.131500.com.au/events/big-day-out-music-festival-2011
• Dehydration – Last year, temperatures peaked at a blistering 42degrees celcius (thankfully I was in air-conditioned comfort having just given birth!).  Next Thursday, predictions are for a balmy 30degrees – not as hot as last year but definitely still able to cause heat exhaustion.  So make sure you take plenty of water – yes there will be water stations but I’m sure they’ll be busy.  Ideally in a reusable ecobottle (there are plenty around so no excuse really – SIGG’s a good brand).  But if it all proves too hard, grab some Fiji Water as they have adopted some positive sustainable practices and are actively trying to reduce their carbon footprint.
• Toilet paper – thousands of people drinking lots of water (not to mention alcohol) = toilet paper running out early.  Don’t find out the hard way.  Take your own paper – and of course make it sure it is an eco-friendly brand – a reminder from an old post on things to look out for
• Use the recycling stations available – don’t be lazy
• If you haven’t yet bought tickets to a festival and are tossing up between a couple – have a look at their green credentials as your deciding vote.   The Greener Festival Awards is a “non-for-profit company that assesses festivals for their environmentally friendly practices and provides information and education for those interested in upping their level of sustainability”.  In 2010, Peats Ridge festival was the only Australian festival to receiving an “Outstanding” award with Falls, Southbound, Womadelaide and Island Vibe securing a “Commendation”.

I’m sure there are a great deal of other ways to be conscious so please comment and add to the list!

Yes, my record hasn’t been entirely clean but I am proud of how far I have come both in behaviour and mindset.

Thought not.

Obesity tends to be associated with excess consumption, a sedentary lifestyle and lots of meat.  Not many vegetarians I would wager are obese.

As most of us know, meat production has a significant environmental impact versus growing vegetables/beans.  In fact the land used for production of vegetables or beans produces 10 x as much protein as land used for beef production.  By foregoing one meat meal a week and switching to vegetarian will both aid your waistline and the environment.

Some great vegetarian recipes

• Absolutely divine freezer burritos that I’ve made a few times now – by the lovely lady behind food blog Shutterbean
• Algerian chilli beans – mmm – the author of blog Morsels & Musings has a whole section on her site devoted to vegetarian recipes and I plan to work my way through them all
• Delicious palak paneer courtesy of where’s the beef site

And for those who don’t/can’t cook and live in Sydney, model Annalise Braakensiek runs a vegetarian catering business that cooks and delivers an organic, low fat, dairy, gluten and meat free meal once a week to Sydneysiders.  I had the pleasure of seeing Annalise speak briefly at a recent GreenUp event and hear about her life growing up on a biodynamic farm and being a vegetarian from an early age.  Her glowing good health is testiment to the benefits of a vegetarian lifestyle.

Either weight loss or quitting smoking invariably end up on most people’s New Year’s resolution list as a new year is such a great catalyst to think about transformation.  And yes I’m one of the many in hoping to lose a little (or a lot!).

For today, apart from the obvious health reasons I’ll thought I’d share with you some of the environmental consequences of the smoking industry in the hope that it might provide some further incentive to keep your quitting dream alive!

