Making Every Bouquet Better

      When did the simple act of sending flowers become a huge moral conflict?

      About the same time buying chocolate did ;-)

      Personally, I think there are a heck of a lot of things you can easily send to people that are a lot better than flowers and have a better impact on the environment and the recipient.  If you haven't read my post Don't Send Flowers, please read that one first for some great ideas for alternative to flowers.

      Sometimes, though, flowers are just the most appropriate thing.  Sometimes, you know someone who just really, really likes to get flowers.  And really, what difference does it make? 

      Actually, it makes a big difference.  The traditional flower industry is guilty of a wide variety of sins against the environment and human rights.  Green Lifestyle Magazine captured it fairly well in this article, saying:

"According to the International Labor Rights Fund, flower workers are exposed to more than a hundred different pesticides, including some that are either prohibited or restricted in the U.S. and Europe. Pesticide poisoning is responsible for neurological problems, birth defects, miscarriages, and more.  The combination of toxic exposure, human rights abuses, and environmental contamination in the flower industry is a sad and ugly example of greed and mistreatment."

      Thankfully, in there are people and companies out there who embrace BOTH capitalism AND social justice/global ethics.  And some of those people grow flowers.  If you're going to order flowers, please do it from one of these sites:

Organic Bouquet

or

Organic Style

      I don't recommend one site over the other.  As a matter of fact, I suspect the sites are linked, because the flowers available on each of them are nearly identical.

      I had the opportunity to browse through these sites recently since my mom's birthday is fast approaching, and we really wanted to send her something at work.  The selection they offered was absolutely wonderful, and the price range was very reasonable and competitive with less ethical sites.

      Now, I still perfer to send gifts that won't die in a week or two, and both of these sites offer many such options.  They offer plants and wreaths like these:

They have a bunch of gorgeous herb wreaths

We chose a bromilead for my mom.

There are a bunch of fruit trees available.

I'm totally in love with this little Tuscan Olive Tree

And how sweet is this little trio of saplings?

      And Gift Baskets:

How adorable are these cookies?

It even appears to be humane cheese!!

      And, finally, if what you really want to give is just a beautiful bouquet, you can't beat Flowers for Good.  With Flowers for Good, 5% of the purchase price is donated to a charity:

There are more than just roses, but I happened to like these charities...

      While I would still rather send different gifts that also have a positive impact, if I'm going to send flowers, these are some darned good options.

*** I was not asked to write this post, nor have I been compensated in any manner.  That said, if either site wants to give me one of those adorable wreaths or plants, I would totally accept it!***

Don't Send Flowers

      One of my closest friends, Scathing Lawyer (SL), has always been amazing at remembering all the birthdays in our group of friends and making sure flowers get sent and cards get signed.  She was also responsible for sending the most beautiful bouquet when my beloved dog died shortly after MacGyver and I got married.  Since then, we have all scattered to the wind, but SL still sends flowers.  So when her birthday came around last year, I wanted to return the wonderful feeling that such consideration brings.

      But I had an ethical dilemma.  I'm morally opposed to many of the practices of the flower industry.  The reasons are myriad, but Green Lifestyle Magazine captured it fairly well in this article, saying:

"According to the International Labor Rights Fund, flower workers are exposed to more than a hundred different pesticides, including some that are either prohibited or restricted in the U.S. and Europe. Pesticide poisoning is responsible for neurological problems, birth defects, miscarriages, and more.  The combination of toxic exposure, human rights abuses, and environmental contamination in the flower industry is a sad and ugly example of greed and mistreatment. "

      And really, a half way descent bouquet, after delivery fees and everything else, is at least $50.00 a pop and then dead in a week or two.  I decided to send SL something a little more lasting.

      Ok, fine.  But WHAT?

      I don't do the shopping and mailing thing.  I hate the post office, and I am awful at getting things into the mail.  I literally still have some thank you notes from our wedding that I haven't sent.  We've been married for over 3 years.  I've moved the thank you notes between more states than I can even count offhand.  I think I'll send them out with the invites to the 5 year...  So internet shopping it was!

