Lavera is one of my favourite brands of organic cosmetics, so it is nearly always on the top of my list of recommendations.  This mint flavoured organic SLS free toothpaste costs £2.75 for a 75ml tube but you can currently buy it on offer here at £4.50 for two tubes.  This toothpaste does contain fluouride.  I recognise that some buyers would be reassured by this and that others would rather avoid fluoride in toothpaste aswell as SLS.  Click here or on the image to find out more.

Green People are now renowned for their chemical-free organic formulations and boast a range of SLS free organic toothpastes.  The Fennel and Propolis toothpaste featured here is excellent for gingivitis, bleeding gums and mouth ulcers and boasts a strong anti-bacterial action.  This costs £3.30 for 50mls and is suitable for the whold family.

This Waleda Plant Gel toothpaste has been especially formulated to be kind to teeth and gums.  It contains chamomile extract which has an anti-imflammatory action and also contains myrrh which is anti-septic.  This toothpaste is both fluouride and SLS Free.  It costs £3.50 for a 75ml tube.

Don’t forget to visit So Organic here to check out all their current offers, there are quite a few ‘buy two cheaper’ offers.  Follow the links or click on specific images for more detail.  These toothpastes will feel slightly different when you use them but remember foaming at the mouth like a rabid crocodile does not make your teeth any cleaner or healthier.

You might also like to read my post on SLS free shampoo.

Waste is rendered usable by the bran in a matter of days and can be added to your compost heap or straight onto beds.  An added bonus is the collection of liquid that has fermented, this can be accessed via a tap on the kitchen composter and used once diluted to feed plants.  As this liquid is buzzing with all those beneficial cultures it can also be poured down drains where it will combat algae build up and unpleasant odours.

Even Greener are established suppliers of bins and recycling facilities to local authorities, but also have a super website for the public selling a good range of green products at bargain prices.   Currently this 18 litre Blackwall Kitchen Composter illustrated left is on special offer, reduced by £5 to £20.  This price includes a drain cup, full instructions and a 1kg bag of bokashi bran which would normally cost £6.50.   A kilo bag should last up to three to four months.  Even Greener supply 3kg bulk bags of bran for £13.50. Click the image to visit the Even Greener store.

These bins are a handy size for storing in cupboards measuring 37cm high by 25cm deep and 32cm wide.  Having said that they are smart enought to leave out, certainly a lot smarter than the old tupperware box we collect our compost heap waste in!

Sorry Willow, no more scraps for you!   

These FSC slatted wooden compost bins from Crocus are a real favourite – not least because they are so easy to put together and take apart – a five year old could do it!  They are pressure treated and guaranteed against rot for 15 years. Prices range from £29.99 for the smallest to £49.99 for the largest.  We have two of these wooden compost bins and think they are great value.  Find out more HERE at Crocus.

 An additional toggled cover to keep heat in is availble here for £11.99 and will fit all sizes.

Even Greener are currently stocking lovely modular FSC approved wooden compost bins at very competitive prices.  If  like me, you’ve discovered the joys of having a compost empire of your own, you can buy add on units that just slot together or you may prefer to gradually increase your capacity and just start with a single bin.  

This compost bin  boasts easy assembly with no screws, nails or tools needed with a front opening panel for easy access, just slide away the front panel and you’re in!  It’s been designed so you can add new modules to increase the capacity. Made from solid wood sourced from FSC sustainable forests and treated with non-toxic wood preservative it has a 620 litre capacity. The dimensions are: w 910mm (36″) d 910mm (36″) h 750mm (29″).  It costs £86.95  and add-on bins (as many as you like!) are very reasonably priced at £70.50.  FREE DELIVERY!  Find out more HERE.

Before!

It is possible to buy a t-shirt or even a pair of jeans for less than the price of a decent meal.  But this simply cannot be possible.  It is not possible in the long term.  It is not possible in the short term without causing both human and environmental degradation.  It is very possible that someone is not getting paid enough to buy a decent meal in order that we can buy cheap clothes in supermarkets.  And what is the environmental cost of textile production, use and waste?

This year my project is very much focused on textiles and materials.  Those of you who read regularly will know it was my New Year resolution not to buy any new clothes this year.  So far, so good!  Nevertheless I’ve still probably got way more clothes than I actually need or even make good use of.

