Mother's Day Goes Green

            Punky was already staking out my room when Flintstone and I emerged [last] Sunday morning.  I was a little surprised considering the fact that she had kept MacGyver up past when I went to bed completing some sort of Mother's Day surprise for me, and because my unsnoozable alarm clock Flintstone usually sees to it that I am up 1 1/2 to 2 hours before the non lactating members of the household on weekends.

      Waiting for me, there was a vase of roses made entirely out of construction paper and a card.  The card had a woman posing in front of an Earth statue as though she were holding the Earth and inside Punky wrote, "I love you mom.  You're the best and the Earth thanks you for it."  Totally cute.  She had also made me a breakfast of fruit, toast, and cereal.

      MacGyver emerged a few minutes later, and we sat and chatted and drank tea until I went back to the bedroom to get Flintstone's and my clothes together for church.  When I came back out, there was one heck of a spread waiting for me!

       It wasn't actually arranged like this, Punky and MacGyver had each set up their separate collections of gifts on the table, but I didn't get a chance to take a picture of them because Punky was much too excited about me opening them.

       Organic, Fair Trade teas and fancy coffees, adorable stackable coffee mugs, all sorts of chocolate/carmel/nut/fruit ethical treats and goodies, an adorable new Equal Exchange apron (so I get fewer of my ethical eating projects on me), and the topper, new cast iron cookware!  We have been talking about making the switch to cast iron for a long time now, but I've been holding back, waffling about buying it peice by peice or is one big set (which would be very expensive).  MacGyver got me one very large skillet and two small individual size pans.  I've used them a few times now, and I LOVE them.

      I'm sure there will be a post forthcoming soon on the benefits and care of cast iron cookware.

      In addition to store purchased goodies, Punky wrote me three illustrated poems and tied them up scroll style, painted a large painting of our whole family as owls (and Flintstone as a small brown blob, ha), and a book she made in school.  Every page of the book was meticulously colored, and on each page was a question or statement about mothers and all the childrens' answers.  By far my favorite page had the heading, "My mother is as beautiful as..."  Every child in Punky's class except 2 either answered "a flower" or a kind of flower ("a rose" for example).  One child wrote "a horse," which I found wildly amusing.  Punky wrote "Hermione from Harry Potter."

      She is so sweet and creative.  And not only that, but after I told this story to some friends at church, one of them paused, looking at me, and said, "You really do look like Emma Watson."  He probably needs glasses, but I was nevertheless flattered. 

      Punky also got me these super adorable magnets:

             After I was done giddily examining my loot the amazingly thoughtful and moving gifts from my family, we headed off to church.

      The Mother's Day service was amazingly moving, and featured performances by Rebecca Folsom.  Just like the week before, when we got into the sanctuary, Flintstone picked himself out a Hymnal and a seat, climbed into the seat, placed the open Hymnal on his lap, and listened intently.  He was completely enraptured by Rebecca's first song, and I think he was a little shocked by the applause at the end:



     I know people don't like videos on blogs, but the video above is only a few seconds long, and I think it's hilarious.  And there are many more where that came from, including three with Flintstone's fake laugh that he does whenever the congregation laughs.

     After church, we were supposed to go out on a litter cleaning excursion in one of the local rivers, but it was postponed due to rain.  Instead, we went to a bookstore, and I drooled over books I want to read and mourned not having time to just live in a library.

      When we got home, MacGyver and Punky made me an amazing dinner of Massaman Chickpeas over Mango Sticky Rice with Roast veggies.  And a molten chocolate cake for dessert.  Sooo yummy.  Have you seen my post about flavored Chickpeas yet? 

      For some reason the picture of the chickpeas won't load.  Suppose I'll have to add a different post later.

      All in all, it was an amazing Mother's Day.  I have such a wonderful, loving, quirky, family and so very many wonderful mothers in my life (my own mother vehemently refuses to accept Mother's Day gifts from us and cussed at me when I brought it up).

       And who wouldn't love Mother's Day with little monsters as cute as this:

After enjoying a bowl of daddy's homemade, healthy crockpot baked beans from scratch.

Oh, ya' know, just brushin' my teeth...

  
Whether you're a mother yourself, a mother of furbabies, trying to become a mother, or have wonderful mother(s) in your life, I hope you all had a wonderful Mother's Day this year.

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. ***