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Whole Story » Blog Archive » Are Your Body Care Products Truly Organic?

Fri, 08 Apr 2011 11:42:43 -0400

Whole Story » Blog Archive » Are Your Body Care Products Truly Organic?

Fresh Start

Thu, 10 Feb 2011 08:22:04 -0500

Good morning all,

It’s been a long time since we’ve been active on our site, but things are going to change! We moved the site over to the fantastic Tumblr platform and will be posting more and more often.

Growing is Forever (by Jesse Rosten)

Wed, 09 Feb 2011 15:46:00 -0500

Growing is Forever (by Jesse Rosten)

"The minute you settle for less than you deserve, you get even less than you settled for."

Wed, 09 Feb 2011 15:19:16 -0500

“The minute you settle for less than you deserve, you get even less than you settled for.”

- Maureen Dowd

Awesome idea! The WWF format is a PDF that cannot be printed...

Wed, 09 Feb 2011 12:26:22 -0500

Awesome idea!

The WWF format is a PDF that cannot be printed out. It’s a simple way to avoid unnecessary printing. So here’s your chance to save trees and help the environment. Decide for yourself which documents don’t need printing out – then simply save them as WWF.

via Swissmiss

Save as WWF, Save a Tree : Home

Wed, 09 Feb 2011 12:17:51 -0500

Save as WWF, Save a Tree : Home:

Awesome idea!

The WWF format is a PDF that cannot be printed out. It’s a simple way to avoid unnecessary printing. So here’s your chance to save trees and help the environment. Decide for yourself which documents don’t need printing out – then simply save them as WWF.

Support your local CSA’s!

Wed, 09 Feb 2011 11:27:11 -0500

My sister, Lauren, volunteers at a local CSA in her community, and in return for her work there she receives a share of the produce each week. Lauren always raves about how fresh the produce it, and having just come back from visiting her and tasting the food, I have to agree. Inspired by her, I decided to seek out a local farm that Zach and I could get our produce from. We love Whole Foods, but the opportunity to support both local AND organic farmers is too good to pass up.

I first did a little research on CSA’s as I’m not entirely familiar with the concept. CSA stands for Community Supported Agriculture, and in essence, if you sign up for one, you purchase a “share” of the farm’s produce for the week. Since the food is from a local farm and not being shipped thousands of miles from another part of the world or country, you can be sure that the fruits and vegetables that you are getting are super fresh. Sound amazing? We think so. Read more about CSAs here.

My initial Google search for a farm near me landed me on the site Local Harvest which is a rather wonderful database of farmers’ market, farms, restaurants, and grocery stores. Put in your zip code, and voila, you get a lovely list of local fare. Read more about my other farm find here.

Little did I know, there are so many local and organic opportunities in my community! Zach and I decided to sign up for one of the local CSA’s this past week. The Local Food Stop is a CSA that creates a bag of fruits and vegetables from the local and regional farms for members. A weekly menu is published, and you sign up for the share that you would like. Zach and I opted for a “regular bag” for this week to see how that would go.

Ordering was easy enough, and we paid for the food online. Pickups are either on Wednesday, Thursday, or Friday. This past Wednesday, I anxiously awaited picking up the food. The pickup location was right down the road from us and conveniently in the same direction as our grocery store. So, armed with what I knew we would be getting, I stopped at the grocery store first for some staples, and then swung by the pickup location on the way home.

The pickup location was at a local antique store. I didn’t notice anything outside, so I went inside. I was so confused given all of the antiques - where would I get my vegetables? A very nice man inside saw my confused look and pointed me in the right direction. On the front porch (I had come in the back entrance), was a table with labeled bags sitting on it. I pulled my car around and excitedly picked up our food. I couldn’t wait to get it home and see what was inside!

Here’s the bag we got:

and it had a nice little tag on it telling us what we got:

As you can see, ordering from a CSA does have some “risk” involved in that some items are not always available. On our little list, it said that grapes were not available this week even though they were on the order list.

Just look at the wonderful produce we got this week! YUM!

Unfortunately, our collard greens did not make it into our bag as promised, but the CSA director nicely offered to throw in something extra next week to make up for it.

Did I mention that food is a wonderful decoration to have in the house? Zach and I have these wonderfully colorful bowls - throw some food in them and you have some pretty vibrant and fragrant table decorations.

