Green Swap Partners

A big thank you to everyone who signed up for our first swap! We have eighteen participants and, to pair people up, I pulled names out of a hat, only making adjustments for those who did not want to post internationally. So, without further ado, here are the partners!

Annie and Floss
Marigold Jam and French Frog
Linny (no blog) and Valerie (Valerie, if you could email us at thatlittlebitgreener@hotmail.co.uk I will pass on Linny's email address)
Emma and Jane
A Country Girl and Maria
Sue and Daisie
The Madhouse and Lorraine
Gemma and Rachel
Mad About Bags and Stuffed Nonsense

Please do let us know if any of the links aren't working properly! Now, click on the link to your partner and leave them a comment to say hello, and start getting to know each other. You have until Monday 7th June to get your parcels together and posted, and it would be great if you could blog about your progress and ideas along the way (without giving too much away, of course, we wouldn't want to spoil any surprises, would we?!)

If, for any reason, you have any problems or you feel you are unable to complete the swap, PLEASE do let us know. We fully understand that, sometimes, life just gets in the way, but we would hate for anyone to be left disappointed, (because, unfortunately, this does sometimes happen) but if you let us know then we can at least try to make alternative arrangements. Thanks for your understanding on this matter.

Now it's time to go and get your thinking caps on! Emma and I will try to post a few ideas over the next couple of weeks, but we can't wait to see what you all come up with!

Above all, have fun, and thanks again for taking part!

Emma & Rachel x

Last chance...

... to sign up for the swap! Signups close tomorrow (Friday) so there's still time! Check out the previous post for more info and leave a comment to sign up. We'll be posting details of swap partners on Monday. It'd be fabulous if you could join us!

Emma & Rachel xx

TLBG: Green Swap 2010

Hello again Emma here, this time and both Rachel and I are sooo excited to say that we are holding our first ever swap (well, on TLBG). We thought it would be a really fun idea to make it a 'Green' themed swap and thought it quite appropriate seeing as we have just celebrated the 40th Anniversary of Earth day.

It's entirely up to you what you send to your swap partner, it could be something Eco friendly, reusable, tips and ideas, re-purposed, organic, what ever you like. We thought it would be nice if you included at least one handmade item (after all, we are all crafty types, are we not?), so it's time to get your thinking caps on. You could even include a little card with a green tip, it could be for cleaning, recycling, shopping, cooking etc?

So.....

1. Leave a comment on this post telling us that you would like to join the swap, please state if you are willing to post internationally (therefore we can pair the non international people together).
Edited to add: Blogger comments don't give us a return email address, so please either include this in your comment, or ensure that we can contact you via your blog. Thanks!

2. Closing date for participants is Friday 7th May and partners will be drawn at random and announced on Monday 10th May.

3. Swap parcels should be sent by Monday 7th June.

4. We suggest you send 5 or 6 items, at least one of which should be handmade (eg, made from re-purposed material or an item that is reusable), and it would be great if all your items could tie in to the green theme somehow.

5. Last of all have fun and get to know your swap partner.

Don't forget to invite your friends/blog readers and followers over to join in, the more the merrier!

Edit: Signups are now closed. We'll be sorting out partners and posting details here on Monday.

NB. To the person who left the last, anonymous comment, we have no contact info for you! If you still want to take part, please email us with your blog details asap to thatlittlebitgreener@hotmail.co.uk



Emma & Rachel xx

The paperless kitchen challenge continues!

Hi, Rachel here! Just thought I'd pop in with a quick update of how I'm doing with our paperless kitchen challenge. The good news is that it's going really well and it's actually been really easy too, much easier that I expected, if I'm honest! We have been using our homemade fabric napkins and the muslin "quick-clean-up" cloths on a daily basis. And I have been remembering to use an old sheet of newspaper for veg peelings. I do still occasionally use a sheet of paper towel, and I still need to train the hubby (!) but it's very noticable that a roll is now lasting several weeks instead of one!

I also wanted to mention a couple of other items I have started using in the kitchen. I recently invested in a couple of sets of silicon cupcake cases. I do quite a lot of baking and, with kids in the house, cupcakes get made on quite a regular basis, so I thought I would give these a try. They fit into a standard size bun tin, the cakes cooked exactly the same and they came out of the cases very easily. The only downside is the extra washing they create! Apparently they are dishwasher safe, but I don't have one, so have to wash them by hand and they do need a little bit of attention to make sure all the crumbs are out of the creases. Apart from that though, top marks! No more paper cake cases for me!

I also use a Magic Non-Stick Liner on baking trays when making cookies or meringues instead of greaseproof paper. It's like a specially treated fabric that is washable and re-usable - it's supposed to last up to 5 years and, again, I've been really pleased with how it performs. I've actually just noticed on the Lakeland website that you can also buy this in precut circles for sponge tins too.