      Then it sort of dawned on me:  If I was going to order her something other than flowers because of the ethics, I might as well take it a step farther and order it from a site where the purchase itself will also do good.  Enter:  The Animal Rescue Site Store.

      I LOVE The Animal Rescue Site.  It is an amazing site where you can go and click the button every day, and just that one little click helps feed rescued animals.  Not only that, the site also has buttons for the Rainforest, Hunger, Child Health, Veterans, Autism, Breast Cancer, and Literacy.  And it is seriously free to click, and it seriously helps these causes.  I know, I researched it.  The company that runs it is actually a for-profit, but a huge amount of the money generated by the site goes to charities.  It's amazing and simple and a little bit of feel-good every day.

      It takes no more than three minutes to click all the causes.  GO NOW.  SERIOUSLY.  GO.  And make it your home page.  Why not?  I click every day from every computer I use.  Every little bit helps.

       In addition to the revenue generated by the advertisements and clicking, the site has an awesome store that pulls together anything and everything from a ton of ethical suppliers.  Seriously, I think about half the stuff I pin is from this site.

      Looking for something for SL, I just clicked the "Fair Trade" category and waited for something to speak to me.  There is also a gift category.  I ended up going with this:

     

The Bright Botanicals Cruelty-Free Leather Wristlet:  Leather is sourced from local Haat markets where the predominantly vegetarian population reveres goats, sheep, cows and buffalo for their value as milk animals, and where a live animal is worth far more than a dead one. Without economic incentive to kill animals for their skin, the artisans instead reclaim skins from animals that died naturally.

      How beautiful is that?  Not just the product, but everything behind it.  Wonderful.  And SL LOVED it.  Though she couldn't help but make a scathing comment about liking cruelty, ha.

      So the next time you get ready to send flowers, think about all the other, more lasting, more positive things you could send, and check out The Animal Rescue Site Store.  And if you'd rather benefit one of the other causes on the site, that works, too!  Each cause has it's own store.

      Other items I'm loving on the site today that I think would make great gifts:

Recycled Billboard Totes

      

       Divine Chocolate is made with only the finest quality, fairly traded cocoa beans from Kuapa Kokoo, a cooperative of smallholder farmers in Ghana. The cocoa is grown in the shade of the tropical rainforest,and slowly fermented and dried in the sun by farmers who take great pride in the chocolate company they co-own.

      And those are just the first few things I saw.  Check out my Pinterest Boards (or the site!!!) for tons more.

       And if you find that you absolutely must send flowers, please check out my next post on ethical flower companies!

      ***I was not asked to write this post, nor have I been compensated for it in any way other than the good feeling I get from getting the word out about simple ways to help great causes. ***

High Demand on Kitchen Scraps

      Between recycling and composting, we have drastically reduced the amount of waste we produce as a family.  We've also increased the number of waste containers we have in our kitchen.  First it was just regular recycling, special plastics, a compost bucket on the counter, and our regular trash can.  Then we started giving some of the kitchen scraps to the chickens - which is probably why they've grown so monstrous, as some of you mentioned recently. 

       So then, in addition to the compost bucket on the counter, we also had a chicken scraps bucket.
       Then we started re-growing veggies from some of our scraps.  Remember that?  Then we had the two buckets on the counter and the windowsill lined with little cups of kitchen scraps.

       Well, I recently read a blog about making your own veggie broth out of kitchen scraps.  What an excellent idea!  Especially when we go through at least 2 - usually 3 - containers of veggie broth a week.  But there is one thing stopping me:

       Another bucket!  And having to prioritize my kitchen scraps!  Regrow? Boil for broth? Chickens? Compost? Of course, the stuff used for broth can still go to the chickens and compost afterward.  But seriously, it's a little silly to have to put that much thought into kitchen scraps!

      The first solution has been moving the compost into the back yard where the chickens can get to it.  So now all the scraps go there, and the chickens can take what they want and the rest just stays in the pile.  And deciding what to regrow is easy: if it will regrow, we regrow it. 

      So I guess my pan now is just to start diverting things from the compost into the freezer to become broth.  To make in all my spare time.  HA!

       In our house, kitchen scraps have become a high demand commodity, and I absolutely love it that way.

All but one of these plants was re-grown from kitchen scraps.