Ten Tips for a Sustainable, Green Christmas

Ten Sustainable Days of Christmas. Play sustainability Bingo!

So far I tick ten, more or less.

https://tallblondetales.com

These tips from ewspconsultancy.com

Ten Tips for a Sustainable and Green Christmas

• Buy your Christmas food locally where possible, or purchase craft from a local market. Support local, small or family-owned businesses where you can. Support local bakeries for your fresh bread as this supports employment and tastes so much better than supermarket frozen offerings.
• Make a homemade gift instead of buying one.
• Give a relative an experience or a helping hand, such as mowing their lawn, as a gift). Give someone a voucher for an ‘experience’.
• Thinking of getting a pet: adopt an animal from the shelter.
• Give edible gifts – home made jams, chutneys and other preserves, infused spirits, cakes, biscuits/cookies or sweets/chocolates, even dried herb or tea blends.
• Use solar-powered Christmas lights/decorations
• Choose an environmentally friendly gift – e.g. a funky, natural, art project using natural or reclaimed materials and placed in an upcycled frame.
• Give Plants or Seeds from your garden as gifts – see below
• Make natural gifts – including lip balms, bath bombs, and scrubs using herbs and flowers
• Beeswax can be turned into a wrap or used to make candles
• Wrap gifts in an eco-green bag, old fabric or clothing cut up, newspaper or normal paper, old greeting cards, magazines or newspapers, or even fabric like a scarf from an old op shop.
• Use reclaimed fabrics to make small gifts such as makeup bags or zippered pouches for people

Photo by Kha Ruxury on Pexels.com

Other Sustainable Gift Ideas

Instead of exchanging gifts, exchange less used/unused clothes with friends.

Pick a few close friends and have an exchange of such pieces.

It doesn’t sound super-exciting, but it is a great way to be sustainable and save money. We all have pieces in our wardrobe that we seldom use.

You can make it more fun by having a secret Santa system and guessing later who got whom. 

What Sustainable Fashion Actually Is

Call me stubborn, but I have been known to wear socks with a hole or two, well past their use-by dates. And then I don’t toss them out. They make great cleaning rags.

Pre-loved jeans from a charity shop

I don’t darn socks anymore, but I do mend small holes in well-loved and favourite pieces of clothing. Who knew that leaning against Ceasarstone benchtops when cooking and preparing food actually gouges small holes in fabric T-shirts?

When was the last time you mended a sock or an item of clothing?

Do you consider the act of supporting sustainable fashion brands will help the planet?

What Can You Do to Buy More Sustainable Fashion Clothing?

Seeing this graphic from cleanuporg.au might give you more reason to rethink future clothing purchases.

Despite this “friendly poke in the ribs” for me to purchase more sustainably, there are companies out there doing great things in the clothing and fashion space, upcycling plastic waste.

Sustainable Upcycling Options

In creating a swimwear range, Australian-owned and designed Alma Universal Swimwear turn plastic waste into 100% eco-friendly products. They use low-waste packaging( rPET), tags are made from recycled paper and their prints are made using 0% water.

Their bathers comprise 82% or 15 recycled plastic bottles. Towels and mats contain 20 recycled bottles. However, they claim you won’t feel it as they treat recycled plastic gently, making it free from toxins.

We derive plastic wastes from oceans and rivers. We do this with the help of our collaborating organizations. Next, we turn that waste into a product range that becomes the epitome of a sustainable lifestyle. All of the products are skin-friendly, recyclable, and free of toxins.”

Afroblonde Eco Collection is a sustainable shoe and accessories brand, transforming old canvas and tires used by trucks and road trains into Australian-made and hand-crafted durable headwear, footwear and accessories.

Truck canvas is 100% made of cotton that is air-permeable and water-resistant. The tarps are tanned by different weather conditions as sun and rain. This gives each piece of canvas its own original look.

Designed, owned and run by women committed to getting more women outdoors and feeling supported and included when active in the outdoors, is the following company: (Yes, I am thinking of you MOSY).

Ambleoutdoors is a small Melbourne-based business committed to sustainability. They have recycled over 250,000 post-consumer bottles into fabrics. Using recycled fabrics, ethical factories, carbon-neutral products, plastic-free packaging and tree planting with every order, they are helping to change expectations in the clothing industry.