The environmental impact of textile production is astounding, whichever way you look at it.  (Future posts on sustainable textile production coming!)  The production of synthetic petro-chemical based textiles, such as polyester, the demand for which has doubled in the last fifteen years, is incredibly energy intensive. It requires the heavy use of crude oil, releases volatile orgnanic compounds and noxious gases, causing both air and water pollution and leaves hazardous waste products.   Natural textile production is not an awful lot better.  Conventional cotton production accounts for over 25% of global pesticide use, devours water supplies and leaves soil exhausted.  People will need this soil to grow food as the global population increases.   American cotton production, 50% of which is now grown from GM seeds, is subsidised and forces prices down for poorer producers of cotton in developing countries.  Most US cotton is shipped out for processing, China being the number one destination, before being shipped back to the US for sale as clothes, bedding and other household textiles.  Let’s not forget the British Empire had its own cotton racket working in its favour for centuries.  Woollen and other animal sourced fibres are not entirely without problems either. The dustbowls of Western China, for instance, have been much exacerbated by the overgrazing of sheep and Kashmir goats.  Washing animal fibres consumes vast quantities of water.  Despite the high environmental and human price of textile production we treat textiles almost as if they were disposable goods.

It is estimated that UK households send over 1 million tonnes of textiles to landfill annually.  We recycle about only 25% of textiles.  We could do way better.  Most textiles can be reused as they are, those which can’t can be used for industrial cloths or shredded for upholstery fibres.  Both charities and commercial rag traders are skilled in sorting textiles for recycling, all we have to do is send our unwanted textiles in the right direction, and with increased doorstep collections there is surely no excuse to be putting textiles in your landfill bin.

Of course if you are serious about reducing your carbon footprint you will be buying less textiles in the first place or better still, buying second-hand items.  All this will reduce pressure on virgin resources and cut down on the energy consumed, and pollution caused, by production.   Waste Online suggests that if everyone in the UK bought just one reclaimed woollen jumper a year it would save 371 million gallons of water and 480 tonnes of chemical dyestuffs. 

Bearing all this in mind but still wanting to have fun with clothes I have been sorting through my wardrobe and trying to make better use of what is there.  I have made a pile of things I don’t wear much, such as the blue denim jacket pictured above, and a pile of things that really are a bit past it but that I can’t quite bear to reduce to cleaning rags.  I’ve also got a pretty pile of broken jewellery.  (A friend of mine used to work the rides at Alton Towers and has made loads of great stuff from broken jewellery she found in rides at the end of the day – never throw your baubles away!)

I’ve had the jacket for four years, part of the reason for its underuse may just be that for the last few summers raincoats have been more appropriate than light jackets.  But I also don’t wear it much because I wear blue jeans a lot and it’s all too much denim.  Time for a bit of upcycling I think – or at least sideways-cycling.  I don’t really have any skill or training in needlework or fashion and upcycling might be too grand a word for my first efforts.  Anyway, here goes, you take some broken jewellery, the pretty trimmings from your favourite top that your partner kindly washed for you and has accidentally ruined and a needle and thread.  Stitch a little of what you fancy where you fancy.  I really had fun doing this. Finish by hoping that when you go out in it you don’t get mugged by magpies!

After!

My jeans are the worst offenders.  What’s more the stiffer fabric doesn’t lend itself so well to cleaning chores and so I’ve quite a few pairs slumped in the bottom of the wardrobe.  I wear jeans with holes in the knees quite happily, I should patch them at this stage really. But what generally happens is I wait till they are peeling away from the knees  and a bit beyond my rather shoddy needlework skills.  And like everyone else I’m pretty good at pleading time poverty.

The pile of denim is daring me to chuck it out.  I’ve decided to start patching them afresh into something new to avoid the temptation.   What the new is I’m not exactly sure yet.  I’m not always keen on patchwork, it can look a bit twee.  Still there should be a happy medium somewhere in between Laura Ashley and Tracey Emin.

I’ve decided to do all the stitching by hand.  This isn’t some worthy attempt at powering down.  I have an electric sewing machine it’s just I don’t have a place where it can be left out.  Chunks of time where I could clear a space and put it all away again are at a premium.  It would just never happen.  I do have small patches of time though in which it is feasible to thread a needle wherever I happen to be.  This is as much an exercise in stitching together patches of time as it is patches of fabric.

In nineteenth century New England young women were expected to stitch together (presumably in their spare time) a bakers dozen of quilts as part of their dowries.  The last and thirteenth being the quilt of the marriage bed.  I’ve managed about nine patches in a fortnight, Miss Haversham will get married before me!

