8 Clever Green Uses For Beer

You didn’t just think that beers were good for drinking and beer pong did you? Well if you did, you are in for a treat, and also to be proven wrong! Beer can be used for a lot of things, many, however, are unusual. Check it out!

Enrich Soil
Pour a few tablespoons of flat beer into your garden to cultivate the soil. The yeasty soil will help plants grow stronger and help things flourish.

Lighten Hair
Soak you hair in beer and then lay in the sun. It will pull out terrific highlights and let your hair get a buzz as well as yourself.

Polish Wood Furniture
Get a damp microfiber cloth and wet it with your flat beer, then rub gently into your furniture. It will give it a polish and bring back some color.

Stain Removal
Much like club soda, beer will take out the stains in cloth and carpet. Just make sure to rinse with water after will take out the smell.

Soothe Tired Feet
Want to give your feet a nice treatment? Give yourself a beer pedicure. The bubbles actually will make your feet feel soothed and calm.

Polish Gold Jewelry
Drop your rings and other trinkets into a dish of beer, and then remove to polish. It will give a beautiful gloss and shine to your things.

Batter Up
We’ve got a recipe for making beer batter fried zucchini spears that’s just waiting for some leftover beer.

Bath In Beer
Bathing in beer can help soften and soothe skin. Make sure to rinse or you may smell like a human ale

5 Easy Steps Toward A Greener You

Whether you’re a bohemian and organic yogini or just a person wanting to be a little more green, there are a few things you can always do to make a difference. Even for the greenest of us, remembering some basics can help to reignite and remind us of simple things to make our lives a bit better.

1) Reduce

Let’s face it: even in tough economic times most people live in somewhat of a state of abundance, and there isn’t anything wrong with that. We also could all use for a little reduction in how we buy and how we consume. Use less paper, print things less often, open the windows, don’t make as much food, actually eat your leftovers, put a timer in your shower, don’t leave the water running while you brush your teeth, etc. Look at your life and find at least 3 ways today to reduce your use.

2) Reuse

The best part of reusing anything is in the creative opportunities that can be found. Not only can you get in touch with your inner artisan, but there are also real-life practical ways to reuse household items. Use your old socks as cleaning rags, make a blanket or quilt out of old t-shirts, old bills and junk mail can become crap paper for notes, jars can become flower vases, and more. Next time you go to throw things away, take a moment and get creative before you toss that junk in the garbage

3) Recycle

Many communities offer a diverse recycling program that can keep many things out of our landfills. I recently learned about a service in my community that will even take away old appliances AND provide you with a credit off a utilities bill if a new energy efficient appliance is purchased. Electronics are also in high demand right now for recycling. Check out EPA.gov for more information about local recycling electronics efforts.

4) Shop smarter – Shop greener

Shopping greener doesn’t necessarily mean buying organic goods from your local mega supermarket. So many day-to-day products now offer eco-friendly, safe, and (often) organic alternatives; sometimes these alternatives may be a bit more pricey, but the positive difference they make over heavy chemical brothers and sisters. You can also find green alternative products that have been recognized and approved by various organizations like Green Seal.

5) Power down

Most everybody has fallen asleep with the TV on, or left a light on in the bathroom while leaving the house in a hurry. Mistakes happen, but being conscious and powering down really DO make a difference. Beyond being aware of simple things, there are several little things that we often overlook: don’t leave things on the charger after they have finished, turn off your computer when you are done, take advantage of cooler days and turn off the AC, etc.

There are so many ways to be more green for beginners and veterans! Organic Bug offers tools, goods, gifts, and more to help make your life be a little more green!

More Sunscreen Tips and Commentary From SustainLane

By now, you probably have heard about the findings from a recent study from the Environmental Working Group about sunscreens.  Many of the major brands tested by the EWP in 2010 Sunscreen Guide,  failed to make the grade.  These findings inspired a post from us last month: Is Your Sunscreen Providing Enough Protection? - and inspired me to pay better attention to my own personal summer skin care for myself and family.

