On Tuesday we revealed our top picks for eco-friendly holiday cards. But buying a box of recycled cards and sending them far and wide isn’t the only way—or even the best way—to green your greetings. Here are some other ideas: Don’t send a paper card at all! Electronic greeting cards save on paper and shipping. Check out Bluemountain.com, hallmark.com, and 123greetings.com. Go for greener photo cards. Photo cards and foil-lined envelopes cannot b…

How do you like it? We’ve written before about this electronic reading device: The Kindle for Breastfeeding Mothers: Is It Green? We never reached a perfect conclusion. While conventional books are made from trees and travel hither and yon before they reach the reader, the Kindle takes energy to produce–and one day, it will need to be recycled (or thrown in the trash). If you have a Kindle, how do you like it? Do you think of it as…

Happy birthday to us! We’re celebrating three years of blogging (as of last Friday) by reviewing our top ten posts of all time here on the Green Baby Guide. Now, according to our stats, A Fan of Fans has the most views of any post, but we chalk that up to a Googling fluke. So how to do we measure the success of a post? By the reception it gets from you, our dedicated readers! Here are the top ten most-commented-upon posts of all time!* Four of…

Now that the crush of my work as a teacher is done for the summer, we suddenly have lots of unstructured playtime on our hands. My kids still enjoy imaginative play (they spent the morning yesterday pretending to be prairie dogs in a fort made of blankets), but it’s nice to get them out in the sunshine without having to buy a heap of materials or make elaborate plans. Following are some incredibly basic activities for semi-lazy parents lik…

Do green homes always come with solar panels? In fact, the six thousand square foot eco-homes of the rich and famous aren’t as earth-friendly as cozy abodes with smaller footprints. We didn’t just buy our thousand square foot home with a small apartment attached in the back for environmental reasons.  In truth, it was the only thing we could afford and we loved the location. By the way, the incredibly cool picture in this post is not our home.  …

Saving the environment takes time and energy that we don’t always have.  The more I write this blog and raise my kids, the more I’m convinced that sustainability has to include more than just the environment.  To be great parents and environmentalists, we have to sustain ourselves. How?  By enjoying our thrifty green adventures.  By letting go of green guilt.  By embracing progress instead of perfection. And by being happy! Think abo…

About a week ago, my sister suggested a radical idea that changed my life instantly.  It’s obvious, cheap, easy, and effective, but it had never once occurred to me. While she was in the whirlwind of raising small children (and she has five of them!), she took time each week to escape to a cafe with her journal.  For one hour she considered the following questions: What’s working? What’s not working? What can I change? How…

In no particular order, here are my top five—and actually only five green cleaning must-haves (excepting laundry detergent, dishwashing liquid, and dishwasher detergent, of course. Oh, and a broom and vacuum cleaner). Steam cleaner—clean floors, grout, even windows without chemicals. The Wagner power steam cleaner Borax: An eco-friendly, budget-friendly wonder product—Joy turned me onto Borax, which I use to scour the bathtub a…

I remember the day we made our first eco-friendly Trader Joe’s detergent purchase. We loved the smell of our fresh laundry and basked in the green glow of our new standby.  While the large plastic container was an environmental downside, the price was reasonable and the lavender essential oils gave it a crisp, clean scent.  Roscoe helps with the laundry We wanted to switch to a greener detergent for our family’s health and the environment. Gre…

If we lived in New York City, our space would seem immense, but here in Oregon, a thousand square foot home is considered tiny for a family of four.  Walk-in closets, mudrooms, generous pantries and guest quarters are standard on most newer homes which average around double the size of ours. To be totally honest, I have to admit that I’m not opposed to larger homes. Sometimes just the idea of a bigger kitchen causes my chest to ache with longing…