I’ve started with some rather rudimentary squares on the grounds it shouldn’t be too complicated even for me.  A couple of The Man from Salford’s tattier shirts have been pressed into use. They have useful checks and lines and make cutting easier although it would be nice if he had a taste for something a little more exotic, purple paisley maybe?   

As denim is prone to fraying I’ve used paper inserts to give me a straight edge.  It was once thought women would stitch in love notes, though  social historians have pointed out only the literate and well-off  would have had access to any useful amount of paper.  Such women didn’t really need to be stitching at all, it was just one of several means to keep them out of trouble.  And where would I be if women hadn’t occasionally caused trouble throughout history? (Married  whether I liked it or not?) 

I am of course recycling paper for this purpose and it will make it’s way to the compost bin once I pull it out of the end product.  I’m slightly ashamed to admit two sheets were an article I’d printed off about deforestation! Will do better!!!!!! 

I’m trying to use every last scrap of the jeans. I’ll use the long strips down the seams for piping.  The rivets make quite pretty decorations, so every so often when I’m bored of plain stitching and squares I’ve made shapes to applique to the less-than-thrilling patches.  I tried using a bit of zip and some buttons to make a happy smiley face but the result seems a little, well vaguely disturbing and sinister.  Let me know if you think zippy should make it to the finished article.  

I’ve been thinking about clothes rather more than usual in the past couple of weeks.  First of all a couple of weeks ago I listened to Mark Boyle discussing his Freeconomy on the radio.  His is a site well worth visiting, but it does make me feel like I’m really not trying hard enough!  I’m quoting from memory so this won’t be accurate, but it is the gist not the details that are important – he suggested something like if absolutely no more clothes were produced in or imported into this country we’ve still probably got enough kit knocking around to be recycled and redistributed for the next twenty years.  In short we just don’t need more stuff.

Of course, children grow upwards, adults (generally) grow outwards and we all grow tired of the same old stuff.  I was quite pleased then to be invited to a Swap Shop organised by Transition Buxton.  (Transition Leek would be even nearer to us so we’re going to steal ideas and suggest they put one on!)  The idea is you take along clothes that are cleaned and ironed and presented on a hanger.  For each item you receive a ticket which you can then use to purchase an item brought along by someone else. 

I took my friend Sarah with me, her daughter Pippa, and Goldilocks who is a born rummager and horder.  We had a really good time.  We all had a drink and a good laugh and it was nice to get to know people better who I knew vaguely from other events.  Sociable and fun are the keywords of the night.  I have to admit I couldn’t help feeling secretly pleased when someone much younger, slimmer and trendier than me bought some of my old stuff.  I suspected that most of us, with wry amusement, were reflecting upon how hard it is to escape the stereotypical gender norms imposed upon us by the fashion and beauty industries.  Is it our green duty not to give in to these insecurities?

I took along nine items in the end, I struggled for hangers I can tell you, I have a bad habit of stuffing things into drawers.  All nine items were quite disperate and didn’t go with each other in any way whatsoever but I quite gleefully returned home with something which could be described as a complete outfit, although I don’t know how good it will look with rigger boots!     

I can’t help feeling that Florence Nightingale would have been only too happy to have my out-of-date dressings.  Even in this day and age I think that in the event of an emergency they would be better than nothing.  Sterile or not, they would still be cleaner than any other fabric I might find lying around to press into use.  Sadly it is not cost effective to replace individual items in a kit, so every so often I find myself having to buy entirely new kit.  This means finding a sensible use for the old kit.  So, what to do?

Well a few kits, minus anything sharp – safety pins are always useful anyway - have simply been given to small people to play with.  I’m glad to report that many a happy hour has been whiled away mummifying teddy bears.  I’d like to think the best use would be to use them for training purposes, older children really love learning how to tie slings etc.  However, as with odd socks – there are only so many sock puppets you can make! - at the end of the day you may still find yourself with a lot of kit that may come in handy for other stuff.

It drives me mad when recipes, usually for preserving or brewing, call for clean muslin to strain stuff through.  I’ve never had clean muslin, or indeed dirty  muslin, I’m not even sure where to get it from.  But I’m no longer bothered because, as I discovered when making my elderflower champagne, a large if expired triangular calico bandage does the job just as well.