We need more of this.

• Do you borrow or swap clothes or source them from thrift shops?
• Do you take heed of washing instructions to ensure longevity?
• Do you prefer timeless fashions or fabrics with proven durability?

Could You Wear the Same Dress for 100 Days in a Row?

If I challenged you to wear the same dress for 100 days in a row, could you do it?

I did it. 100 days straight wearing the same dress.

I took up a challenge to: “Live simply, consume carefully and do good.”

That’s the motto of an American company Wooland, which uses Australian merino wool to create durable, breathable, odour-resistant sustainable garments.

Live Simply – More stuff doesn’t equal more happiness.

Consume carefully -Thoughtfully building a “quality over quantity” capsule wardrobe.

Do good -Together, leaving this world better than we found it.

I have talked previously how Textile waste is a huge environmental problem

Australians buy almost 15kg of clothes every year and most of it ends up in landfill, report finds. Australians buy 14.8kg of clothing, or 56 new items, every year, a new report has found, making Australia one of the highest consumers of textiles per capita in the world. 20 July 2022

The Guardian

2022 Wool.and 100-Day Dress Challenge

Back in May 2022, I embarked on a challenge to wear one dress for 100 days.

Of course, you do wash it! [anticipating your question]

Being a fine merino wool dress, you can launder it easily, and it has the bonus of drying fast. You can wash the garment overnight and have it ready to wear again, the following morning.

It’s odour-resistant, so there isn’t the need to wash the item anywhere near as frequently as other pieces of clothing. Especially stretch fabric man-made fabrics that hold odours. You can wear this fine merino wool dress for a surprising number of days without washing, and there is no smell. That’s the benefit of wool. A natural fibre.

I loved it.

• Less Washing is better for the Environment, and your clothes last longer.

Plus, this is a socially responsible company –

• The packaging is plastic-free, being made from post-consumer waste.

Buying this dress will not save the planet;

But owning less is the most effective way to reduce our individual footprints, and [Wooland is] founded on the idea that women get more out of life when they have fewer things. We say own less, own better. We think Merino wool is the key to owning less clothing, since it remains fresher for longer compared to other fibers.

We also want to help break the pattern of buying clothes we never wear! Instead, we want to make the most worn item in your closet. [Wooland]

I tend to agree!

Australian Merino Wool

This company uses:

Wool from Australian farms that follow recognized standards relating to animal welfare and eco-friendly land management practices. Through the International Wool Textile Organization, we’re able certify and trace our wool purchase to a specific farm that meets our values in sustainability. We’ve recently partnered with the family-owned Ashmore Station, based in South Australia. [Wooland]

The farm is specifically focused on improving energy efficiencies, land conservation, and biodiversity.

Wool Clothing and Carbon Footprint

I found hand-washing the dress and draping it over a clothes hanger to dry, meant I didn’t even have to iron it!

Winning!

25% of a garment’s carbon footprint comes from its lifespan of care (washing, drying, dry-cleaning), and all that cleaning takes a toll on the garment itself.

Wearing wool means wearing a garment that requires less time, money, energy, and materials to maintain. Wool can be washed less and should be washed less.

The company says “way less,” and suggests spot-cleaning your garment unless otherwise necessary.

AEG Arabia (a premier appliance manufacturer) says that

“90% of the clothes we wash aren’t dirty enough to justify being machine washed. We know habits are hard to break, and laundry is one of them. Still, we encourage our customers to re-evaluate how and when they wash their clothes since wool excels at evaporating sweat, the breeding ground for bacteria that we associate with dirty laundry.”

What was the Downside of the 100 Day Dress Challenge?

Very little, if any.

Few people even commented that I was wearing the same dress!

Benefits of A Capsule Wardrobe

*I enjoyed not having to plan out what I was going to wear the next day, I knew. I didn’t have to co-ordinate two pieces together – the majority of my wardrobe.

*I could have fun accessorizing and working out different ways to wear the same dress. Somedays I would wear something over it, wear it as an underlayer, tuck it into a skirt making a top, or just accessorize with scarfs. And I have hundreds of scarfs from around the world. Prior to my self-imposed scarf ban, I used to think one could never have too many scarfs. Now I had the perfect use for all of them.

