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Green Holiday Giveaway # 16: Eco-Friendly Family Library 13 Books!

December 1, 2011 0

Hello, Friends. How is your morning? Today’s first giveaway is a fun one, I am giving away 13 of my favorite green themed books! This would be a great gift for your family library, or you could give them away as holiday gifts. Aren’t books the best gifts ever? There are books for the little ones, books for animal lovers, family books and a couple of serious green books too. Something for everyone.

Curious Critters by David FitzSimmons: Curious Critters showcases animals up-close and personal with super cute text to boot!

The Good Garden by Katie Smith Milway: The Good Garden is a simple family book focus on one big issue: food security and how you can make a difference!

6 Little Green Books

My First Garden by Wendy Lewison: My First Garden is a beautiful books that shows tiny tots how a garden grows, while teaching them their colors along the way.

Don’t Throw That Away by Lara Bergen. Don’t Throw That Away is a lift-the-flap book about recycling and reusing with a super-cute heroine with large fun graphics!

What Do You See? by Stephen Krensky. What Do You See? is a lift-the-flat book about endangered animals with beautiful colors and fun rhyming text!

This is Our World by Emily Sollinger. This is Our World is a story about taking care of the Earth. Nine double-sided puzzle pieces are included for children to create two puzzles at the end of the story!

Easy to Be Green by Ellie O’Ryan. Easy to Be Green is full of simple activities you can do to save the Earth. This book is full of coloring pages, Earth-saving tips, fascinating facts, and easy activities and crafts that you can do to help the environment!

Soft Cover Little Green Panda Book is a super soft baby book with a sweet story about a Panda. This is not only a book but a soft, cuddly toy too!

The Natural Pet Food Cookbook by Wendy Nana Rees. The Natural Pet Food Cookbook is full of healthful recipes for your dogs and cats. This book is perfect for encouraging children to work in the kitchen, cooking up goodies for their pets.

The Magic Blanket by Litsa Bolontzakis. The Magic Blanket is a sweet story of summertime, and one girls magical summer on a beautiful Greek Island, enjoying the blue ocean waves, pebbly beach and the magic blanket.

The Green Bride Guide by Kate Harrison. The Green Bride Guide has everything eco-conscious couples need to make their event more sustainable.

Green Chic: Saving the Earth in Style by Christine Matheson. Green Chic shows how to go green without giving up great style, offering dozens of earth friendly ideas!

No More Dirty Looks by Siobhan O’Connor and Alexandra Spunt. No More Dirty Looks is the ultimate guide to safe and clean cosmetics!

How to Enter:

1. Sign up for my weekly newsletter (if you haven’t already). I will be announcing the winners in the newsletter, so you need to sign up to get the newsletter to see if you win!
2. Like Sweet Greens on Facebook.
3. Tweet: I hope I win one of the $2000 in eco-friendly prizes at @SweetGreens Holiday Giveaway Week 2011! http://tinyurl.com/7vq8xgo
4. Leave a comment on this post for each way that you enter.

Good luck, the winner will be announced on December 8th.  

** UPDATE: The winner is Melinda S.

Green Book Review: Curious Critters by David FitzSimmons

December 1, 2011 0

Tonight we are going to start our book advent calendar. The first book that will be opened is one of my favorites. It’s called Curious Critters, written and photographed by David FitzSimmons.

Curious Critters showcases amazing photographs of beautiful animals coupled with Mr. FitzSimmons own words describing what he thought each animal was thinking. Brilliant!

On the American Toad page it says: “It’s not true: I don’t give people warts when they touch me. And that fairy tale about a princess kissing a frog….Bah! It’s rubbish!” Cute, right?

The book also has a natural history section that gives more information on each animal, their habitat and diet! It is a fantastic book – the large colorful, up-close photographs will immediately grab the attention of children and adults alike. And, while your children are devouring it, they are learning at the same time! Bonus: the book is so beautiful, you will want to display it on your coffee table for everyone to enjoy!

