WWW.messoflettersandnumbers.COM

I think part of being green is being efficient with resources, time, and web addresses. I just love TinyURL.com. You can turn any URL into a short, efficient, manageable on. Good for send links.


Try it. Copy this great article on green baby showers in which Satsuma Designs is mentioned http://www.babyzone.com/pregnancy/baby_showers/photos_baby_shower_guide/3 and paste into the field at TinyURL.com.


Now make things Tiny!

New Baby: Green of the Green

Whether you're waiting for the arrival of your first and checking out some green parenting tips here, or have a brood of little green kiddos at home, you'll likely remember the last days of pregnancy in one of two ways. Total recall or complete mental block. I find myself in total recall as I'm 1 days into being overdue with our second child. So fun!

Leave it to Google to help ease my pain. If found a great list of 101 things to do when you're overdue (or close). Robin Elise Weiss, LCCE of About.com is right on! My first pick was number 14 - recalculating your due date. I figured, hey, science and the highest grade electronic baby imaging machines might be wrong. Sadly, I found out the due date calculator put my due date one day BEHIND. Calm.

Guess next I'll tick of #69 and avoid #67.

Oh, and check out The Gift Idea blog where you'll find gift ideas like this fun and zany plush toy.

Enjoy!

Piperlime Goes Green?

While I could only find a handful of eco-friendly collections at Piperlime that use recycled materials in their products, site such as Terrasoles and Simple, the company (a division of Gap Inc.) has a fantastic partnership with not for profit Soles4Souls. According to Piperlime, they've donated over 3mm pairs of shoes to people in need since starting the program in 2006. Kudos!!

Oh and if you're a recently new visitor, you can do a VERY short 5 question survey and donate $$ to one of five charities - Boys and Girls Club of America, my personal pick Dress for Success, among others.

And you may or may need license to consider an investment in this season's hot new riding trend, there are some great albeit not so green selections at the site. Free shipping and returns too. Forgive me?

Giddy up!

Say Happy Holidays in Green This Season

If you haven't started the annual hunt for your clever, elegant and amply photo-holed holiday card, it's time dear friends. Yes, mid-November is a great time to start searching for designs that inspire and holiday cards that are clean and green.

I was excited to find a pretty large range of 100% recycled paper options in beautiful card stock, along with vegetable and soy based inks, topped off by shops that use 100% renewable energy. That does make for a bright holiday season!

Check out Paper Shouts' holiday collection. Cards are printed on 100% post consumer waste (PCW) recycled paper and ship with envelopes in 50% PCW. You can do better than that for envelopes, but it's a start. Prices range from $1-$2/card.

GORGEOUS Chicago-based Snow & Graham stationers has an elegant offering in which they use 100% PCW paper and vegetable based dyes.

And RedStamp.com has a great custom card offering using 30% PCW paper made by 100% renewable energy. They don't saw what kind. Could be offsets, but something's better than nothing.

Now, warm up those fingers, get clicking and practice your penmanship.

Happy green holidays!

How to Adopt a Green Attitude (and Drain)

Getting your family and little ones excited about evironmental stewardship doesn't have to mean sacrifice and Saturday's spent with other volunteers hauling away debris from parks, etc. What it can mean though is taking an active role in your micro-community or neighborhood to ensure that green stays green.

A couple tips to make it happen.

- Always pick up litter you see on the sidewalk or roadside. Keep a couple of recyclable plastic bags in your jacket pocket and car so you'll always have something on hand to carry away garbage. Always be careful with what you pick up and let junior identify the litter while you handle it.

- Adopt a Street or Drain in your neighborhood. Seattle has an excellent program that's becoming very popular to protect the over 78,000 storm drains in our city from clogging after our what seems weekly torrential downpours. Participants are asked to adopt at least 4 drains to keep free of leaves and debri. The city provide reflective vests, rakes, yard waste bag and pick up services in return. GREAT idea for a neighborhood group or a few families to undertake. Same thing for adopting a street.

But look, you don't need a bureacracy to get help the environment. If your city or town doesn't have a program in place, make your own program and promote it on local mom blogs, your Facebook page, a flier at the organic produce market you frequent and anywhere else you can reach an audience. Thanks.

So get out there, enjoy the fall colors by adding a little green to the pallette. Stay dry!

We The [Green] People...

...of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.

Amen!

