But I have been keeping an eye out for great eco-friendly products that are reasonably priced (like $25 and under) that would make great gifts and stocking stuffers.

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Be lovely inside then out is Vaute Couture’s motto. With a coat as lovely as the Bomono Coat (doesn’t it make your mouth water?) it makes you wonder just how lovely Vaute Couture’s designer and founder, Leanne Mai-ly Hilgart’s, innards are. I’ll tell you, they are drop dead gorgeous…

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Necklush is quite possibly a gift from God made by the hands of two men, Stephano Diaz and Troy Mattison Hicks. The Necklush (patent pending) was created in Brooklyn, NY and was first sold on the streets of NYC. Now available on Etsy, Supermarket, online retailers, and the duo’s very own site it’s sure to win over any accessory addict, like myself.

Necklush can be worn by males or females all year round making it an essential eco-friendly accessory. Each scarf (print included) is handmade to order, use only non-toxic inks and many colors are available in organic cotton!

• Natural with any print
• Dusty Blue with any print
• Creamy White
• Black with Silver
• Brown with White
• Banana

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Yurts appear logical for my tropical climate where elements of nature aren’t so severe. Well, surprise, but no worry. Just know that maintaining yurt warmth can be an easier task than keeping cool.

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Planning your garden during the winter and early spring can help you get a jump start and give you an idea of what you’ll need for the season so you can be prepared.

If you’re starting a garden for the first time, you’ll first want to take stock of the area you have available to garden. Will you have a container garden on your porch or a big veggie patch in your back yard where the lawn used to be? Determining where you’ll garden well in advance will allow you to be ready to dig in as soon as the weather warms up. If you’ll be converting a lawn into garden space, you may need to rent or borrow a tiller and start preparing the soil a few months before the last spring frost. If you’ll be starting seeds indoors, you might want to clear a sunny windowsill or a closet for seedlings until they’re big enough to plant out. So it helps to think ahead and have a plan in mind.

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You are invited to attend the Love Wins gala with author and visionary Van Jones, yogi Seane Corn, and activist Julia Butterfly Hill. The event is thrown by the Engage Network, which is a social networking non-profit start-up that helps folks make change by empowering community leaders. To date Engage has launched 35 social change circles in 7 regions training well over 200 leaders.

The gala will be featuring cocktail receptions, organic dinner, music, dancing, and performances.

Event details after the jump:

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If you liked Husqvarna’s robotic solar hybrid lawnmower, then you’ll love its winter companion: the I-Shovel. This patent-pending device automatically detects snow accumulation and can clear a 4,000 square foot driveway on a single battery charge.

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The idea of a hooded scarf this winter is appealing, and here are a couple designs by Elwood offered by Nimli. For you knitters out there this looks like an adorable pattern project. If you are chilly this winter, warm up with this hooded scarf idea.

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Temperatures in Jackson, Wyoming, ranged from -6 to 30 during my visit over the weekend. And yet folks were much more likely to be found outside than in. Perhaps that is because the “outside” of Jackson, Wyoming, is so beautiful and offers so much in the way of wonderful outdoor activities, from skiing (alpine, nordic and telemark) to snowboarding to snowshoeing through the magnificent Grand Teton National Park, to name the most obvious. I think the beauty of the scenery and the thrill of the activity keeps us warmer than the temps suggest. This notion occurred to me when I overheard a seemingly non-sensical statement during my trip. As we waitied for a shuttle on one particularly chilly morning, it was -4 at the time, a woman waiting beside me told her friend,

You know, with these temperatures back home, it’d be freezing!

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Winter is long where I live. Long. Snow and cold weather lingers from as early as October to possibly March. A long winter can translate into long days inside which leads to restlessness, more television, boredom, eating and more pounds…for the entire family.  To help make the winter more active and healthy I have begun to employ some new tactics that help everyone watch less television, eat better and get some activity.

Winter sports and activities can be the cure. I don’t like winter and I don’t like cold or snow but it’s where I live and the other months are gorgeous.