If you are looking for a book to give this holiday season, grab a copy of Curious Critters, it is sure to be a huge hit! Plus, Mr. FitzSimmons will personally sign the copy with your own personal dedication!

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Sweet Greens was not compensated for this post – we received copies of the book to review and I loved it so much that I wanted to share it with you. Coming up, a giveaway including Curious Critters!

HOW TO: Make a Simple Eco-Friendly Advent Calendar Using Books

November 29, 2011 0

Sometimes, we get so focused on the actual day of Christmas that we forget to enjoy the whole month of December. An advent calendar is a fun way to celebrate each day of the month, and also get children excited about the upcoming holiday. Right after Thanksgiving I unpack all of our holiday books and place them in a large stack on our coffee table. However, this year I want to make sure that every single one of those books gets read together as a family. So I made a simple advent calendar using these books along with a few others that I picked up from our local thrift store – all holiday themed. This way, we can celebrate each night in December with a new festive bedtime story. Learn how to make this simple, eco-friendly advent calendar for your children.

Does your family celebrate with an advent calendar? 

Banner Elk Winery | High Country, North Carolina

November 4, 2011 0

While on our Fall Family Trip to North Carolina, we spent an afternoon at Banner Elk Winery. Banner Elk Winery is a small, local family owned winery that uses no pesticides on their grapes and uses only local ingredients. The winery is adjacent to a 25 year old blueberry farm – the blueberries are used to create their award winning Blueberry Ice Wine.

Mr. Sweet Greens and I sampled several different wines; Marechal Foch, High Country Rose, Seyval Blanc, Chardonnay, Banner Elk Red and Banner Elk White. We were interested in finding a few wines that would compliment Thanksgiving dinner and I was really focused on the whites – since they are my favorite!

The three wines that we fell in love with were, the Marechal Foch, a Cabernet Hybrid developed to grow at high altitudes and withstand cold winters. It is very fruity and will pair well with Thanksgiving dinner. The High Country Rose which is more off-dry with a fruity flavor – a Bronze Medal Winner. And the Seyval Blanc made from Appalachian Mountain grown French-American hybrid grapes, this wine is dry with citrus overtones – another Bronze Medal Winner. We picked up a bottle of each to serve with Thanksgiving dinner.

I really wanted to try the North Carolina Ice Wine, it’s a rare dessert wine made from Seyval Blanc grapes that have frozen while still on the vine. It’s a sweet, full-bodied wine, I think it would have been my favorite. Samples were not available since the North Carolina Ice Wine is super popular and they only had three bottles left.

During our visit, we were lucky enough to experience some of the grapes being pressed – Eben enjoyed a  sample of the fresh grape juice. He also loved running around the beautiful grounds with Noodles and playing with another little boy visiting the vineyard. The property is amazing, complete with a lovely porch to sit on as you admire the beautiful trout pond, mountain ridge and vineyard. There is also a lovely Villa on the property that is perfect for weddings, honeymoons or family retreats.

+ Banner Elk Winery | 60 Deer Run Lane, Banner Elk, NC 28604 | 828.260.1790

New River Pumpkin Patch | Boone, North Carolina

October 28, 2011 1

One of my favorite parts of our Fall Family Trip is the pumpkin patch. We always get our heirloom pumpkins from New River Pumpkin Patch, just outside of Boone, North Carolina. Last year, We picked up half a dozen pumpkins on our trip. This year – I couldn’t resist, we brought 16 heirloom pumpkins home. [I will post photos of the different pumpkins in an upcoming post.]

New River Pumpkin Patch are super nice and helpful. New River always does their best to be environmentally friendly by using Integrated Pest Managment (IPM) practices as well as other techniques to avoid using chemical sprays. This year they did NOT spray any fungicides or insecticides on any of their pumpkins. And they helped us get all of our pumpkins from the patch to our car. Good thing – Eben was getting tired trying to carry all of the pumpkins. 🙂

Besides having a fantastic pumpkin patch, New River also has an amazing corn maze.

Does your family support a local pumpkin patch?

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