And thanks to our Constitution and the liberties and freedoms it protects for each of us, organizations that promote and support green living can thrive in our economy. One such is Green People, a full and growing database of green minded companies ready to serve.

I found the Search function by category to be the easiest, as opposed to using the Search Field in the upper right of the home page. Here's how:

- Choose your category, click

- Choose your zip code and distance from home/work you prefer, as close as 5 miles, as far as 200 for more rural communities

- Voila! Shop on and Enjoy!

Secret Revealed: Why Scandanavians Are So Beautiful

Well here's one reason anyway - all organic lotions and potions from a great NW based company called KO Denmark. With a growing collection of totally natural bath and body products, KO Denmark makes feeling and looking beautiful pleasant, easy and best of all green.

Their custom blend of all natural neroli and jasmine flowers is totally exotic and has an incredibly soft, but aromatheraputic fragrance. Check out these ingredients: "organic aloe juice, brazilian jojoba oil, organic black willow bark, indian rose water, neem oil, indian jasmine grandiflorum oil, tunisian neroli oil and vitamine e. Also free from paraben, mineral oil, artificial color, artificial fragrance, glycols or animal testing."

It says to apply daily. Well, of course!

Enjoy!

Green Holiday Shopping: The Do Not Mail List

Bravo Pier 1! The purveyor of all things bright and seasonal has a great link on their site, which is also listed on the back of their catalogs to make it easy and anonymous to get off their mailing lists. I never have a problem calling customer service of any of the what seems like hundreds of catalogs, but it's nice to just get it done online.

Simply go to the remove link and take care of business.

I personally like Pier 1's offering and am equally impressed by their commitment to customer service and letting green minded (and junkmail-phobic) folks have it their way.

Thanks P1!

You Know You're a Parent When...

You sing the much loved folk song Edelweiss (made popular by the Von Trapps in The Sounds of Music) more than 15 times to help you toddler get back to sleep after a 1:30a crying jag that has him screaming MOMMY and you crying, swaying and singing on his bedroom floor. "Hang in there!", I tell myself

Capturing Junior's FIRSTS the Green and Easy Way

There's no greener way to capture your little one's FIRSTS than through digital media - photography, video, and more. But if you're like me, you're overwhelmed with all of the tools and services available to shoot, edit, share and print (on recycled high quality papers) junior's life affirming antics.

Now there's Media Mamas to help you find your way one click or deleted file at a time. The company was founded by four media savvy mommies and is committed to "...supporting healthy families by using technology as a tool for self-expression, communication, and advocacy. " Nice.

They've just debuted their Seattle-based series of workshops from Video Shooting and Editing 101 to one on how to blog your heart out. The classes are great for beginners through power users. Let's hope they start some online sessions too.

Enjoy!

Great Green Gifts

Peekaboo Picks has spotlighted a great list of green gifts and companies to check out in their Ultimate Holiday Gift Guide.

I think my favorite Pick is Luxoskid where creative genius and founder Susi turns mom's (or dad's, grandma's, whoever!) Goodwill or Salvation Army bound garb into one of a kind couture for kiddos. It's an incredible use of otherwise wasted material and oh so green.

Totally brilliant, I say. Check out this knit shift at right. Tres chic, mademoiselle!

Satsuma Designs' founder speaks out about important parenting topic

Yes, best practices for this oh so green and natural ritual - cutting baby/toddler nails! Read on and enjoy.

Skinflash Radiance Booster Pen by DIOR

All right, a little off the green topic, but I realized that this product has given me the energy (or look of it) to go find what is green out there for our families and little ones. For this, I pay homage.

It's Dior's Skinflash Radiance Booster Pen and it's ridiculously great. Here's why I love it.

1. Great form factor. Feels like a nice bold Sharpie in the hand and has a nice heft. The kind of feeling you get when you're holding a good soup spoon. You know, feels classy.

2. Brush applicator. Very soft natural bristles capture the liquid shadow concealer/under eye camouflage and spread it out beautifully below the eye or any other place on the face.

3. Color options. I'm an 002. It comes in three shades that I think would work for most.

4. Name. Radiance Booster. Yes.

Price is high at around $30/$33, but worth the splurge. Enjoy!

You Know You're a Parent When...

You find a nice, half eaten strip of bacon camouflaged in your dark brown family room rug. Yum!