The best part of the whole experience was the new recipes that we tried. Zach and I got two wonderful cookbooks, How to Cook Everything Vegetarian: Simple Meatless Recipes for Great Food and Passionate Vegetarian out of the library and we have been trying some new recipes from them, particularly since we are getting some foods in the CSA bag that we wouldn’t normally buy in the store. Cheers to experimenting with recipes!

Some of the wonderful things that we have cooked this week:

Parky’s Southern Braised Kale with Sweet Potatoes

Summer Squash and Zucchini and Herbs in Parchment

And here’s a picture of the yummy dessert we made to top it all off: Peach Pie in an Oatmeal-Almond Crust

Have any of you had any experiences with CSAs or local farmers’ markets? I encourage you to discover what’s grown locally in your area and to share your experiences with us. The taste of the food is definitely worth it, not the mention the benefits of keeping trucks off the road and planes out of the air just to bring food to our tables.

Volunteering at a Local Farm

Wed, 09 Feb 2011 11:27:00 -0500

In searching for a local CSA (read more about this here), I discovered a local farm within minutes of my house that had a volunteer day. Zach and I would love to have our own garden, but living in a condo means no land of our own to grow on. We have our own little Topsy Turvy Planterwhere we grow some tomatoes and herbs, but I really wanted to get some experience in an actual garden. Well, a local farm is even better!

The farm close to me is Above and Beyond Farm, and volunteer days are on Wednesdays. After a quick e-mail to the woman who runs the farm, Jessica, I was ready for my first volunteer day at the farm.

I was amazed when I drove down the road towards the farm. I could not believe that there was a farm so close to my home! It was like a beautiful respite from the busy world. Walking through the entrance gates, I was faintly reminded of reading the Secret Garden as a child. It’s just beautiful with all the green trees and sunshine!

Here’s the garden once you enter the gate:

We spent the morning weeding the raised beds as well as the crops planted in the ground. We were joined by two other groups of regular volunteers of both adults and kids. With such wonderful conversation and company, the morning passed by quickly! After weeding, the kids of the group brought hay over to the worm bin and broke up vegetables to feed to the donkeys. Another volunteer and I helped to tie the tomatoes so that they would grow towards the sun. I didn’t know much about doing this so it was a great learning experience. For these tomatoes, a stake is planted in the ground next to the tomato plant, and as the plants grow, you take a piece of string and tie the stem to the stake so that the plant grows upwards. Here are the tomato plants:

Here’s a close-up shot of a tomato plant that I tied.

Finally, I learned how to harvest chard and basil. I’ve always just pulled the basil leaves off of the Topsy Turvy planter that we have, but I learned that when you harvest basil, you want to pick the center stem when there are five leaves growing out together. In the picture below, I have my fingers wrapped around the stem that should be cut:

Here is the basil in a raised bed. It smelled divine. I wanted to roll in it; it smelled so good!

When one harvests chard, one should take the outer stems, and only two or so per plant.

Here’s the chard - red and green varieties:

Jessica kindly sent the volunteers home with some wonderful chard and basil. When I brought the basil home, my kitchen smelled unbelievable.

I’ve never cooked chard before, so I looked in the books that we got from the library and found a recipe in How to Cook Everything Vegetarian: Simple Meatless Recipes for Great Food.

We made Roasted Quinoa with Potatoes and Cheese and Chard with Oranges and Shallots. I’ve never had quinoa roasted, and if you haven’t ever before, it’s definitely worth trying. The flavor is unbelievable. The chard recipe with oranges had a nice light, summery, citrus flavor.

Here’s the preparation:

And here’s the finished product - it was really good!

This past week was a rather exciting trip to the farm. We did some more weeding, and then placed hay underneath the cucumber plants. Then we helped Jessica make a worm bin. That was really neat. We used donkey manure layered with newspaper and regular dirt to make the bin. Jessica has some wonderful chickens who will love the worms that come from the worm bin. I also met her goat, geese, and donkeys this week.

Tip to the wise, though: when you volunteer, don’t lock your keys in your car. I decided to leave my keys in my car so that I wouldn’t lose them while in the garden. Well, I certainly didn’t lose them when they were locked in the car!

That night, we made chard with carrots and sugar snap peas. YUM! With the left over basil, we made some delicious pesto.

