If you are anywhere near Union Square NY (Manhattan) this week, you will definitely want to stop in @ Paragon Sports to check out Icebreaker’s line of sport apparel and get a 26.2% discount AND a free pair of their wonderful socks.

This is fabulous, natural apparel — great for running (supposedly doesn’t get stinky, but I haven’t tested that aspect yet). Really great for NY weather and the base layer offers protection for those winds coming off the Hudson.

Icebreaker is an extremely sustainable sports apparel company based in New Zealand. Most of the clothing is made from merino wool and when you purchase Icebreaker products, you get to meet your sheep! Read more about Icebreaker . . .

I have no idea how they will do this, but if you bring your old synthetic running top with you, they’ll turn it into a reusable shoe bag for free!

Make sure to bring in this coupon to get this great discount.

Promotion starts today, October 5 and runs for a week until Monday, October 12.

See you there!

eat. blog. be merry.
gd meg

We had a chance to put together a Way Basics shelf recently. It really was as easy as they represented – at least it was for Woody the wonder dog and my two daughters Mary and Jessie.

I read about Way Basics and was intrigued. I needed some simple book shelves and figured I’d just go to a garage sale and find something, but it just hadn’t happened yet – didn’t realize how prized these things were! So, I was thrilled when they sent me a sample to play with.

Way Basics use their own zBoard, which is made from post-consumer recycled paper into extremely light yet strong boards. They’re ‘keep it simple’ philosophy includes basic designs and colors all sustainably sourced with low-impact materials. I was drawn to the whole ‘no tools’ message . . . and so was Wayne. You can buy pre-designed packages or get creative in a number of ways.

With a cradle-to-grave thoughtfulness, these versatile cubes are also recyclable, so when their time comes, they go back into the cycle of sustainable life. Of course, I’m no where near ready to put mine in the recycling bin!

For all I can tell, this company really lives and works the values they represent, being members of the Sustainable Furnishings Council, they have taken many steps to ensure a low-impact office as well as sustainable manufacturing practices. And if that isn’t good enough, they also work to give back by offering contributions to folks who may have serious needs for furniture, such as natural disaster victims or women and children rebuilding their lives from domestic violence. Read more about this ‘way’ great company and their concepts.

Prices are very reasonable starting with the basic cube @ $20. But they have an awesome sale going on so visit waybasics.com to get your sustainable shelving now! I’m going to purchase more to go with my lonely little cube.

eat. blog. be merry!
gd meg

I don’t do this ‘green diva’ thing for the financial rewards (slim pickins these days), but there are times when a special event or product review opportunity comes along and I experience a sense of purpose and well, it is just flat out fun!

This week is one of those times when I love being a green diva. The smart PR folks for Lexus found me and decided I should test drive this beautiful not-available-till-2010 HS 250h hybrid sedan. Unfortunately, I’m on lock-down at my office most days and couldn’t get to the event in NY back in June. I whined a little by email with this sweet PR rep about how my man, Wayne drives a Lexus 400h and he rarely shares it.

She indicated that the cars would be back on the East Coast in July and she could hook me up with a ONE WEEK test drive! I asked her to repeat that message and she confirmed that they were offering to drop off a car anywhere I needed them to and let me play with it for a week and then pick it up at my convenience at the end of a week. Hmmmmmm? I played along, but expected a catch, like a huge deposit or ransom to include one of my children or something.

Apparently there are no catches and it’s all real and I aim to give you a daily account of my experience in fostering this car that I will want to adopt at the end of this week . . .

LexusLog :: Day 1

We were all sprawled out on our back deck enjoying the gorgeous day when this fabulous silver Lexus arrived in our driveway. This nice man walked up to me as I sprinted and practically stumbled down to meet him. He simply asked if I was Megan McWilliams. I said, “yes.” And with that he handed me over this key-like apparatus and gave me about 30 seconds of instruction on how to start the car using the button. He may have given slightly more instruction, but I was still in shock and am certain my jaw was loose without words. He had to leave as the ‘follow’ car was waiting in the road and he was gone within 5 minutes. Was he real?