Once I completed the 100 days, I then qualified for $100 off my next purchase at Wooland and chose a t-shirt and a sleeveless wool dress.

In case you want to know, I have not worn these items exactly every day since the challenge expired, but they have become my favourite wardrobe item.

The t-shirt is perfect for exercising, yet keeps me sun safe and the dress is super smart casual and just in time for summer in Australia.

I will continue to downsize to a capsule wardrobe – a downsized version of my former wardrobe. I have already culled, given away, donated, recycled, upcycled and re-invented purposes for some of my older clothes. One top I had in my wardrobe for over 15 years and it was worn – a lot.

Wool is the Perfect Climate-Controlling Fabric

One particularly unseasonably hot day I actually changed into the dress and out of a skimpy synthetic t-Shirt, I had been sweating in whilst out walking. To my astonishment, the wool dress was cooler to my skin than the sleeveless synthetic top with bare shoulders!

Here’s the surprising part of wool’s thermal properties: wool keeps you cool in warm climates too. Lightweight wool garments breathe and wick moisture away from the skin, keeping the wearer cool, even in humid climates.

More than any other material, merino wool is a performance fiber. We love it for its wearability and its ability to go extra days between washing (even 100 days!). But merino wool has a myriad of other benefits including wrinkle- and odor-resistance, personal climate control, and of course, it’s naturally renewable. [Wooland]

Here are some reasons anyone should give it a try:

• Learn how to get more wear out of a garment (e.g. when you spill on your dress, you’ll immediately take action to clean it since you’re wearing it again tomorrow!).
• Recognize what you need and don’t need in your wardrobe.
• Realize that your clothing isn’t what defines you (have you heard of the spotlight effect? It’s a phenomenon in which people tend to believe they are being noticed more than they really are.)
• Have more money to spend on experiences with the people that make you the happiest.
• Reduce your impact on the planet when you realize you don’t need a closet packed full of clothing.

Would I embark on another challenge?

For sure. But you can only do the 100-day challenge once with Wooland.com

We don’t need more clothes, we need better clothes.

Wooland

What Do You Want to Achieve in 2023?

I must have been around 20 at the time. What was I thinking as I stood there in the wind, wondering where life would take me?

I had little fear for my future, in 1982.

I lived in and for the present moment. Spontaneous. Responsive. With little planning.

If I had planned ahead better, I could have made more of those days. Those uninhibited days, ignorant of intense worry and sorrow. Now I have gravel rash scars and several deeper wounds incurred through a lived experience. I came to know that kind of sorrow later on in life.

In 1982, I was primarily concerned about bigger-scale environmental issues and global temperature rises, but few listened.

So I went on with life.

In 2022, I see sustainability education has finally become mainstream, being adopted in schools, the workplace, and business. The mindset is changing. More and more folks realize our world cannot sustain continual plundering plus climate, soil and air damage without serious repercussions.

We must act fast and with care for our future generations.

Our Purpose and Scientific Experiments on Fear

Neuroplasticity is a buzzword. We know we can change our brains in both negative and positive ways.

In a scientific experiment with a mouse and a cherry, a mouse was deliberately given an electric shock each time it tried to eat a cherry. The mouse quickly learned to fear the humble cherry and froze when it was presented with it.

The mouse’s Grandchildren responded to the cherry in the same way the Grandfather mouse had done.

The fear response originated from the Grandfather and was passed down, not in the grandfather’s genetic code, but in manifestations, in the way genes were expressed in his grandchildren’s behaviour.

So the grand-mice froze in fear when presented with a cherry.

Our human brain’s amygdala initiates our fear and disgust responses while another part of the brain elicits pleasure and reward.

In the case of the mouse, the circuitry was diverted from the brain’s olfactory (smell) centre and pleasure response centre, because of the shocks and pain. So instead of responding with pleasure, the mouse froze. Then this information was passed on epigenetically to his offspring as an evolutionary adaptation.

Our learning in life contributes to the DNA memory that we pass down epigenetically via our offspring.

