Green Options

Halloween is one week away, and the blogosphere has erupted in green Halloween posts. From The Green Guide to Eco Child’s Play, everyone is writing about having an eco-friendly, ghoulish good time. Green Halloween has also been a hot topic lately on Green Options:

• Daily Tip: Halloween with Less Waste,
• Green Style How-To: Supermarket and No-Sew Halloween Costumes,
• Five Super-Simple Steps to Green Trick-or-Treating,
• Daily

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It’s that time of year again: eight-pound bags of "fun-size" candy fill whole aisles at the grocery store and houses in the neighborhood are sprouting plastic pumpkins, foam headstones and other ghoulish decor. According to the National Retail Federation, Americans are expected to spend more than $5 billion on Halloween costumes, candy and decorations this year. But there are ways to celebrate without doling out much cash for stuff that,

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For Columbus Day, my cousin and I took the "Not Martha" challenge and created our own little sun jars. The project was quick with a total of 30 minutes to complete not including the wait time to store the sun rays and shopping of the supplies used. Also, it was fairly inexpensive at about $20 to make and fun to boot. Definitely a great way of showing how you can have a little green tech

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Oh yeah, and we got Endangered Species chocolate for trick-or-treaters this year!

Avoid the preservatives and unpronounceable ingredients of store-bought sweets this Halloween by making your own.

When you make your own confections, you have control over what goes into it. You can choose organic or Fair Trade ingredients and how much or what kind of sugars you use. Alternatives to refined white sugar include honey, real maple syrup, raw sugar, and even apple sauce.

Substituting some ingredients may require a little experimenting and

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Getting your little ghosts and goblins ready for Halloween while attempting to minimize your impact might seem scarier than global warming, but it’s so simple: you’re probably already doing at least one of these things.

1. Use reusable candy-collecting bags. Simple, easy, and ensures that your large stash of candy won’t end up all over the street from a less-than-durable plastic bag. Avoid those plastic pumpkins, too. They’re made of petroleum, and

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Ghouls, goblins, and tasty goodies are just around the corner. That’s right, Halloween is now just a month away - have you decided on your costume yet? If not, your green style maven is here to help with two collections of affordable, easy-to-make outfits for both adults and kids, care of Ms. Martha Stewart. For the younger tots, 7 Grocery Getups features hula dancers, a cheerleader, cowboy, princess, flapper girl,

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As I continue to write and think about the issue
of Fair Trade, it becomes more and more apparent to me that our economic system is a root cause for a wide array of our world’s woes. Instances of poverty, disease, wars (and the dehumanization that accompanies all three), and our quickly degrading environment occuring all over the world (but especially in the poorer Southern hemisphere) can all be traced back to an economic

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