SustainLane, a wonderful source of eco and health news & commentary, came out with their own recommendations and tips as a result of this study.  Though the 2010 summer season is coming to a close; we felt like this information was relevant and important enough to pass on to our readers and friends.  Here are some guidelines to choosing safe sunscreens from the article Is Your Suncreen Safe :

1. Don’t rely on SPF ratings. As we said, SPF only accounts for UVB-ray protection, which means the higher the number the more likely it is that you’re being misled about the protection. Part of the reason the EWG slagged this crop of sunscreens is because many are making claims of SPF 50 and over. In fact, some are promising SPF as high as 100 this season. (Insert eye roll here.)

2. Avoid chemical sunscreens. Chemical sunscreens absorb the rays so you don’t have to, and then they sneak into your body and mess around with your hormones. Oxybenzone, a hormone-disruptor found in 97 percent of Americans according to the CDC, is one widely used active to avoid—and if you don’t want to do it for yourself, do it for the planet: Every year, 4,000 to 6,000 tons of chemical sunscreen comes off our bodies (and into the ocean), destroying the coral reef in the process.

3. Zinc is your new best friend. This is the cleanest and most effective active ingredient you can find in a sunscreen. It offers broad-spectrum protection—that means from both UVA and UVB rays—while posing absolutely no health threat. And fear not: Advances in technology mean the zinc on the market is nothing like the stuff you used to see striping your lifeguard’s nose.

4. Titanium dioxide is your new second-best friend. As an ingredient, it’s not as clean as zinc—you won’t find it in your multivitamin since it’s dangerous when ingested or inhaled—but it offers the same meaningful protection and isn’t absorbed through skin. All of the 39 EWG top-rated sunscreens featured zinc and/or titanium.

5. Beware of nanoparticles. Used in some sunscreens to make titanium dioxide appear less white on the skin, nanoparticles are a hot-button issue right now. By making them that small, there is evidence that the particles can then migrate to body tissue, where they may wreak all kinds of havoc. In Europe, companies using nanos have to say so; not so over here, though.

6. Avoid vitamin A in sunscreen like the plague. While animal studies never represent conclusive evidence for humans, when other mammals are getting cancer faster—as was shown in the FDA’s study of vitamin A and sun exposure—it’s a good idea to avoid the suspected culprit. It’s packed into a lot of anti-agers and sunscreens, and should be avoided at all costs.

7. Be wary of the other ingredients in there. Fragrance (which contain phthalates), chemical preservatives like parabens (which may or may not mess with hormones), and a host of other questionable things are found in most mainstream sun products. We’ll cover these in more depth in future columns and in our book, but in the meantime, remember that the fewer ingredients the better.

8. Don’t count on sunscreen alone. Even if you’re using the good stuff, most of us tend not to apply enough, or reapply it like we should. The false sense of security offered by sunscreen is thought to be one of its biggest threats. Which takes us to…

9. Protect your head. The EWG and any doctor with a brain will tell you as much. Hats, protective clothing and shade are still your best bet when it comes to avoiding sun exposure. But…

10. Get a little unprotected exposure. While it goes against everything we’ve been taught, some doctors are recommending we get limited exposure to the sun without any sunscreen to ensure healthy vitamin D levels. If you don’t want to risk it—and we don’t blame you if you don’t—make sure to get your D in other ways, through diet and supplements.

This is the second installment in a series inspired by No More Dirty Looks: The Truth About Your Beauty Products and the Ultimate Guide to Safe and Clean Cosmetics, a forthcoming book by GOOD’s features editor Siobhan O’Connor and her co-author Alexandra Spunt.

Green Your Clutter

Who ever thought that gutting out your space could make you greener? It seems that simplifying your life and clearing out the clutter can be a greening experience. By implementing simple lifestyle changes such as saying no to junk mail, using the library more for reading vs. buying books and simplifying grocery shopping to reduce waste are all great ideas.