I can’t wait to see what exciting things I’ll learn the next time I visit the farm and what new foods we’ll try. Have any of you volunteered at a local farm? Made any exciting new meals? We’d love to hear your ideas!

My Makeup has WHAT in it?

Wed, 09 Feb 2011 11:23:33 -0500

I have always heard that makeup can be quite toxic, but I never really paid much attention to the information. I don’t wear makeup often, so I figured that it wasn’t too bad for me if I wear it only a few times a month. I have extremely sensitive skin, and last year, I began having problems with skin irritation around my eyes. I started noticing that after a night out wearing makeup, my eyes would be incredibly itchy and red for a few days. Not an attractive look!

So I decided to find out what EXACTLY was in the makeup I wear. At that time, my makeup bag contained the following:

Neutrogena Healthy Defense Moisturizer with Sunblock
Clinique packed power
Estee Lauder eyeliner, black
Bed Bath and Beyond eyeliner, Smoke
Maybelline Mascara, black
Maybelline Eyeshadow Duos, Browntones
Clinique Blush
Trish McEvoy Concealer

I dumped all of my makeup out on the kitchen table, and promptly started Googling the ingredients. I quickly stumbled on a few wonderful websites with a wealth of information. TheSkin Deep Cosmetic Safety Database allows you to look up your current products. It rates each product on a scale of 1 - 10 based on the hazard level of the product. The webpage is run byEnvironmental Working Group, which works to “to expose threats to your health and the environment, and to find solutions.”

I like the fact that the Skin Deep Database uses an easy to read scale. It is also color codes the scale (green = 0 - 2 and low hazard, yellow = 3 - 6 and moderate hazard, red = 7 - 10 and high hazard) for ease of use.

I quickly realized after a few searches on this database that the majority of the products that I had in my makeup case were quite toxic. Here are just two of my search results, which were marked as a high hazard.

Unfortunately, not all products are listed in the Skin Deep Database, but I gathered enough information from my searches to conclude that I should throw out my makeup and start from scratch. All of it went straight into the trash.

A few tidbits about the Skin Deep Database. They provide a wonderful shopper’s guide to safe cosmetics that you can download from their website (.pdf) and carry in your pocket. It lists ingredients and products to avoid on a little cheat sheet that you can use when you are in the store and can’t quite remember what it is that you should not purchase. It does get confusing when you are looking at all of the products on the shelves. Believe me, I have bought and returned many products because I get home and look up the ingredients only to find it has something in it that I don’t want on my skin.

Additionally, the database provides you information with the companies’ policies. The Environmental Working Group started The Campaign for Safe Cosmetics in 2004 and provide information in this database regarding the companies that have signed or not signed the Compact for Safe Cosmetics. There are 6 provisions of the compact, and companies will be rated by the campaign on how they are meeting the requirements.

Now back to my makeup. Replacing everything at once is very expensive, so I started by just replacing the necessities and figured that I’d add items as I needed them. I regularly shop at Whole Foods, so I started looking at the products that were sold at my local Whole Foods store. While there were several lines that Whole Foods carries, I was drawn to the Aubrey Organics line of cosmetics simply because I use their face wash and lotions (I’ll definitely post about discovering those products at a later date). What I like about Aubrey Organics is that they actually publish a Dictionary of Natural Ingredients that lists all of the ingredients that they use in their products, along with what it is and it’s purpose in a product. For this reason, I tried their makeup remover, blush, base, and lip gloss. Additionally, their products are much more affordable than other natural makeup lines.

My search for the products that I currently have in my makeup bag now yields:

Aubrey Organics - Herbessence Makeup Remover : Rated a 2
Silken Earth Powder Blush Warmed Rose : Rated a 3
Silken Earth Translucent Base Beige : Rated a 3
Natural Lips Sheer Tints Sheer Pink : Rated a 2

Here’s a quick screen shot of one of the Aubrey products in the Skin Deep Database:

The powder and blush feels very smooth and natural, and it is not heavy at all on my skin. I loved the lip gloss, however, I naturally lost it and need to replace it.

Eye liner and eye shadow proved to be more of a difficult challenge for me. Aubrey Organics does not currently make an eye liner and or shadow. At the time that I was looking for eye liner and shadow, Whole Foods did not carry any of the brands on the Skin Deep Database that were low on the hazard scale. I had an event coming up that I needed to have makeup for, so rather than taking time to search and order online, I focused on the products (again) that I could buy at my local Whole Foods.

