The Green Parent

This past weekend was out local town’s Earth Day celebration.  As part of the festivities, I built this solar oven from a pizza box and handed out yummy smores made from solar energy.  My girls (ages 6 and 3) were easily able to help with this project and after assembling the materials, we had it [...]

Are you looking for a great way to celebrate Earth Day with your children?  The best way to teach your kids about going green is to help them fall in love with nature.  So get outside, get dirty, and show your kids why this planet is worth protecting.  Here are 7 cool activities to help [...]

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 about 6-8 [...]

For this week’s edition of Waste-Free Wednesday, I’m tackling my daughters’ art box.  No sooner could my girls put pen to paper then my walls suddenly were papered in their sketches, drawings, painting, and doodles.  Once I ran out of wallspace, I needed to figure out a way to get the most mileage from their [...]

Got an old pair of jeans hanging around? Recycle them into a cute mini-backpack with just a few quick stitches. Check out this video to see how its done. Photo by Tofutti Break

Looking for a fun eco-craft to share with your kids this weekend? Try your hand at building this eco-friendly birdhouse that uses scrap materials and simple tools to make a new home for your feathered friends while helping your kids learn about the planet! Gather up these supplies: Scrap wood (preferably reclaimed or FSC certified) Nails Hammer Drill Cut your [...]

The first rule to celebrating St. Patrick’s Day is that you don’t have to be Irish to love the Irish. The second rule of the day is that you gotta go green…and the greener the better! So enjoy the luck of the Irish this year and celebrate an eco-friendly St. Patrick’s Day. [...]

Magazines seem to pile up quicker than dirty laundry in my house, even though we purposely limit the number of subscriptions we carry in order to reduce waste. Fortunately, there are a number of things we can do with our monthly magazine supply to keep them out of the trash bin and even give [...]

Materials 8 Toilet Paper Roll Tubes 1 Paper Towel Roll Tube 1 long board or box Recycled Aluminum Foil Recycled Paper (I used scrap pieces of red, orange, and yellow recycled construction paper) Non Toxic Paints (I used blue and white) Non-Toxic Glue This craft is eco-friendly because it recycles items that you probably already have before they hit the trash bin. [...]

Even the youngest children can help with this project… Make a nutritious treat for the feathered friends in your neighborhood by coating a pine cone with peanut butter and then rolling it in oatmeal or sunflower seeds. Tie a 3 to 4 foot long string around the stem of the pine cone and hang it from [...]