Now, I will admit that I have no idea exactly how "green" these products are in terms of the materials used to make them and the manufacturing processes, but they have certainly helped to further reduce the amount of paper going into our rubbish bins, and that has to be a good thing, right?

Do keep a look out for our next post as we have something exciting planned!

Take care

R x

Earth Hour and a BIG FAT apology

Well hello there, Emma here and its most definitely long time no see. For that I do apologise and I hope that you hadn't given up on me. Are you still out there TLBGreeners?

OK straight to it....the BIG FAT apology goes out to Rachel my TLBG buddy. I'd taken a little bit of a back seat for quite a few months, well it was more like I was sitting in the boot rather than the back seat!! But Rachel has been doing a super job at keeping TLBG going and for that I am eternally grateful to her. You are a star Rach!!! Big Hugs!!

The last time I contributed to a post was way back on 5th January (how shameful is that!!) and thought it was about time I made an appearance. I have to admit, well confess really, that being greener has not been on my list of priorities with too many work commitments etc.

After seeing a segment on the news I jumped at the chance to take part in earth hour, so on 27th March at 8:30pm off went all the lights and we even turned the TV off and sat and chatted for an hour. It wasn't until the next morning that I saw just how many people had taken part. All together there were 88 countries who participated and some of the most famous sights of the world turned off their lights!! Pop over to the official site to take a peek. If you're not from the UK you can select your country, by clicking on earth hour global. Some of the photos are quite spectacular.

Did you take part?

So before I pop off to finish one of my crafty projects, if you have any topics that you would like us to cover (come on guys I need a rocket up my backside) please feel free to send us your ideas/topics.

And I think you'll agree in saying that Rachel is the best TLBG buddy I could ever ask for (have a grovelled enough yet Rach?) :D

See you real soon, Emma xxx

Green beauty bargain

I've just recently started using a new skincare range, but have been so impressed by it so far that I wanted to share with you. Organic Surge is manufactured in the UK, contains organic essential oils, has no animal testing and contains no chemical nasties like parabens, SLS, petroleum or propylene glycol. And the best bit is that it is really cheap! I have very dry, very sensitive skin, prone to flare ups of redness and flakiness and, for the last few years, have been using products from Neals Yard or Liz Earle - products which I love. However, whilst not being hugely expensive, they are a bit more than I really want to spend on skincare at the moment (as we're all trying to watch the pennies, aren't we?) So, when I spotted this new range in Boots last week, I thought I'd give them a go, especially as they had a "buy one get one free" offer on them. I bought the Gentle Cleansing Lotion and the Super-Intensive Daily Moisturiser and, since starting using them a week ago, my skin is now looking better than it has in a long time! The redness has all but gone, there is no sign of flakiness and my skin is feeling really soft and smooth. The products have a lovely, clean scent and feel really nice on my skin. Obviously, everyone's skin is different so what works for me might not work for you but at such reasonable prices I think it's definitely worth trying. I'm certainly converted! The brand also produce hair and body care products, so I shall definitely be giving those a go too. You can find out more about the brand at www.organicsurge.com

Rachel x

Paperless Kitchen Challenge!

A couple of weeks back, one of our members, Jo, emailed Emma with a link to a great post about the paperless kitchen idea. Now, both Emma and myself will admit that we are not great when it comes to this particular area - we both love our paper towels! So I was very interested to read the post, and we agreed that it was indeed something we ought to blog about here (and hopefully kick our butts into doing something about it!). Then, last week I read this post by Jessica of Turkey Cookies, about the very same thing. This time, it actually inspired me to do something about it straight away, so I dug out some fabric and quickly sewed up a few little napkins for the kids to use. They were so quick and easy to sew up, I don't know why I haven't made any before, so I will definitely by making some more grown up sized ones too.




I also remembered that I still had a stack of muslin squares, from when the kids were babies, and thought that they would be perfect to use as "quick clean up" cloths, instead of always reaching for a paper towel. The squares were quite big but by cutting them into quarters they are now pretty much the same size as a sheet of kitchen roll.



Of course, if you don't have any old muslin squares lying around, I'm sure old t-shirts or other fabric scraps would work just as well. Now I just have to get myself into the habit of using them! I'm also going to try and remember to use a sheet of used newspaper for more solid messes - spilled food or vegetable peelings, which can then be thrown straight into the compost bin.

Please do take the time to read the two posts mentioned above if you can, as they have loads more great ideas for reducing paper use in your kitchen. I shall be keeping you updated with how I'm doing, and we wondered if you might like to join us on this little challenge? Please do let us know how you get along or, if you already have a paperless kitchen, do you have any other tips you could pass on?

Rachel x