It's time to bring Earth Week to a close. Next week, I plan to do a post on gardening -- not because I'm remotely good at it, but because I have picked up a few tricks here and there. First I want to thank Sabra of
Sew A Straight Line for letting me join along this week. Special thanks as well to the sponsors:
Natural Home Essentials,
Monkey Travel Club,
8 Little Coconuts, and
Nature's Fabrics. Additional thanks to guest posters
The Everyday Palate and
Lemon Squeezy Home. It's been awesome.
Thanks so much to all of you who stay tuned this week even though Earth Week was not your thing. And thanks to all the new readers who tuned in because Earth Week is your thing (stick around, you still might like all the other jazz I'm up to). It's not gone unnoticed.
Project: Project returns to its regularly scheduled programming next week. That's mostly my (mis)adventures in sewing projects, getting stuff done around the house, and gardening in the Summer. It's pretty much what's been in my
flickr all along, I just spend more time going on and on about it.
I want to finish the week with a list of links to sites and companies that I think are good resources or are worth supporting and why. Enjoy!
Veg Dining and
Happy CowI haven't eaten meat in almost 20 years. My husband is vegan. We both love to travel and finding food is often difficult. Both of these sites have listings and reviews for veg restaurants all over the world.
Environmental Working GroupA charity working to get rid of dangerous chemicals and toxins in our homes and products and foods. Every year they publish a list of safe sunscreens and they even have a current list of safe cosmetics. They have a list of cell phones and the levels of radiation they emit. Check out their
printable list of the Dirty Dozen foods to buy organic and the Clean Fifteen. It will fit in your wallet.
Buying handmade eliminates the middle man and allows you to get you to know the person behind the craft (except if they are a jerk and don't return your convos, in which case you can buy from someone else, right?). Check out the
Shop Local tool that can connect you to people in your area.
Greenfeet has just about everything you need to ingest foods more safely like their stainless steel water bottles, bpa- and pthlate-free baby food trays (we used these daily while Zadie was eating baby food), and all kinds of good stuff. AMAZING customer service.
I bought cloth diapers from a million and one different websites. Finally I found Abby's Lane. Always free shipping and they carry all the brands I need at good prices. If you join their yahoo group, there is a coupon code.
A very useful guide to avoiding GMOs when you're shopping for food.
There is a new issue of Modern Handmade Child up today. I wrote a story on tattoos for Father's Day (page 74 - 75). I don't know why I thought it was a Father's Day issue. I'll have to go back and check on that. The story was heavily edited so please ignore the typos. They are not mine.
I have finally completed my shirt for Top Week. I didn't think I'd actually be able to do it even though I had it mostly done last weekend. There was something bothering me about the collar but I just tacked it down on each side of the back closure and I think it works.
But here's the deal: It's too big. Don't you think? I altered the pattern I used to make this shirt (so much so that I don't even think alter is the word for it). The original faux silky shirt fits well but this shirt is hanging off of me way more than I'd like. I think it's because the knit is so fine that it has absolutely no structure. It's just pulling itself down.
Having learned from my first encounter with said pattern, I made the belt a good bit longer and also a little wider. It looks cute from the front but because of all the fabric I added to the back for the gathers, it looks awful. Bunchy bunchy.
I love the Heather Ross fabric I used for the top panel. It was lovely to work with and I still have a little bit of it left to hoard. I also liked working with the knit. You will no longer hear me complain about it. I'm good. I used a hook and eye to close it up at the top. I thought there was enough going on in the back so I didn't want to add a button.
I apologize for the lack of posts with substance this week. I mentioned before that I'm in the middle of grading what seems like thousands of final papers and projects. But I've also got some really cool stuff in the works:
Sorry for the delay! Remember how I told you that I teach Technical Writing? Well, it's that time of the year when I am in the middle of grading a million very, very, very, very long papers and at the end of the day I can hardly see.
It's time to bring Earth Week to a close. Next week, I plan to do a post on gardening -- not because I'm remotely good at it, but because I have picked up a few tricks here and there. First I want to thank Sabra of Sew A Straight Line for letting me join along this week. Special thanks as well to the sponsors: Natural Home Essentials, Monkey Travel Club, 8 Little Coconuts, and Nature's Fabrics. Additional thanks to guest posters The Everyday Palate and Lemon Squeezy Home. It's been awesome.
