If you read my recent post Are You too Lazy to Recycle?, you would know that becoming an earth-friendly individual is a new development in my life. With each passing day, I am gradually reducing my carbon footprint. I am eager to find new ways to preserve my little piece of the planet. I am hoping that you are doing the same!
In support of Earth Day, the staff at Parenting Help Me would like to offer you the opportunity to win one of several eco-friendly gifts. Just submit an activity or idea that you and your family use to help protect and conserve your
environment. If it’s green, it’s good. We will select the top 2 ideas and feature them on our website.
Our first place winner will receive a thermal tote from California Innovations. This is a huge tote (23″ x 7.88″). (You can actually fit a small child in it! My son likes to play hide and seek in my tote:) It will keep foods frozen for a very long time. Never use a plastic bag again!
Our first runner up will receive a SIGG Safari Fun kids water bottle. These bottles are
100% recyclable, ultra-lightweight, nearly indestructible, have no scent or taste transfer, and 0% leaching of any substances (BPA, BPB, or any phthalates). Bottles are made in Switzerland from a single piece of aluminum and is seamless. SIGG is also a member of the “1% for the planet” organization where 1% of all sales are committed to environmental causes.
We will also be giving away small prizes for honorable mention. All of the honorable mention gifts are handcrafted from recycled materials and made with love by artisans we discovered in our quest for eco-friendly gifts.
Abigail’s recycled crayons are one of our honorable mention gifts. You can check out the inspiring story behind her recycled crayons in my post Save the Crayons, Save the World.
To enter, simply post your idea in the comment section below (must be on this page). You do not have to use your real or full name. However, email addresses must be accurate in order to contact the winners for shipment of their gift. Email addresses will not appear on the site and will ALWAYS be kept private! Contest ends April 15th, 2009. Winners will be featured on our blog on Earth Day, April 22nd, 2009.
Good luck and keep those unique and innovative ideas coming!
Well, I guess I missed the contest, but love the idea so I will share my ideas here too!! I always recycle all cans, plastic bottles etc. I don’t by water bottles anymore. I am switching over to all stainless steel sippy cups (takes a while- Expensive!!) I started my own garden last year and I love that and it’s great for the kids too!! I try to create crafts from items I already have (more on that on my toddlercraft blog!)
Happy Earth Day!
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Contest ends in less than 6 hours… Hurry post a comment with your Eco-Idea at.. [link to post] < - Tree Huggers better hurry!
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We practice Recycle, Reduce and Reuse everyday in our home. We carry our purchases in reusable bags, we recycle our trash and we reuse bags & plastic deli containers. This year, we made “green houses” out of the plastic containers that you buy fruit in (like strawberries). The work great for starting seed that will go into our garden. Happy Earth Day.
We donate our old toys to second chance toys. It’s a great way for unused to toys to be enjoyed again AND keep them out of landfills!
http://secondchancetoys.typepad.com/
Rather than throw away cards, I recycle them into little origami boxes and use them for small gifts or for hanging on my tree. I have a tutorial I wrote here:
http://katydidandkid.blogspot.com/2008/09/kitchen-table-crafts-origami-box.html
I also have recycled frozen juice can lids into little ornaments too by tapping a design into it using a nail and hammer.
I have my patio garden every year and I buy as much local produce as I can from the farmers market.
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RT @alexander13: Win Earth Day Eco Friendly Prizes. [link to post] RT appreciated
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Win Earth Day Eco Friendly Prizes. [link to post] RT appreciated
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We have educated our children about the little ways we can save our earth, reminding them that even little children can make a big difference! In fact, children can do as much as grown ups when it comes to saving our earth. Here are a few of our simple guidelines!
• Last one out turns off the lights!
• Instead of turning up the heat, we put on a sweater or use an extra blanket.
• On warm days, we open the windows instead of using air conditioner.
• If it’s a short trip downtown or to a friend’s house, we walk or ride our bikes.
• We bring our own plastic bags to the store. This is the most efficient way to recycle them.
• We use reusable containers for leftovers.
• We try to buy used CDs, books, games, and clothes.
• We donate our “gently used” stuff to a non profit organization. We joined freecycle.com
• We don’t keep the water running while our brushing our teeth.
• We take short showers and do our singing somewhere else!
• No dripping faucets in our house.
• We wash our cloths in cold water.
• We try not to keep the fridge door open too long. Get it and get out!
Every person, big or little, counts when it comes to reducing, recycling or reusing it!
We use smart strips for our computers and TV’s major electronics.
My husband and I invested in those reusable cloth bags several months back and we take them everywhere with us instead of using the plastic bags that they put your stuff in at the stores. You can fit so much more in the reusable bags. For Christmas we put our family and friends presents in the reusable green bags to pass on the “Going Green”, and everyone just loved it!
WE DONATE TO STAY GREEN:
There are tons of ways to keep your junk out of landfills. One of the best ways is to donate it. We all know the standard donation ideas, but here are some more unique ones:
• Donate old glasses at One Sight: drop off old prescription or nonprescription glasses at your local Lions Club, LensCrafters, Pearle Vision, Sears, Target, or BJ’s Optical store (they’ll give you a receipt for taxes), or mail them in (and request a receipt)
• Donate an old car rather than let it end up in a junk yard. This can be a great tax write-off.
• Donate sneakers in ok condition at Soles4Souls. Soles4Souls facilitates the donations of shoes to aid the hurting worldwide. They coordinated relief efforts for the Asian Tsunami and Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, netting over 1 Million pairs donated for these disasters.
• You can also donate sneakers that are not suitable for wearing to Nike’s Reuse a Shoe Program. The Reuse-A-Shoe program takes your worn-out kicks and turns them into Nike Grind, a material used in sports surfaces, playgrounds and even new Nike products.
• Donate your wedding dress to a metastatic breast cancer patient who will be a bride herself (http://www.makingmemories.org/).
Almost anything you have can be donated to a local church or charity and will keep tons of garbage out of our landfills while also saving all the resources of creating a new product.
Excellent idea Alex 13
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Parenting Help Me’s Earth Day GiveAway [link to post]
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In addition to traditional recycling efforts, we organized a recycling project at our son’s elementary school, where we recycle juice pouches, nabisco cookie wrappers and frito lay chip products through the company, Terracycle. In six months, we have recycled over 6,000 juice pouches and 1,000 wrappers. We also sell the juice pouch pencil cases from Terracycle in our school book store to get the kids excited about recycling.
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RT @alexander13 You a parent? Then check out this contest. [link to post]
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i would like to hear alot more about recyleing our town insist that we recycle but thats cool with me because we always had tried to recycle what we could but so many in this town thinks it crazy but my family loves it
WOW what a uniqe and great idaa!
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FREE thermal tote and kids SIGG water bottle. Leave a comment and enter to win. [link to post]
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You a parent? Then check out this contest. [link to post]
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I am starting my own garden. I am also learning how to compost to reduce the carbon footprint and trash and then use it the compost on my garden.
We make recycling fun. We have color coded bins to coordinate the plastics from the glass from the cardboard. Everyone around me loves our recycling room!