• More than 5000 billion cigarettes are manufactured worldwide each year.   China, with around 350million smokers puffing away on an average of 15 cigarettes a day, is a global giant in the tobacco world with the state run producers accounting for more than one third of global market share of cigarettes as well as being the world’s leading grower (the US a distant second).  Whilst across the board, China’s incidence of “food poverty” has decreased (in 1995, in rural areas 28% of the population were considered in  ”food poverty” ) from a layperson’s perspective you have to worry that the lure of the tobacco dollar ($77billion in taxes in 2009) will encourage the government to place an greater emphasis on tobacco farming to the detriment of food production and thereby threaten the gains they’ve made in reducing food poverty.  Not a particularly palatable thought knowing that the production of your cigarette may have made someone go hungry.
• Another tree bites the dust  - I kinda like trees, they sort of rock in a critical nourish the earth way…  What doesn’t rock is second-hand cigarette smoke.  To hear that one in eight trees felled every year are due to tobacco growing or curing (most of the tobacco cured is done by burning wood) is therefore not a statistic that makes my heart soar.  A double environmental blow considering in the first instance this cleared land could have continued to be used as our environmental lungs (ironic really) or cleared for other agriculture crops.  And in the second instance, adding insult to injury, that trees are burned to produce something that is again burned boggles the mind.
• Soil degradation – Tobacco uses up nutrients from soil faster than any other crop which in turn forces growers to compensate with fertilisers.  As a consequence, land used for tobacco growing is unfit for a number of years for any other crops.
• Butts, butts and more butts.  Not a fan of removing butts from the crawling path of my baby at the park not to mention the accumulated litter issues that millions of butts cause.
• Cigarette packs – here’s a novel idea.  If you have to smoke how about re-usable / re-fillable packs.  My hubby smokes and as I type this post there are two empty packets sitting on the computer desk along with a third nearly empty.  Why not bring back the old tobacconist seller from whom you had to go to to refill your own cigarette case.  Might mean a bit of forward planning though as there would be no late night refills when drunk at the pub!

Of course tobacco companies, like most other multinational corporations, are loudly proclaiming their sustainability credentials to make smokers feel OK about their addiction but really the best thing is to not smoke at all!

If you’re one of those people who have quitting smoking on your resolution list I hope I’ve helped give you some further incentive to stick to your goal.  Good luck!

I stumbled across a blog recently written by a remarkable 41 year old man who has been recently been given the news that his cancer will be terminal with the high liklihood is that he won’t be around for next Christmas.  The blog is beautifully written and reinforces how each day we have is precious.  No putting off until tomorrow …

My little blog reflects one of my many goals, the desire to live a little lighter on the world via challenging myself to not buy anything new for 365days and living more sustainably.  I’m half way through and the end of year sales are proving to be a massive temptation.  I unfortunately did give in and bought a top and skirt from a local shop – it was too hard to resist – my daughter was playing with the shop owners daughter (they are in the same year at school) and I was too weak.  But I’ll try and not let this be a set back and get back on the wagon.

What are your goals for 2011?  Please share as I find by writing things down it makes us more accountable.

It’s New Year’s Eve!  And along with a few million or so of my fellow Sydneysiders I will be watching the Sydney Harbour fireworks spectacular from one of the many vantage points dotted along the foreshore.

Currently the sky is a perfect blue, the temperature is sitting at 27degrees and the wine is chilling.  Earlier, up the street for my morning cappucino, I got excited by the definite buzz in the air.  We are very fortunate to live within walking distance of some of the best & popular vantage points (8 in total!) in Sydney for the fireworks and as a result of popularity the whole Balmain Peninsula is closed to vehicular traffic (expect buses & emergency vehicles) from 3pm to midnight.  This results in a stream of jovial people walking, cycling or public transporting throughout the day with the numbers steadily building throughout the day.

The NYE event (pre-show entertainment, 9pm family fireworks, midnight fireworks etc) is a Carbon Neutral Event (and has been since 2008) achieved through the following measures:

• Buying carbon credits to offset all emissions from the event.
• Recycling 80 per cent of all rubbish collected (about 20 per cent is non recyclable waste).
• Using recycled water to clean the streets.
• Distributing personal ashtrays on the night to help reduce cigarette butt littering.
• Reusing props and scenic designs
• Encouraging everyone to take public transport or walk to events and leave the car at home.
• Partnering with World Wildlife Fund, the official charity of 2010 Sydney New Year’s Eve

Post event a Carbon Audit will be conducted to measure emissions to ensure that the objective was delivered upon and any emissions are offset.

I think it is really encouraging that the Sydney Council and event organisers have woven sustainability practices into such a large event as it would be all so easy to dismiss something that adds added complexity to an already enormous task.  It also shows that more Sydneysiders are expecting and demanding environmental accountability.

But enough about seriousness.  It’s NYE.

So crack open that champagne and celebrate.

Happy days

xx

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