The biggest benefit of buying in bulk is that it leads to less waste in terms of packaging. Products that are individually packed often use up more plastic, carton, and ink than products that are crammed into one large container. This is true whether you buy detergent, milk, or toys.

Another benefit of buying in bulk has nothing to do with the environment, but is something any penny-pinching housewife will appreciate – savings. Companies usually price super-sized products a bit lower than small packets to encourage consumers to buy more. While the difference in price is not that big, those pennies will eventually add up to a significant amount.

Here are some tips for buying in bulk to ensure that nothing is wasted:

• Buy products in bulk only when you also consume them in bulk. Examples of ideal products to buy in bulk include toilet paper, shampoo, milk, biscuits, detergent, and anything that you use on a daily basis. Here’s a good list of some items you might want to buy in bulk.
• Check the expiration date. If you won’t be able to consume the product before the expiration date, then don’t buy in bulk. The last thing we want is to encourage a throw away culture.
• Do away with plastic bags and paper bags. Some products bought in bulk come with handles in their packaging (i.e. disposable diapers and toilet paper). Reduce waste further by not having them bagged.
• Do not buy non-consumables in bulk because they will just end up stocked in the house for a long time.
• Stay within your budget. As much as we want to help the environment, we also know that most families have budgets they need to work with. Exercise financial restraint when bulk buying, stocking up on the most needed items and putting off unnecessary purchases.

Enter “Eco Balls”, amazing little balls which, when thrown into your wash, do all the work your regular soap does (and claim to kill bacteria too) without any chemicals, detergents and the like. When you work out what you save on soap, the savings are enormous, with something like 6 cents a load with the balls, to approx. 80 cents with detergent, more depending on what brand you buy. You can buy kits which come with refills, stain remover (it doesn’t do that great with heavy stains) as well as dryer balls for “fabric softer” role.

So does it really work? While I wait for my order to arrive, I found a good review worth checking out. The verdict? Some liked it, others were disappointed with its cleaning power. There was also one complaint about how the ball came apart and broke her washing machine. Either way, its a product I think worth trying out for yourself -because I think eliminating detergents would be a great thing.

One of the mantras in my household is “Wash your hands please”. When the kids get home from school, before mealtimes, before cooking, after playing, after touching the pets and so on. But when you’re out of the house, using water and soap obviously isn’t the most convenient thing. And the solution a lot of people have been using come in the form of antibacterial gels, which are cheap, plentiful and found just about anywhere. The problem with it though, is that terrible ingredient, triclosan, an antibacterial agent found in a lot of products nowadays, from soap to socks! But the fact remains: Triclosan is no better than plain soap.

Several months ago, I read a very disturbing article by a Mom, aptly called: “Cancer or Germs? I’ll Take the Germs!”. She took the time out to do research on the stuff (the things a Mom will do!- bravo) and it made me ban triclosan from my household forever – why? because among other nasties, it causes cancer and is bad for the environment. Enough said. If you want to know more about it, or what products contain it, please go here.

Okay. So we know antibacterial gels with triclosan are bad, but that doesn’t really solve our problem about killing germs while we are on the go. Mind you, soaps have it too, so be wary and always read labels. Well, the best solution is to buy the natural stuff (like Clean Well), or better yet, make it yourself.

Here are some ideas:

Grapefruit seed extract: diluted with distilled water, makes a great all-around germ-killing spray for hands, air, surfaces and even wounds!

Vodka and essential oil: Mixing vodka, essential oil (like lavender) and distilled water, is another easy and cheap alternative. Put it in a spray bottle and keep it handy.

Essential oils and water: Simple yet effective, take your favourite essential oil and mix it with water to create a very natural antibacterial. The most potent are: cinnamon, cloves, verbena, lavender, angelice, juniper, sandal, cedar, thyme and lemon.

The fact is that online shopping involves so much less energy than normal shopping. For example, if you look at the operations that are involved in merchandising, traditional retail stores use up a lot of resources; more storage space, more overhead expenses, more manpower. As compared to this, e-commerce businesses use up about 1/16th of the energy and resources. Add up the number of e-commerce businesses in existence and you will realize just how much better for the earth this is!