Yesterday I had another light-bulb moment as I pulled a rather sad looking blanket off the top of the compost heap.  The blanket itself is beginning to decompose and probably not doing the most effective job of keeping heat in.  It is also a bit slimy and unpleasant to handle.  I have seen, believe it or not, advertisements for ‘compost duvets.’  Like most people who like getting their compost (and much more besides) for nothing I wasn’t ever likely to fork out for one of these shiny quilts.  What could I use to keep my heap warm as the cold weather approaches?  Well as I mused on what to do with all my first aid stuff, I realised  I seem to have more foil rescue blankets than I’m ever really likely to use.  So here is the heap looking very cosy and super space-age shiny to boot.

Do you have any other suggestions for reusing my First Aid kit?

UPDATE:

If you would like to recycle your first aid kits then Aid To Hospitals Worldwide do accept donations from individual households, please send any of your supplies to:

Aid to Hospitals Worldwide

PO Box 603

Bury St Edmunds

Suffolk

IP33 9DF

These guys do fantastic work to ensure that medical equipment no longer required in this country is put to good use all over the world wherever it is needed.

Unlike ready-to-use products I find that simple bicarb is versatile and lends itself to a variety of cleaning tasks that no one single ready-made product can tackle.  I like to think this homespun approach to cleaning cuts down on production and packaging and generally works out cheaper.  It is definitely a must-have for fans of papier-mache volcanoes.  So here is my list, by no means exhaustive, of five fabulous uses for bicarbonate of soda. 

Happy cleaning!

Use a box of bicarbonate of soda as a fridge deodorant.  We all do it, either leave something in there to the point of mouldiness or forget to cover food items. (I have a bad habit of doing this with half used onions!)  If your fridge has got a bit whiffy just leave an opened box of bicarb at the back of the fridge on one of the lower shelves.  Bicarbonate is well known for its odour absorbing properties.  If the smell was particularly offensive remove the box and dispose of after a couple of days.  As a general deodorant you should be able to leave it in there for two to three weeks.

If you’ve been hulling and chopping strawberries this summer, your wooden chopping board will tell the tale.  To get rid of these tell-tale stains rinse the board with water (do not dry) and scatter with a large spoon of bicarb.  Almost immediately the stains will begin to change colour.  Wash and scrub the board as usual afterwards and the marks will virtually disappear.  This works because bicarbonate of soda has a high alkaline content and neutralises acids.  Try it on other acid food stains as well.

Use bicarbonate of soda as a carpet freshener.  I do this especially on all the areas that our dog Willow  habitually occupies.  Again you are capitalising on bicarb’s ability to absorb odour.  Scatter the bicarb over your carpets. Leaving it there overnight is ideal but a couple of hours will do.  Next sweep up the excess with dustpan and brush and then hoover.

Use bicarbonate of soda as a gentle non-scratch scourer for sinks, basins and baths.  Just scatter over the surfaces, scrub with a clean cloth and rinse well. (Rinsing with vinegar gives an extra boost to the cleaning power.)

You really do have to make fizz bombs in your toilet bowls and down plug holes.  Pour a cup of bicarbonate of soda down the bowl or plug hole and follow this with a cup of distilled malt vinegar.  (You can use any vinegar of course, I suggest this as the cheap option save your nice stuff for salad dressing!)  Enjoy watching this fizz and feel the clean.  Don’t worry about a residue of bicarb in the toilet bowl, it will still be doing a good deodorising job down there and will eventually flush away.

If you’re keen to get going with eco-friendly cleaning  but don’t know where to start So Organic now provide complete ecover conversion kits and also ecover products in bulk, which saves on costs considerably.  Don’t forget to apply the fizz-bomb methods to your papier-mache volcanos, especially useful when you have children in the 7-10 age range.  You don’t make those all the time?  Shame on you!  It’s all compostable after the fun too.   

The main chemical nasties to look out for in shampoos are; parabens (preservatives), sodium lauryl sulphate or SLS (foaming agent) and methylisothiazolinone (a biocide.)  A survey of what was on offer on the supermarket shelves revealed that while some shampoo products no longer listed parabens,  all of them listed sodium lauryl sulphate (or sodium laureth sulphate which is SLS after it has undergone a process called ethoxylation) as the second ingredient after water.  My regular shampoo and a few others besides also contained methylisothiazolinone.  (I do not want to type that again and I’m pretty certain I don’t want to subject my scalp to it again.)