What kind of learning are you passing on?

Is it not our purpose to learn and pass on helpful information to our offspring, ensuring our brains don’t tip into fear mode?

Fear breeds hatred and hatred breeds divisiveness and fear.

In 2024, challenge yourself to pass on positive experiences and helpful information to future generations.

More Global New Year Resolutions for 2023

Photo by Pixabay on Pexels.com

Janis posted about making a New Year resolution not for herself, but for the whole world. Primarily her salient words were to not be so stupid. Simple rules to live by.

Suggestions like to NOT text and drive nor drink and drive.

There were more serious resolution suggestions too:

• Develop a healthy scepticism – Don’t believe everything you read, hear, or see on the Internet – check things out (and not only with your favourite confirmation bias source).
• Don’t equate the accumulation of things with the building of happiness.

The premise of capitalism – the MORE and MORE does NOT Lead to MORE wealth and MORE jobs nor a higher standard of living. Just look around.

The World is not an infinite well.

That model no longer stacks up to PROGRESS as the planet, and its resources are FINITE.

Resolutions for 2023

Before you make your next purchase this year, in 2023, ask yourself

DO YOU REALLY NEED IT?

If you must buy, choose timeless clothes, durable appliances, and minimal technology, recycled goods.

Avoid one-use plastic items.

Choose to support ethical companies.

Re-use items in a different way rather than dispose of them.

It is definitely not rocket science.

Meeting a TV Hero and Simple Sustainability in the Garden

Remember the self-sufficiency movement of the ’80s? That was my teenage dream, one that sadly never materialised, so the chance to meet a modern-day guru of sustainability got me super-excited.

You may have heard or even watched River Cottage UK, with Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall, but did you know there was a highly successful Australian version of the show that has now spawned a sustainable food movement for city folks?

Today I was blessed to meet the host of River Cottage Australia Paul West, who spoke of the benefits of growing and cooking fresh, wholesome food and about Grow it Local. It is a grassroots movement that’s connecting communities across Australia, through urban farming, irrespective of the size of the land on which you live.

Paul’s message:- you can make a difference to the planet and to your own nutrition by growing your own food, minimising waste and connecting with other producers in your area. 

Paul was a chef who trained at a hatted restaurant, but 16-hour days with no time to cook for himself left him thinking there was more to life.  For a time he was a WWOOFer – a ‘willing worker on organic farms’ – on a Tasmanian property.

Required to work four hours in return for board and accommodation on the farm, he was inspired by the farmer’s good health and lifestyle to work over 8 hours each day. When Fearnley-Whittingstall was looking for a host of a new TV production, “River Cottage Australia”, Paul got the job.

Ten years after the first of four seasons of River Cottage Australia aired on Australian TV, Paul West is still that cheeky, charming, affable guy.

Paul’s not just promoting a gardening and recipe book, Homegrown, he thinks that a lot of problems could be ameliorated if people took time to grow their own bit of food (even a balcony garden), minimise waste, cook stuff from scratch and connect with the family and friends.

It is true that our fondest memories are often associated with family, friends and food, and sharing a meal together. 

Many people who watch River Cottage Australia live in cities, and I want to show everyone that what I did on River Cottage is totally achievable in the backyard or on the balcony,” he says.

Paul West

My small but productive garden at the Home by the Sea sits on soil that is salty clay, remnants from a mangrove swamp in years past. That is not conducive to growing food crops.

With some help from worm castings and compost from garden scraps, we have feasted on home-grown lemons, strawberries, tomatoes, asparagus, choko and cucumber, as well as loads of herbs from chives to dill, parsley to basil and thyme.  Paul’s presentation spurns me on to grow even more in my small space, and add more rosemary plants to the front garden and those so far untapped areas on street verges.

Connecting with others growers in my local area means I can swap ideas and excess produce for our mutual benefit.

Fabulous, right?

Paul’s book Homegrown covers many of the River cottage measures he used himself. Ones that are easily transferable for anyone to become more sustainable through a year of cooking, growing and eating. With planting notes, garden projects and recipes, anyone can share a River cottage experience, no matter how small their home or community is.

Who wouldn’t want food that is fresh, tasty and more nutritious than ever before?