Now how about the fuel that you use going to the mall? You might be thinking that the shipping involved in online shopping would use up a lot of fuel as well. The thing is that you actually use up more fuel driving to the mall than ground shipping or overnight air shipping. This drive to the mall does not even include driving around looking for a parking space or moving from one mall to the next. Now I bet you didn’t really know that, did you?

In any case, there are also more online shops that offer various options that will help you lessen your carbon footprint. That’s the good news. Go ahead, shop online all you want.

Bring your own bag

Reusable shopping bags are the rave these days, and I think they are one of those trends that should just never end. Instead of relying on plastic or paper bags that shops give out with your purchases, why don’t you lug along a reusable bag or two?

Share transportation

Carpooling is such an old idea, but it has never been more relevant than it is today. Plan your shopping activities so that you can share a ride with family members and friends instead of everyone taking separate cars. Use the money you save on gas to buy more stuff!

Don’t go too far

Yeah, some deals might better in places farther from your home, but do you really have to go that far? For sure, you will also find great Black Friday deals closer to home. More so, you might even have a grand time shopping online. This will save on time and fuel consumption!

Skip shopping!

Sure, Black Friday is fun. Shopping is fun. However, no one is obliged to actually go out and do Black Friday. If you can, why not choose other ways to spend your Black Friday? It doesn’t have to be shopping, doesn’t it?

If you want to have something more meaningful aside from Angry Birds on your iPhone though, I suggest checking out these three iPhone apps. Yes, they are free, and even better, they are dubbed “green.”

FindGreen

This app will be your guide to businesses that are green and sustainable. You can find more than 56,000 establishments via this app. In order to help the green movement become even bigger, support these businesses!

Greenpeace Tissue Guide

Don’t laugh it off just yet. Tissue paper is something that we all take for granted, and yet, we cannot live without it. The impact of tissue paper consumption on the environment is pretty serious, though, and with this app, you can determine which products have a lesser negative impact. With more than 100 brands to choose from, this guide will point the way to saving trees.

The Good Guide

How sure are you that the labels on products live up to their claims? You can either spend time scouring the labels thoroughly or you can download this iPhone app. It can tell you all the pertinent details about products – how green and how safe they are and so on. Just point the camera at the barcode, and the app will scan it. You will then have access to the information stored in the database!

Don’t fill your phone up with mere exciting games. Put it to good use as well!

But did you know that forests are being affected negatively because of the tissue paper industry? (Of course you cannot discount other paper products.) I just read a report by the National Resources Defense Council and this is what it contained.

If every household in the United States replaced just one box of virgin fiber facial tissues (175 sheets) with 100% recycled ones, we could save 163,000 trees.

That’s a LOT of trees. It’s hard to imagine using “bad” facial tissues not made of virgin fiber, though. How about toilet paper?

If every household in the United States replaced just one roll of virgin fiber toilet paper (500 sheets) with 100% recycled ones, we could save 423,900 trees.

Okay, that’s a much higher figure! I guess I can deal with non-virgin fiber toilet paper much easier. And how about kitchen paper towels?

If every household in the United States replaced just one roll of virgin fiber paper towels (70 sheets) with 100% recycled ones, we could save 544,000 trees.

Here is my suggestion: more than using kitchen towels made of recycled paper, maybe we can start using cloth rags every now and then?

On thing I know is that kids love flashlights, or torches, as they say in England. They like to play with them, especially under the sheets, in the dark. The regular flashlights we’ve had throughout the years have been victims of my kids abuse, because when one of my kids get their hands on them, they either get misplaced or left turned on. Not good for when there’s a sudden power outage or when the plumber needs to look under the sink. Nor is it good for the environment when you think of how many used batteries there are that go in landfills and are not disposed of properly.

So when I found the Powerplus Penguin, I was thrilled to bits, and so were my kids. Firstly, its not always that you find an eco-friendly toy that REALLY appeals to older kids, second, this was very good value (most eco-toys are NOT cheap), and third, it also has a great practical function and won’t just sit there in the playroom after they’ve played with it a few times.

This cute little penguin has no need, I repeat, no need for batteries. It’s a clever invention from the U.K., which is charged by simply pumping the wings (a light squeeze from your child). When charged, the ultra bright LED has a lighting distance of twenty meters which is just right for kids purposes.