The one near me carries Gabriel Cosmetics, and I looked at their line called Zuzu Luxe. Again, what I liked about their products is that they listed all ingredients, and I was able to look up each one. I have been pleased with the products that I’ve used. The eye liner does not run into my eyes, yet I am able to manipulate it to create a “smudge” look. The eye shadow was in a compact form when I bought it, but it has broken into many tiny bits from me throwing it into my makeup bag. That’s my only complaint with it. You can see in my picture below that my eyeshadow is almost a powder at this point. I suppose if you were really careful and never threw your makeup around it would stay all neat and compact, but I’m just not that careful with my makeup.

In looking at the database now, I see that there are other eye shadows out there that do not use ultra marines in their eye shadows, and thus are lower on the hazard scale. For example, the eye shadow by Coastal Classic Creations is one option. Has anyone tried these products?

I have gone without a few makeup essentials, simply because I have yet to find a product that I like, that is relatively non-toxic, and that doesn’t cost a fortune. For these reasons, I haven’t bought a mascara or a concealer yet.

Additionally, since I dumped out all of my makeup, I dumped all of my brushes as well. I picked up a Ecotools Bamboo Brush Set at Target, and they have been just a good as any previous brush I have bought.

So, that’s the start of my journey towards less toxic makeup. I know I have a ways to go, and I will update you on my progress, but in the meantime, what products have you tried? I’d love to hear your ideas and solutions.

Ants Go Marching

Wed, 09 Feb 2011 11:22:07 -0500

Lesley’s sister (and our healthy-living mentor) Lauren recently said that she was “looking for a healthy way for ants to stay out of our house." Well Laurie, you’re in luck.

According to eartheasy.com, "The first line of defense is to remove the attractants: keep counters free of crumbs and sticky spots. Cover the sugar and put the honey jar in a plastic baggie. Cut off water sources such as drips or dishes left soaking overnight.”

They also list out a few more tips:

Keep a small spray bottle handy, and spray the ants with a bit of soapy water.

Set out cucumber peels or slices in the kitchen or at the ants’ point of entry. Many ants have a natural aversion to cucumber. Bitter cucumbers work best.

Leave a few tea bags of mint tea near areas where the ants seem most active. Dry, crushed mint leaves or cloves also work as ant deterrents.

Trace the ant column back to their point of entry. Set any of the following items at the entry area in a small line, which ants will not cross: cayenne pepper, citrus oil (can be soaked into a piece of string), lemon juice, cinnamon or coffee grounds.

Mix one liter of water, one teaspoon of Borax and a cup of sugar. Soak cotton balls in the solution and place them in a small yogurt container with holes punched in the lids to allow ants access. Place container in a location where ants are present. Ants will carry the bait back to their colonies where it will eventually kill the colony. Important: use indoors only; must be kept away from pets and children.

Leave a small, low wattage night light on for a few nights in the area of most ant activity. The change in light can disrupt and discourage their foraging patterns.

Ants on the deck? Slip a few cut up cloves of garlic between the cracks.

Thanks to eartheasy.com for some great tips. What about you guys? Any other tricks or tips for keeping uninvited guests away from your kitchen or other parts of your home?

In Love (and almost) Green

Wed, 09 Feb 2011 11:14:15 -0500

We’ve got the in love part down. We're sorta new at this whole green living thing, though.

Sure, we try to buy organic as much as possible; and we’ve got a little container garden sweltering out in the Georgia sun. But we could do better, right? We see this blog as a way of documenting our journey, our learnings, our research. And hopefully we’ll learn some fantastic ideas and resources from our readers as well. So welcome. We’ve really enjoyed the process of getting this blog started… now we’re ready to get this green life started!

Green and In Love

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Fresh Start

Growing is Forever (by Jesse Rosten)

"The minute you settle for less than you deserve, you get even less than you settled for."

Awesome idea! The WWF format is a PDF that cannot be printed...

​S​a​v​e​ ​a​s​ ​W​W​F​,​ ​S​a​v​e​ ​a​ ​T​r​e​e​ ​:​ ​H​o​m​e

Support your local CSA’s!

Volunteering at a Local Farm

My Makeup has WHAT in it?

Ants Go Marching

In Love (and almost) Green

Whole Story » Blog Archive » Are Your Body Care Products Truly Organic?

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