Most controversy centres around the use of the foaming agent Sodium Lauryl Sulphate, also present in toothpastes and bubblebaths, to name but a few.  SLS was originally used as an industrial degreasant.  It is claimed that SLS can damage the skin by stripping it of natural oils and leaving it prone to pitting and irritation. There is a worry that it may cause cataracts and improper eye development in children and that it can cause mouth ulcers.  SLS in conjunction with other chemicals present in cosmetics can form carcinogenic nitrosamines.

There are four types of paraben commonly in use; methy-, ethyl-, propyl- and butyp-paraben.  These are preservatives used in a wide range of cosmetics.  Theories linking parabens to breast cancer are as yet unsubstantiated though fears that parabens act as oestrogen mimickers should be taken seriously and they may be a source of endocrine (reproductive) disruption in both humans and wildlife.

Methylisothiazolinone, sometimes listed as MIT, is a biocide that kills moisture loving bacterium.  Even short exposure to high concentrations can lead to nerve cell destruction.  Adequate neuro-toxicity studies of the effect of this chemical on humans have not yet been undertaken.

Three of the best non-toxic, SLS free shampoos:

Best Value SLS Free Shampoo: Faith In Nature is a well established organic brand.  A favourite with our daughter because you can buy a chocolate scented one, you can’t eat it though!  It costs £4.47 for 400mls.  Available from Amazon here or click image for more details.

Most Popular SLS Free Shampoo: The intriguingly named Tigi Bed Head Superstar is the shampoo they are all raving about.  Unlike many SLS free shampoos it promises lots of foaming action!  Price is £10.25 for 750mls available here at Amazon also.

An SLS Free Shampoo Suitable For Younger Family Members: A very gentle shampoo suitable for babies and young children by Nature Babycare.  Currently on offer at £4. 98 for two 250ml bottles.  Available here from Amazon.

You might also want to read our article on SLS free toothpaste.

As usual I’d being trying to do too many things at once.  On this occasion two of those too many things were trying to write a post at the same time as exfoliating my face.  Somewhere along the line I forgot to wash my hands in between the two and we now have a sticky mouse.   

Lemons are good.  Unlike off-the-shelf cosmetics they are not full of  suspicious preservatives or petroleum derived products such as mineral oil, which clog rather than clean.  Unlike alkaline soaps, they do not disrupt the skin’s naturally acidic mantle and therefore do not dry the skin out.  Lemons are astringent, so they tone (tighten pores) as well as cleanse.  The most important thing in lemons are the AHAs, or alph-hydroxy-acids.  These dissolve the glue that helps dead skin cells to stick to the surface of the skin, making it appear dull and lifeless.  AHAs are natural exfoliators.

You could, of course, use any fruit that contains citric acid in the same way and eating the rest certainly won’t do your skin any harm.  AHAs are also present in apple juice, cider, and cider vinegar in the form of malic acid.  Milk and milk products (lactic acid) are a good source, you can even use dried milk  to clean your face and it’s easy to transport on trips and holidays.  Grape juice, wine, (although I wouldn’t personally waste it in this way!) and cream of tartar all contain tartaric acid, and are plentiful in AHAs.   Sugar, or glycolic acid, also contains the magic AHAs, so maybe Sherbet Fountains will work as well, but I haven’t tried that one yet!   

To carry out my exfoliating regime, I first wash my face with water to remove surface dirt, then I squeeze a slice of lemon and pat the juice all over my face, (sometimes when I’m feeling extra hurried I just wipe the slice all over, but the pips sometimes scratch!)  There is usually some tingling at first but it doesn’t last long, and after ten minutes I rinse the lemon juice off.  Having patted the skin dry I then rub in a tiny smidgen of wheatgerm oil, less is definitely more here, to gently and naturally moisturise.  Wheatgerm oil is rich in vitamin E and omega 3s, both allies of good skin.   Three days of this regime and my skin feels soft, smooth and has a healthy glow about it.

The only off-the-shelf face care product that I use, is my Green People SPF15 Day Solution.  I’m outdoors a lot and want to protect my face from the sun.  You need also to be aware that when you exfoliate your skin is more vulnerable to sun damage, so do protect it in some way.  Please remember that all skins are different and will tolerate different treatments.  Always try new treatments out on a small, inconspicuous area first and don’t embark on new regimes the day before an important interview or social event!