Green Daily

Liberating the lawn. Living in the suburban sprawl of neatly manicured lawns, Green Bean of Green Bean Dreams will be liberating some of the back lawn for an edible garden. Already, a grass-covered sidewalk strip in the front has been torn up and planted with beans and corn. Last year, in planting a garden with flowers known to attract butterfly and hummingbird, she took note that few wildlife arrived. Until now.

In the reclaimed sidewalk strip out front, where beans and corn grow, a toad is merrily croaking its presence. In addition to the already planned liberation of the backyard in favor of an edible garden, the Green Bean family is planning to turn part of the front lawn into a butterfly garden with flowers planted in the shape of a butterfly. Green Bean could not be happier to hear a toad is near. In Liberate your lawn, she lists seven great reasons for freeing the lawn to gardens that support wildlife and feed people.

Batter Blaster. If you think manicured lawns are a waste of landscape, then Batter Blaster is going to strike you sad in the silly absurdity of its very existence on the supermarket shelf. Beth Terry of Fake Plastic Fish first read about the organic pancake batter in a chlorofluorocarbons free aerosol can in a review at the Organic Picks blog. Organic Picks compared the useful existence of Batter Blaster to a butter stick or a toilet paper folder. In agreement, Beth commented that Batter Blaster is ".. just wrong on SO MANY LEVELS!"

Her post comes with a solution by way of Mark's No Big Deal Pancake Recipe. As Beth points out, "In a CNet video comparing canned Batter Blaster with traditional batter-making, mixing up batter the old fashioned way took 3 whole minutes, compared to the 5-second squirt from the can." Last year, I set a challenge to cook from scratch as much as possible to cut down on the extraneous packaging of the food we purchase from the store, and Batter Blaster feels like a setback to those trying to live green. Who cares if the pancake batter inside the can is organic.

Handmade Sandwich Wraps. Formally an environmental scientist, now a stay-at-home mom, Julie of Towards Sustainability took up the challenge to pack lunch without using disposable food bags or food containers. She came up with a homemade sandwich wrap. With step-by-step instructions and photos, she shares how she constructed the fabric sandwich wrap. While discussing how to make the homemade sandwich wrap, Julie mentioned her youngest daughter already takes her school lunch in two drawstring calico bags. Very cool, simple to do ideas.