Paul structures simple recipes around produce from each season and includes Zucchini fennel pizza, Homemade tomato sauce, Pumpkin and beef curry, Ginger beer, and delicious salads with basic ingredients sourced from your own veggie patch. There’s info on composting, maintenance, when to prune, DIY seed-raising mix, chicken feeder and pen, and encouraging bees (and pollination) via plantings.

Confession time: I admit to sounding starstruck at meeting a self-sufficiency hero. I’ve never followed celebrities at all, nor wished to do so. Thus, I was surprised I was ever so excited to meet this guy. He was just as he appears on TV: super cool, genuinely affable and kind-hearted. The sort of person you’d love to live next door to. And his message is a positive one that cares for the planet and for our health and that resonates with me.

If you were wondering, I did buy the book and Paul signed it! [Happy dance!]

Natalie’s Weekend Coffee Share

An Experiment in Sustainable Fashion

Day 1 of 100 days has commenced with the arrival of the parcel.

Am I excited?

Hell yeah.

Will I still be excited in 100 days?

I reserve my judgement for now.

I have taken a bold step in accepting a challenge from Wooland, a company dedicated to promoting sustainable fashion and making women’s lives easier. The challenge runs over 100 consecutive days and it involves wearing the same garment for 100 days and documenting the process.

Why?

Our aim is to design the most practical, most wearable dress in your wardrobe.

Wool&.com

The company motto says it all:

Live Simply

Consume carefully

Do Good

Wear a Wool& Dress for 100 Days Straight

This is Day 1.

The challenge rules mean I’m attempting to wear the same dress for around 8 hours a day, for 100 days, documenting the journey and styles, via a daily photograph. Photos that, ultimately, will be emailed to the company at the conclusion of the experiment.

If I can do that, I am eligible to claim a $100 credit at the Wool& web store. Keeping to the challenge for 100 days will be tricky but at this point, I’m determined.

My savvy shopper radar is activated and ready to go the distance!

Advantages of Wearing the Same Outfit for 100 days

Natural, breathable fibre clothing is way nicer, next to the skin, and to be honest, I am highly attracted by the benefit of a simplified morning routine, making “what to wear” the easiest question of my day.

• No daily indecision regarding what clothing co-ordinates with what; what is socially appropriate and if it looks good. (First world problems)
• Saving water and less laundry – who’s against that?
• Less ironing – wool is wrinkle resistant
• Less use of chemical detergents in the waterways
• Supporting a sustainable product – fine merino wool from a sheep’s back
• Exercising creativity – inventing different styling options
• Living with less overall
• Reducing the impact on the planet
• Wool is a performance fabric with remarkable odor-resistant properties. A few reasons why you’ll love wool. 

Disadvantages of Wearing the Same Outfit for 100 days

• Will I become bored?
• Will I forget to document the challenge each day and miss the challenge benefits?
• What if the dress become stained/damaged/stretch out of shape?
• Will it dry in time for me to wear again the following day?
• Will it smell between washes?

Wool – Environmentally Friendly, Sustainable, Practical

It has taken around eight weeks for this dress to arrive, such is the demand and popularity for this product, made with fine merino fabric, (and a small part in nylon).

I’ve chosen a very practical black style with short sleeves for durability. With winter approaching, there is less chance of me sweating in the tropical heat.

Being somewhat of a germophobe, and Covid and all, the issue of washing the dress infrequently does play on my mind.

Because I won’t be sitting at a desk for 100 days. I’ll be out and about.

Furthermore, I am reminded by the company marketing speels, that wool is not just breathable and naturally soft, wrinkle-resistant, it dries quickly, making keeping the dress clean fairly simple.

And that is part of the point.

Wash less. Do we really need to wash clothing if it isn’t smelly and dirty? Aren’t we trying hard to be sustainable in terms of reducing water use, chemicals in the waterway and keeping clothing durable but smart-looking?

Countdown to Thursday, 4 August 2022

1659579600

  days

  hours  minutes  seconds

until

100 Day Dress Challenge

Could you wear the same garment each day for 100 days?