By then, we were all standing around opening doors, crawling around it and gawking at this brilliant beast that was now blocking every other car in the driveway. Once the shock started wearing off, my first instinct was to hop in and go for a ride. Now, what did he say about starting this thing . . . ?

The key wasn’t really a key, but some type of wireless electronic device that just needed to be near the driver inside the car to make the push-button thing work. After 20 solid minutes of pushing buttons and trying various configurations, we were about to panic when we figured out that you had to push the button, which wakes up the computer screen that unfurls itself from a sleeping position on the dashboard, wait a moment, and then put your foot firmly on the break before pushing the button to start the car. Of course, the car doesn’t make ANY noise when it starts, but we were used to that from Wayne’s car. The novelty of that hasn’t worn off on me yet.

I did some errands, but was totally distracted by the space-age configuration of the dashboard and driving area and the mouse like computer operations at my right hand, where the gear shift used to be. I heeded Wayne’s warning NOT to get too distracted by these features and crash this phantom car that appeared in our driveway. Good advice.

Later that evening, I attended a small gathering of women to celebrate the ritual passage of one of those decade birthdays – 30. Since every single one of us was over 40, we all sat in a circle and talked about what our lives were like at 30. Yikes. We all agreed were were better off where we were and wished her luck . . . but, not before we went outside to gawk at my surprise ride. They were all amazed – not only by the Jetson, futuristic value of the shiny silver car, but that being a green diva could bring such treats to my doorstep.  I really hadn’t had time to play enough to answer most of the questions.  I went home exhausted and a massive storm started up, so I did not take the time to explore further.

Yes, day one went well. Stay tuned for day two.

eat. blog. be merry!
gd meg

Green Diva Meg showing off her English Retreads bag

I got this English Retreads bag from one of my favorite green cyber-shopping spots, BuyGreen.com. I love BuyGreen.com because they do a fairly thorough evaluation of their products, reviewing and rating all aspects of a product’s sustainability.  This bag got 49 on its sustainability score (see the details of how this bag was rated).

This bag is very simple, compact and works for basics – small wallet, some makeup, keys and cell phone. While it doesn’t have all those organizational bells, whistles and zippers on the inside, it pays off in ‘feel good’ points.

Who would’ve thought to make something so cool from stinky used tires?

Heather English, founder of English Retreads, came up with the idea while floating in an inner tube down a river in Colorado (all great ideas come from pure, relaxing moments like Heather’s!). Heather was and presumably still is a devoted vegan and wanted to find a great purse that didn’t involve leather. Taking the seemingly endless supply of tire inner tubes that plague our landfills and turning them into useful and stylish items is a brilliant stroke of recycling creativity.

In the 2 or 3 months I’ve been using this bag, I’ve had some pretty interesting conversations with strangers. WARNING: Don’t wear this bag if you don’t want to meet people! Actually, a few of my friends have already been inspired to purchase bags by English Retreads!

eat. blog. be merry!
GD Meg

As I review more and more ‘green’ products these days, I’m kind of baffled that there isn’t more of a standardized rating system. I googled ‘green product standards’ and I found the Green Seal of course, which is great for paper products and cleaners.  The EPA even has a database for information on environmental products and services – if you go there and you can figure out what the standards are and actually find product lists, please let me know! It’s a little confusing.

What about standards for all the great stuff we find on sites like AlternativeConsumer.com, FeelGoodStyle.com and of course TheGreenDivas.com? What about clothing manufacturing, which by the way is traditionally a pretty harsh industry on the environment? What about other textile products, great sustainably-designed kitchen gadgets, and what about all those awesome accessories - eco-bags/purses, belts, jewelry, shoes!?!

I found one promising standard system . . .
BuyGreen.com seems to have a rating system that works. It is a flexible system and offers an opportunity to become more educated about certain types of products and their inherent characteristics in terms of their basic product life cycle. It also seems to work well across a diverse range of products from clothing, to toys and yes, accessories! They even offer office products.