Once you get in your home and see now what needs to be cleared out can be a daunting experience. Here are some simple ways to keep you focused for your road to liberation.

Get your boxes ready

Make sure that you have plenty of space to put the things that you are ready to get rid of. Go to your local grocery or liquor store and get their old boxes. They usually have them sitting outside or go to a clerk and ask them if they have anything in the back that you can use for your new liberation.

Recycle, donate, keep

When you are clearing out the crap make sure that you are prepared with your piles and make sure not to confuse any of them! Separate your piles into the recycle or toss pile, donation pile and your keep pile. This allows for you to just throw your items where they belong and to move on. For the recycling pile, not everything can be recycled. What you can move on to a recycling bin is preferred, but what you absolutely cant toss it!

Move on!

As hard as it may be parting with some of your items, know that not only are you doing well for yourself and your mind, but you are also doing well for your planet. By cutting the clutter and donating what is not used you are allowing for new space, new things, new ideas. But more importantly you are living hopefully a simpler life. By living this way you actually are reducing your carbon footprint in the fact that you are taking up less space (reduce), letting others use what you don’t need (reuse) and moving on the parts that you don’t need to better places (recycle)

Fighting Obesity through Cycling

Obesity rates are increasing every day. In fact, they have never been as bad as they are in the US, which has been a kind of cry for help. Thankfully, people were listening. Anne Lusk, a Harvard Nutrition Researcher, has been studying the ways that bicycles can contribute to reducing obesity and maintaining a healthy weight overall. Recently, Lusk did a study of walking vs. cycling in relation to keeping women slimmer.

Last year over half of the country’s states obesity rates increased and one decreased (District of Colombia) and two thirds of the states have rates over 25%. In their study Lusk looked at the change in weight in over 18,000 people being studied from 1989-2005. Related to women, on average they gain about 20 pounds every 16 years.

Looking deeper at the data she found that women who briskly walked or cycled every day for 30 minutes controlled their weight much easier than women who engaged in slower walking. They also found that even 5 minutes of cycling a day was even better than the slow walking alternative. And she found that women who walked briskly or cycled for 4 hours or more per week had lower odds of gaining more than 5% body weight.

Now you may ask why this is important, it may seem like obvious factual information. Well it’s exciting and could push us as a country in a new direction. These results show us that cycling can have the same affects on control of body weight as a brisk walk. Now there is not a lot of information that looks into cycling and health. But Lusk’s study relates it to being as or more effective than a brisk walk which could lead more people to getting on their bikes more often. Also, you can invest less time in biking and get the same results as a long 30 minute walk would give. Bottom line: biking often can be seen as a great way to control and prevent obesity.

Harvard’s School of Public Health was so impressed by her study that they allowed her team to pursue the creation of legislation in the next Transportation Reauthorization Bill to require putting at least 10 miles of bicycle tracks in every U.S. State.

Although small, the new tracks that could be implemented are going to be a fantastic first step for incorporating biking into a daily routine opposed to a daily dreaded visit to the gym. Also, you have a greater chance of riding further than the 10 mile track which is going to encourage legislation to expand the 10 mile required track.

Lusk is hoping her “10 Miles of Cycle Tracks per State” initiative might be introduced into the next Transportation Reauthorization Bill, and she is working on Senator Tom Harkin (D-IA) to support the idea.

Mother Nature’s Party Planner

This summer you are going to be throwing many lavish, fun amazing parties, right? Of course! Well to be a gracious host(ess) it is important to make sure that you are going green so that you know not only you but all of your thankful guests are helping reduce carbon emissions into the beautiful atmosphere. Check out some ways to stay on the environmentally side for your summer party hosting.

Ball Mason Jars

Although the upfront cost is more than plastic, the overall reward out gives plastic or paper cups a run for your money. Not only are these jars surprisingly sturdy and tough to break, they allow people to party without ditching their one time use paper or plastic cup. If you are hoping that people can get their names on them, then set out some masking tape and a sharpie, have people label them. After the party you can use the jars as leftover containers, flower or candle holders or even a pencil cup.