I’m trying to embrace the season with a more positive attitude. With a snowy winter there are many healthy active sports that the children and I can enjoy. They get us out of the house and mean physical activity.

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A recent survey of drivers found that 2,150 tons of CO2 are generated by UK motorists warming up their cars in the morning, creating the equivalent CO2 emissions of three 747 flights from London to New York each day.

“Everyone is now familiar with simple energy saving tips like switching off a tap, turning off lights and recycling but it seems many people’s green intentions go out the window when they are faced with a cold start in the morning. Our research has shown that an estimated 2,150 tonnes of CO2 and 21,450MW  of electricity will be wasted each cold morning across the UK.” - Lucy Bailey, ibuyeco spokesperson

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I recently assisted in a historical slide show of our small mountain community, and when this slide came up of the US Forest Service ranger station in 1931, a senior citizen who had lived in our valley since she was a  young girl said, “We used to have winter.”  This statement sent butterflies to my stomach, and it made me reflect on what my own grandparents used to tell me about winter. Their stories of trudging to school in several feet of snow always felt like old exaggerated tall tales, but were they?  What will we tell our grandchildren about winter?

When talking to children about what is happening to our seasons, I feel it is important to use correct terminology.

We really aren’t experiencing just global warming, but we are experiencing climate change.  The term “climate change” includes changes in weather systems as part of its definition, rather than simple “global warming”, which refers to the overall warming of average temperatures.

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A slick pair of boots looks current with a knee length a-line skirt, smart under dress pants and fierce over your dark wash skinny jeans. They’re the ticket to keeping your feet warm and protected without looking unprofessional or, worse, like you’ve given up. But who makes a cool-looking, leather-free sustainable pair?

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[Creative Commons photo by KeWynn Lee]

Nabih Tahan’s “Passive House” on Grant Street in Berkeley is the first one in California. It uses a ventilator to recycle the heat that radiates from the appliances, reducing the use of heat from fossil fuels by 80%-90%.

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Horny Toad, owner of Nau (one of our favorite places for outerwear) has a new way to save on their site: simply prove that you’ve donated old clothes this winter and they will give you a discount on their products as a thank you.

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Growing up in the suburbs of Virginia, I didn’t even hear of Winter Solstice till 9th grade or so. I associated this mysterious Winter holiday with equally mysterious people…pale nerdy folks who liked to wear purple velvet clothing and buy dragon figurines and miniature crystal balls from New Age bookstores at the mall. They called themselves Pagans, and more specifically, Wiccans.

Though I wasn’t raised Christian, I still took on the same dismissive attitude as my local Bible-toting community, thinking of people who worshiped nature as eccentric, campy folks who should be left alone to perform their inconsequential hocus-pocus spells and rituals.

As I got older and became an environmentalist, the Winter Solstice did strike a bit more genuine interest within me; friends of mine- scientists, yogis, Christians, Jews, and treehuggers alike- were celebrating the Solstice in nightclubs, houseparties, and quiet gatherings in nature. I liked that Winter Solstice revelers were actually acknowledging some natural phenomena, something about planetary movement and time. I have been invited repeatedly to these soirees over the years, but never attended- the “hokiness” factor of my childhood kept me closed to the exploration.

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Well it happened. The first snowfall of THE SEASON. As we nestle into our new home in Ontario, we must face the fact that winter Tis the season more often than Tis not. Ditto for the white stuff, which will soon become brown stuff as everyone likes to remind me.

Though my husband and I have little use for snow (a White Christmas Day would suffice) our kids are excited to have a new use for their sand toys. The other day as I stepped away from the window to grab the camera and prove to my friends in the west that we are in fact nuts, my daughter scooped up a generous helping of snow and licked her mittens right down to the wool. I laughed and told her to stick her tongue out to catch some flakes, knowing her little brother would watch and do the same. But, as I snapped the photo the green meanie suddenly came over me…Is it safe for kids to eat snow?

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