Since it’s World Environment Day today, it seems apt to be thinking about recycling and reusing. Being a huge supporter of the R’s, I’m always on the look out for imaginative ways to give life to old or unusable items.

Cool Hunting Green is a book dedicated to designers who are doing just that but in a much funkier and trendier way than I ever could

The book focuses on designers who are creating, reusing or recycling items to produce greener products for fashion, gadgets, stationery, the house, transport, outside and even the afterlife.

Each item featured is accompanied by a website where you can get more information and buy the product.

Some of my favorite sites are:

http://www.rebeccawardjewellery.com/

http://www.souls-australia.com.au/shop.html

http://www.greenknickers.org/index.html

http://www.ecoist.com/

Recycling is good, but reuse is even better. This is the mantra of Scoodi, a site I’ve been meaning to blog for a while.

Scoodi is a cross between Freecycle and E-bay where users can search for items to buy, or even better…get for free. It’s free to list and trade, and allows people to link up with each other locally to trade and swap stuff. Not only is it a great way to get stuff, but a great way to get rid of unwanted items.

And of course a great way to keep unnecessary items out of landfill.

I love beer, especially now that I am pregnant and shouldn’t drink it

My husband brews a pretty good drop from our garage, which usually comes top of my list for taste.

But now there’s a new beer I’d like to try (when I can) and that’s Cascade Green, which Cascade claims is 100% carbon offset.

What does this mean? Well according to the Cascade brewery, all remaining greenhouse gas emissions from the beer are offset from the moment the company sources its hops to when the beer bottles are placed in recycling bins.

Cascade also says that it uses bio-degradable vegetable oil based inks in the beer’s packaging, and the carton is 100% recyclable.

Have you tried this beer? Let me know what you think.

The Greenwashing index is an interesting website where people can submit advertisements that they think are greenwashing a product.

You can upload an ad or watch other ads that have been uploaded, and then add your comment. The site aims to educate people about greenwashing and how to be aware of a product that’s being greenwashed.

The site provides a good definition of greenwashing: it’s greenwashing when a company or organisation spends more time and money claiming to be “green” through advertising and marketing than actually implementing business practices that minimise environmental impact. It’s whitewashing, but with a green brush.

The site is very US focused but it seems to be open to ads from all over the world. So if you know of a good example of greenwashing - upload your ad.

Closer to home (Australia), Environment Victoria runs the annual DUMP Awards where people can nominate products that are unnecessarily over packaged. I couldn’t find any information about the upcoming 2008 awards on the organisation’s site, but you can read the results from the 2007 awards (PDF report).

Eight years ago I travelled to Sweden and was impressed with how the supermarkets did not provide free plastic bags to shoppers. Instead, shoppers could buy durable, biodegradable brown paper bags or bring their own.

A few years later I lived in the Netherlands and the supermarkets there provided durable plastic bags but for a price. These bags lasted forever and encouraged shoppers to bring their own bags. No one batted an eyelid; it was just the “done thing”.

I think the recent decision by Australian environment minister Peter Garrett to ban plastic bags, or impose a levy on each them, is a move in the right direction.

Plastic bags are made from polluting petrochemicals, detrimental to landfill and can be deadly to wildlife.

Already, many Australians are using recycled bags for their shopping but I think if we are charged for plastic bags then many more people will make sure they recycle.

Welcome back to 2008. I hope you all had a good break over the Christmas/New Year period. So far this year (and the last few months of 2007) has been great for our garden. Sydney has had so much rain.

My garden is thriving. Our space saver pumpkins have taken off as well as my cherry tomatoes, rhubarb, rocket, herbs, jalapeno peppers, sunflowers, carrots and leeks. My fruit trees are also looking pretty good - mandarin, lime, lemon, bush lime, fig, mango, olive, avocado, mulberry and guava. Although my chocolate sapote got an attack of black soot and never quite recovered.

The rain has also been extra kind to our lawn. I know lawns get a bad rap these days but we put a small patch in during spring. It replaced a very weedy section of our garden and some broken pavers. Originally we wanted to grow a native grass but couldn’t find one that resembled a tough lawn that could deal with a lot of wear and tear.

We chose Sir Walter, which claims to be a hardy, shade and sun tolerant variety of grass, as well as being very water wise. The excessive amounts of rain means that the grass is now well established and thriving, without us having to use the hose. Although, sometimes I put the grey water run off from our washing machine on to the lawn.

Although I would have loved to turn the lawned area into vegetable patches, we decided to lawn it for our son. He really needed somewhere to play outside and the lawn has really done the trick. No more scraped knees on the pavement as he slides down his slippery slide ;-0.

The other thing I love about the lawn is the constant supply of mulch I have. I thin layer of grass clippings over the garden beds really helps suppress weeds plus reduce water evaporation from the soil. I don’t have to buy sugar cane mulch anymore. The clippings also heat up quickly in my compost bins, which helps everything to quickly break down.

I’m off for the silly season. I’ll be back blogging in the new year. In the meantime have a great holiday.

I’m not really one for plastic or freshly cut Christmas trees. The picture is of our Christmas tree - a potted Wollemi pine - featuring my son’s fabulous star creation.

Oh, and by the way, the biodegradable pot it originally came in did totally break down in my compost bin. Not a trace was left.

Today is Blog Action Day where bloggers around the world are uniting to write about the environment.

I’m covering composting because it’s an easy way to help the environment by reducing your household’s waste and improving your soil organically.

It’s a long post, but if you want to know more about setting up your own compost system, then read on. (more…)

Earlier this year I wrote about building a worm farm from scratch. Since then I have had quite a few questions about looking after the worms themselves.

Worm are relatively easy to look after, however things can go wrong.

(more…)

To celebrate 100 issues of ReNew magazine, the Alternative Technology Association is holding free sustainable house open days. The houses will be open this weekend across Australia.

Last year I checked out a few houses in Canberra during Sustainable House Day which gave me loads of ideas and inspiration for my own home. You have to pay to enter the houses during Sustainable House Day so this free event is a great opportunity to get inspired by people who are living the “sustainable dream”.

The weird thing is I will be in Canberra again this weekend so if I get time I will try and check out the house in Mawson. If you are in Sydney, you can visit Michael Mobbs’ house in Chippendale, which was one of the first sustainable houses in the city. Bummer I will miss that one.