Recycle, of course

The morning after clean up can be much easier when you are using green goods. Not only can you quickly chuck the bottles and cans into recycling along with all of the necessary paper and throw away products.

Cloth Napkins

This is not only an amazing way to wow your guests by showing them your snazzy style, but also is a way to save money (in the long run) and to help out your environment by saving a couple trees. It adds a true element of elegance to the party for everyone to enjoy. Throw them in the washer and fold them for your next use.

Reuse those utensils

If you are on the party train to Greensville, then pack on some more and let it ride! Check out Preserve On The Go Cutlery ($5.50 for 8 sets, preserveproducts.com). It’s reusable, recyclable, made from BPA-free recycled plastic, and dishwasher-safe. Make sure to let your guests know that they are not the usual throw-away kind of plastic cutlery.

Compost your plates

Sometimes paper is the only way to go. You don’t want to risk breaking your nice plates or having to go out and buy mismatched plates from the thrift store. Only in this case, check out the green paper plate option. Preserve On the Go plates are compostable plates that let you chuck them straight into the composter.

Vegan Living, Vegan Food

Some people shift into a vegan diet slowly, starting with vegan ‘analogues’— plant-based foods whose taste resembles animal products. Others simply take out the animal products from their diet and replace them with plant foods with which they’re already familiar. Still others concentrate on experimenting with entirely new vegan foods, often from international cuisines. Thankfully, there is no shortage of vegan foods to help make the transition. In fact, most of the food we eat is vegan, without us knowing it!

Eggs are a popular product that vegans do not partake in. If you are making the transition or are looking for more options, check out below for substitution options:

•              Ener-G Egg Replacer (follow directions on box)

•              1 banana (for cake recipes)

•              2 Tbsp corn starch

•              2 Tbsp arrowroot flour

•              2 Tbsp potato starch

•              2 Tbsp soy milk powder & 2 Tbsp water

•              2 Tbsp mashed silken tofu

Your local grocery store likely carries veggie burgers and vegan hot dogs. Alternative milks are also available ranging from rice to almond. There are also vegan alternatives for butter and cheese. Try them all to see what you like best.

Dining out doesn’t have to be overwhelming if you are vegan. Check out the menu for asterisk and footnotes describing whether they have vegan dishes or alternatives.  If you’re on a fast food schedule, pizza places, Taco Bell, and Subway all have vegan options. Check out VegDining.com for a vegan restaurant near you!

Here is a video that shows you how to easily make delicious chocolate chip cookies vegan style! Courtesy of Everyday Dish TV.

What is going Green, Anyway?

As the world turns, life is in fact getting greener. Homes are getting powered more and more by solar, people are buying more organic and local food and of course people are starting to buy non-toxic, sustainable and responsible products. Although this is a fantastic leap in the right direction, we all must slow down for a moment and make sure that we understand….why?

If all people understand why “living green” is so important for our species and for the world at large, it may just be the difference between the continuity of “living green” and letting it fizzle out as just another fad.

Going green is essentially the promotion of life. It promotes things like paying people the fair wages that they deserve and giving them a shot at building their own communities world wide. It promotes the protection of our ecosystem at large, this includes everything from animals, to plants, to outer space, to our air that we breathe everyday. It promotes the fair and equal treatment of all beings on earth whether we be a duck or a human. It promotes the growth and protection of our forests and wildlife areas and everything that lives in them.

Ok so now you may ask, how is me buying “green” contributing to all of this. Well, that is an excellent question. By buying, living, thinking and acting green in every move that you make you are basically creating a domino effect. You buying a head of organic locally grown broccoli is not going to save mother earth. But it is a statement amidst a large speech that they world is listening to. Not only that, but when you live and buy green, you are basically asking for the demand to raise for responsible, green products. You are asking other people to innovate and create more green companies and ideas that will further the protection and sustainability of our planet.