Although I bought it for my 7-year-old girl (the packaging said it was recommended for kids 6 and above), my 4-year-old eyed it enviously (he said it was Pablo from the Backyardigans, his favorite, which meant it was for HIM) and definitely wouldn’t have much trouble using it too. Oh, and the packaging was fantastic too – made from attractive recycled materials, it was really simple and easy to open, without all that extra awful plastic, sharp bits and twisty metal things you find with most toys.

You can purchase the penguin at Nigel’s Eco Store for £5.99, but you can find it a little cheaper at other shops if you search.

In changing your ways to greener living, the key thing to remember is:

“little things mean a lot”

Meaning, you don’t have to go out marching in Washington or move your family to a yurt in the wilderness to save the earth.

Take your weekly trips to the grocery store, for instance. Just by being aware of what you buy can make loads of difference. For me, the main thing I’ve done in my home is to switch the cleaning supplies I use from the nose-burning, toxic, chemical-laden stuff to non-toxic, bio degradable brands. It was the smell that actually bothered me the most (especially when I was pregnant), so switching to the lovely natural stuff I use now as a surface cleaner, which uses orange oil, is such a great thing.

A small local company in my area makes most of the stuff I buy now (more points for saving on transport fuel) , but even the bigger guys are starting natural, eco-friendly lines now, like Clorox Green Works, which launched early this year. Did you know they bought Burts Bees too?

Here’s a part of a good article I found which should help you in the grocery. Read and heed.

Buy local. When food doesn’t have to travel far, it requires less packaging materials, fewer preservatives and often fewer pesticides. Not only are these processes bad for the environment but they also take away from the taste of the food. Another benefit to buying locally grown food is the shorter distances the produce needs to travel, which results in less damaging greenhouse gases.

Buy environmentally friendly products. Many companies are trying to be more environmentally conscious so look for brands that offer natural products in recycled packages.

Take fewer trips. Car emissions continue to be a major contributor to greenhouse gasses in Canada making carpooling and fewer trips to the grocery store a must. Making a grocery list in advance can help cut down on trips to the store for one-off forgotten items. Organizing a grocery store carpool with friends or neighbours is also a fun way to spend time with people while reducing the number of cars on the road.

Cut down on plastic bags. Canadians use approximately 10 billion plastic bags each year. Reducing that number means bringing reusable grocery bags with you to the store. If you don’t already have some, most stores have their own brand of reusable bags you can purchase while you are there. Another alternative is to use cardboard boxes to carry your groceries or paper bags that can be recycled.

Effects Of Cell Phone Radiation With Green Planet Armour

For years, my spouse, an anti-technology dinosaur, has been preaching the danger of cellphones. He’s always owned one though (pre-paid), rather begrudgingly, never turning it on unless absolutely necessary, much to my annoyance. Well, the other day he told me it was time I did some research on the dangers of cellphones and do a post on it on YURTO as he reckoned most people use their cellphones at home even if it was invented for use outside of the home.

What I found was basically that cellphones emitted radiation, which when given in large doses, is indeed dangerous. In fact, I read this very disturbing article in the UK Telegraph, wherein a noted brain specialist says that “mobile phones are more dangerous than smoking” and was the reason for the rise in brain tumors.

Mobile phones could kill far more people than smoking or asbestos, a study by an award-winning cancer expert has concluded. He says people should avoid using them wherever possible and that governments and the mobile phone industry must take “immediate steps” to reduce exposure to their radiation.

The study, by Dr Vini Khurana, is the most devastating indictment yet published of the health risks.

It draws on growing evidence – exclusively reported in the IoS in October – that using handsets for 10 years or more can double the risk of brain cancer. Cancers take at least a decade to develop, invalidating official safety assurances based on earlier studies which included few, if any, people who had used the phones for that long.

Obviously, the mobile phone people has dismissed the professor’s claims as baloney, and a large study in the UK has shown little evidence, BUT it also said:

Professor Challis, emeritus professor of physics at the University of Nottingham, said: “It all sounds pretty reassuring and that is good. But we cannot rule out the possibility that cancer could appear in a few years. The epidemiological evidence is not good enough and most cancers take longer than 10 years to develop.

So I am inclined to agree with hubby, but am not quite prepared to give up my phone (what if there was an emergency with the kids while I was out?). Luckily, there is a company addressing this, and their product is something we should all get, short of giving up your portable.

Green Planet Armour is a nifty little product you can easily connect to your electronic device which uses nano technology to combat the ill effects of radiation. Check out their website today.