The Green Parent

Does your backyard need a rain garden?  These lovely little features are a great way to utlize the runoff from your roof and reduce the amount fo water entering sotrm drains.  Big or small, rain gardens also help to reduce water pollution by trapping sediments and excess nutrients before they hit waterways.   So what’s [...]

.!. So, I was sitting outside with my family yesterday when my husband and I suddenly heard a very loud buzzing sound.  We looked up and saw a swarm of bees.  I don’t mean one or two bees…I mean a real bona fide swarm of bees.  I didn’t stick around to count them one by [...]

Finally, spring has sprung!  Are you ready to plant so seeds with your little ones?  You don’t need a bunch of store-bought seed starters and supplies to grow plants indoors.  Here are some great seed starter projects that use recyclables instead. Newspaper Take a sheet of newspaper and fold it in half so that it’s [...]

For this week’s edition of Waste-Free Wednesday,  I’m getting wiggly…as in wiggly worm composting.  Don’t be afraid!  Worm composting is an excellent way to reduce your food waste, create your own all natural fertilizer, and get your kids interested in gardening. Worm composting, or vermicomposting for you gardening geeks, helps kids learn about ecology while [...]

by Christine Heinrichs What’s greener than chickens? They consume kitchen trim and garden waste and turn it into eggs. Their manure can be part of a green garden program. They are the Companion Animal that Gives Back. Even if you live in town, you may be able to keep a few chickens. In rural areas, [...]

With fall in full swing, it’s time to starting think about fertilization…for your lawn and garden that is.  Why now? Fall fertilizing nourishes and strengthens your plants’ and lawn’s roots.  And stronger roots will give them a stronger base on which to thrive next spring.  Many of the fertilizers you find in the store are [...]

ATTENTION: Don’t miss the compost tumbler giveaway at the bottom of this post!! Did you know that food scraps make up over 12% of the US waste stream?  According to the US Environmental Protection Agency, Americans throw away more than 25 percent of the food we prepare, amounting to about 96 billion pounds of food [...]

by Michelle Andrade – co-founder, editor-in-chief, author, CoolMomsCare.org This year we decided to start a very small garden. We began with tomatoes, herbs, arugula, and lettuce. After a few weeks, I read that you could plant whole potatoes and decided to plant some. Just this week, we decided it was time to check on our [...]

Susan Harris doesn’t believe in green thumbs. Instead, she says she learned the ins and outs of gardening by “trowel and error.” That sounds a lot like my current gardening plan…heavy on the error. So I’m happy to take as many tips as I can from Susan, who is now a Master Gardner and gardening [...]

Every year, Americans use 10,000 gallons of water, 70 million pounds of pesticides and over $5 billion dollars worth of fertilizers in order to get those “green” lawns to which we are so obviously addicted. According to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, “Homeowners use up to 10 times more chemical pesticides per acre on [...]

With a motto of “Turning Garbage Into Gold,” New Jersey-based TerraCycle is making it their mission to “eliminate the idea of waste” by creating products that are made from and packaged in garbage. To date they’ve kept over one million plastic soda bottles out of the landfill by using the bottles to package their cleaning [...]

Why pay for good food only to throw it away? It doesn’t make sense, yet it’s something that all of us have done. That’s why 12% of the U.S. waste stream is made up of food scraps. Keep your hard earned dollars out of the trash by using these simple tips to help reduce your [...]

It’s winter and my house is sealed up tighter than a drum to keep the warm air in and the cold air out. That’s good green parenting, right…or is it? By keeping my family safe and snug inside my modern American home, I may be exposing them to high levels of indoor air pollution. After [...]

Have you ever met a kid who didn’t love jumping into a pile of freshly raked leaves? I certainly haven’t! So with a beautiful fall weekend almost within reach, it’s time to rev up you rakes and get ready for some weekend fun. And after your kids get finished smashing the leaves to smithereens, be [...]

Brr…Well folks, summer is officially over and the crisp cool air of fall is moving in. Before you know it, winter will be here, and despite the best efforts of global warming, many of us will still have to deal with snow and ice this season. And while the white stuff isn’t falling yet, the [...]