Companies more and more are doing things like printing on recycled, post consumer paper. Or only selling non-toxic, sustainable and fair trade products. Or even nearly halting the amount of green house gasses that are currently put out everyday with a machine. Or offsetting the carbon that they do put out into the world, kind of a “payback” system.

No matter which way you look at it, going green makes sense, but understanding why and setting the intention can make the largest difference in the history of the world. So, push the domino over and get started.

Be Aware: VOCs and Your Home

Don’t believe the old adage “if you can’t see it, you can’t believe it”. When it comes to VOCs, this is absolutely not the case. In fact, they are very real and very dangerous. VOCs or volatile organic compounds, and are a wide range of carbon-based molecules (organic compounds) used in a wide range of products that find their way into our homes (but often undetected by ingredients). Under normal conditions they vaporize, effectively leaving their host and entering the air where they combine with other airborne compounds to form ozone, which isn’t good to breathe, hence ‘volatile’.

Although VOCs exist everywhere in the environment, the most common of them is methane, which we all know comes from everything from wetlands to cow pies and other types of gases. They are important in our lives because of the damage they can cause to us indoors. Where can you find these invisible agents of toxicity? They can be introduced via paint, carpets, furnishings, and cleaning agents.

VOCs contribute to poor indoor air quality, (which the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency says is often two to five times worse than the air outside), and contribute to concentrations of VOCs of up to 1,000 times more indoors than outdoors. Used in many glues and adhesives, one of the common VOCs includes formaldehyde. That means your wood veneers, plywood and particle board, and polyurethane; which is used in many types of foam, paints, varnishes, and construction sealant and is all contributing to your home’s indoor toxicity.

At high concentrations, some VOCs can cause chronic and acute health effects; others are known carcinogens. But even low to moderate levels of multiple VOCs can produce acute reactions. Bottom line: Avoid volatile organic compounds as much as possible.

There is hope to avoiding VOC-ridden products. Products such as water-based glues, adhesives, finishes, and soy-based foams will help keep VOC levels to a minimum in furnishings and decor. Buying green cleaners helps ensure that you aren’t adding toxins to the air when you clean them.

Try Some Food for Pain

Pain relief can be tough. With so many things on the market these days that can be hazardous to your health, or just plain addictive, getting the relief you need without damaging yourself in other ways can be a tough gig. Well, why not look to Mother Nature?

Fish Oil

Fish oil has been shown to relieve joint pain, back aches, and arthritis. As your body digests the oil, it is naturally broken down into anti-inflammatory chemicals.

Arnica

Arnica, an herb derived from a European flower; has natural anti-inflammatory properties that have been shown to reduce bruising, muscles aches and swelling.

Cherry Pits

That’s right, the pits are perfect pain-soothers, tackling backaches, headaches, shoulder and neck pain, joint pain, even arthritis. Toss the comfy pit pack in the freezer or microwave and chase pain away naturally.

Turmeric

Turmeric, an ingredient in curry, has naturally occurring curcumin, which has been shown to ease rheumatoid arthritis. Eat it for mild overall relief, or get prescription caplets containing turmeric.

Chili Pepper

Chili Pepper has been shown to target and relieve arthritis, muscle stiffness and headaches thanks to capsaicin, its active component that desensitizes pain-producing nerve receptors. You can eat the spicy stuff for general (though mild) pain relief, or choose a topical capsaicin cream for more impact. Most often used for muscle and nerve pain people have also experienced noticeable relief from migraines and cluster headaches..

Corn Kernels

Similar to Comfypacs, Corn Bag Critters are sacks filled with microwave ready and freezable whole corn kernels. After just a minute in the microwave, the sack can hold heat for hours!

Menthol

More than the on-impact pain-relieving cooling and warming sensation from the Menthol, anti-inflammatory herbs like St. Johns Wort, Arnica and Balsam Poplar go to work to quell the swell deep down in the muscle.

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