Revelations About Carbon Emissions

Co2 Emissions by World Population – pendantry.wordpress.com/

Back in the 80s, when I was studying the environment, the question of how to effect climate action in a globally just way was hard to figure out. Why shouldn’t Third World countries develop and exploit natural resources and enjoy the pleasures that a higher standard of living can bring? Just because it is “bad for the environment?” When the first world is largely responsible and enjoyed the benefits!

Equitable Climate Change

Who wouldn’t want a car, air-conditioning/heating, a comfortable home and life? Here’s a good reason:

Burning of fossil fuels and deforestation> polluting emissions and habitat and biodiversity loss> increased global temperatures> melting polar ice>disturbances of oceanic and global weather systems> increased mega-fires, drought and extreme weather events> agricultural and economic disruption>breakdown of food and supply chains> environmental catastrophe?

Carbon Emission Reduction

For those living outside the developed world, there’s some comfort from Professor Rockström, a Director of the Potsdam Institute of Climate Impact Research. He represents both Future Earth and Earth League and states the latest statistics show:

..the richest 1% must reduce emissions by a factor of 30, while the poorest 50% in the world can actually increase emissions by a factor of three for the world to stay within the global carbon budget in a fair way.

Johan Rockstrom –

Photo by Markus Spiske on Pexels.com

Climate Action by Behavioural Change

We need to have a transition not only into decarbonisation of the energy systems in terms of technologies, but we also need 1.5°C lifestyles.

Johan Rockstrom

Seven Simple Ways to Help the Planet and Live a 1.5°C Lifestyle

• Eat Less
• Fly less
• Avoid plastic
• Buy from local suppliers
• Upcycle and re-use
• Turn off power sources when not needed
• Live sustainably – buy only what you need, not what you might want.

Lead by example and pressure your policymakers and parliamentary representatives to do the same.

We Can All Do This!

Are you decreasing consumption levels?

What are the barriers to lower carbon consumption in your region?

Read more about these sobering facts were sourced from pendantry.wordpress.com/

Read also a wonderful post from Jill on Greta Thunberg – the Covid crisis has replaced the environment in the headlines but one still feels in awe of Greta’s words which inspire us all to do more.

Lots of Recipes to Love Lemons

What makes a great-tasting Lemon Cake?

Ju-Lyn might consider me a Queen of Lemon Cakes, but I am no reigning monarch of cooking, merely slightly obsessed with lemons. The family loves lemon cake, which means I am keen to try out any new lemon-themed recipe I find.

This month, in setting up a tasting contest between my most popular Lemon Cake recipes at home, I discovered how versatile lemons could be not only in improving heath, but also in replacing certain chemical cleaners and insecticides around the home with natural alternatives.

Lemons are comprised of:

• 31 g vitamin C
• 1.1g protein
• 9.3g carbohydrates
• 2.5 g sugar: 2.5g
• 2.8 g fibre: 2.8g
• 0.3 g fat
• 20 calories
• 89% water

More lemon facts

Photo by Julia Zolotova on Pexels.com

Packed with Vitamin C

Lemons are a plant native to Assam, in Northern India and South Asia. Lemon juice in its natural state is acidic, but once metabolised it actually becomes alkaline.

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The acidity of lemons makes them a great adjunct to cleaning around the home and lemon peel can even repel insects when peel is placed outside your door.

• Rub your chopping board with a cut lemon to eliminate garlic or stubborn odours
• Clean windows and chrome fittings with a half a lemon dipped in salt
• Remove red wine spills (mix to a paste with salt and baking soda)
• Add a cut lemon to your dishwasher in place of rinse aid for a streak-free wash.

With the Changing Seasons, lemons are a natural way to bolster our immune systems.

Lemon Cake Tasting Challenge

Renowned for reliable recipes it may be no surprise that a recipe from The Australian Women’s Weekly magazine took first place in the Lemon Cake Challenge. As voted #1 by colleagues and family. This is how it turned out:

Australian Woman’s Weekly Lemon Cake

Are you keen to make the winning cake for yourself?

Instructions and the link to the Women’s Weekly Lemon Cake recipe

Another Lemon Cake Recipe

Linking thanks to Janis’ suggestion to What’s on Your Plate over at Retirement Reflections