The four main categories are designed to rate a product from ‘cradle to grave’ and represent a product’s basic lifecycle. The categories used are: source material, manufacturing, use, and disposal. Every product offered on their website uses a rating box, which has all four of these categories represented by an icon. If the product meets or exceeds that categories requirements, it will be displayed in color. If not, it is there, but in grey.

There is also a number rating for overall green attributes 1 – not so many: 100 – lots of good green attributes.

You can see an example of this in the image in this post. Note that this hemp blouse has a fairly good rating. The ‘use’ icon is not highlighted. Not really sure what that is about exactly. But, if you want to learn more, you can go to their informative standards page and understand what their rationale is.

I’ve seen some very rudimentary attempts to rate products, but this one is by far the most detailed and perhaps most useful one I’ve come across. Go BuyGreen.com!

eat. blog. be merry!
GD Meg

We’re thrilled to have entrepreneur and organic cotton diva Leslie Joy in the studio with us this Thursday night.

The Joy sisters have a New Jersey-based business that is having a positive impact around the globe.

They are committed to creating wonderful, organic and fair trade cotton products and if you haven’t tried any of their clothes, you are missing out!

Meanwhile here are some stunning statistics and excellent reasons why you should consider organic cotton products (from JoyOrganic.com):

• Three percent of the world’s farmable land produced more than 50 billion pounds of cotton in 2007
• Twenty five percent of all insecticides that are manufactured are applied to the cotton crop
• Cotton is the most heavily sprayed field crop on the planet
• One third of a pound of toxic chemicals are used to produce one pound of cotton fiber
• By purchasing organic cotton you save our land and water from being polluted by thousands of pounds of toxic chemicals

Visit the Joy Organic website to learn more and go shopping!

Don’t forget to tune in, log on and listen up:

HomeGrownRadioNJ.org
7 – 8pm EST
every Thursday night!

eat. blog. be merry!
GD Meg

We have a great show planned for this week. Lots of relevant news (some of you will get the pun there).

We’ll be interviewing Galahad Clark, who is a 7th generation shoe artisan and CEO of Terra Plana and Vivo Barefoot footwear. Eco-shoes – and people some of these shoes are very hot!

Meanwhile, please go to the Green Divas Radio Show page on Facebook and become a fan!

Don’t forget – tune in, log on, listen up!

Every Thursday 7 – 8pm EST
HomeGrownRadioNJ.org


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GD Meg

I received this beautiful blue mug from Terra Keramik, a socially and environmentally responsible ceramics manufacturer that uses renewable energy and energy efficient clays. Everything is designed and produced by Felix Volger, founder and creative director, who personally signs every piece in platinum. Apparently, the production of tableware can be seriously detrimental to the environment. Terra Keramik has gone to great lengths to minimize their impact on the environment. Read more about Terra Keramik’s sustainable manufacturing practices.

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This is a picture of my ‘day job’ desk. Among the clutter of items, you will see my two favorite fluids and their favored respective containers – my tea mug with a caption that reads ‘tips for dieting: if you can’t lose it, decorate it!’ I find this strangely encouraging. The other fluid container is my new favorite stainless steel water bearer. This awesome insulated container is a Thermos. This hip update on a classic is called the Intak Fashion Vacuum Insulated Hydration Bottle - that’s a mouthful, huh? I’ve never liked the plastic straw containers, but this one is flexible AND it is BPA free!

“1.1 billion people on this planet lack adequate hydration due to a shortage of clean and safe drinking water”

- according to the HydrationForAll website.

Thermos is running a very cool (pun intended) campaign associated with the Intak called HydrationForAll. Thermos is serious about helping everyone get healthier with proper hydration. They have teamed up with Charity: Water to help make sure more people around the world have access to safe and clean drinking water for life-saving hydration and health.

If you go to their website and make a donation, for every $5 or more donated to Charity: Water through the site, Thermos will match it and 100% of the money will go towards construction of new freshwater wells in two African communities that are in desperate need of a healthy water supply.

The HydrationForAll website also has helpful tips for helping keep the whole family hydrated. Go see for yourself and maybe make a donation while you’re there!

eat. blog. be merry!
GD Meg