Love Your Earth this Valentines Day!
Photo by Cole Collective
We love love!
But…Have you considered our impact on the planet for the consumer-driven Valentines Day?
By Amy, Lily & Oliver Lupton
The kids have been doing a climate change unit at their school and have been coming home passionate (and somewhat judgy I might add, haha) about the plastic, excess, and throw-away items that live at our home and in our lifestyle. I really hadn’t took much notice, but when the word “single-use plastic” entered my kids vocabulary, I realized it was everywhere… I really mean everywhere.
I would like to say that I thought we were a pretty green household, or trying to be. We compost, recycle, reduce and reuse what we can, trying to not support industries that clear rainforests and clog our oceans or water bodies. We don’t throw away food (it goes to our animals), and we support rain collection and growing our own food. I love hand-me-downs, and try not to participate too much in flash fashion.
But something like Valentines Day? Its all candy, hearts, and roses !I wasn’t aware until my little passionate earth advocates schooled me on it (don’t you love when you learn something from the kids?).
So we thought we would share with you in hopes that maybe we could make a lesser impact on our Earth for Valentines Day!
Call us old-fashioned (or rebels), make your own Valentines Day Card!
Valentines Cards are the thing, and who doesn’t love a love note, friendship poem, or romantic note handwritten on paper? I (Amy) am a tactile girl, and love me a book I can hold (the e-book thing wasn’t my jam), but the one-time-throw-away cards cost Americans an average of one BILLION dollars for Valentine’s Day alone, according to the Greeting Card Association.
So this year, we handmade our own.
Sure, it took a little time, but it was soo cute and from the heart. The children’s school had encouraged recycled or handmade cards this year, and we took on the challenge. We wanted to find some ways to use leftover papers and cards that we had, so the scissors, glue, tape, markers all came out. We found some leftover Valentine cards & reused them, and even found some old English Beano Comic postcards and dubbed them as Valentine cards. What turned out was great. :)
Be Present instead of giving meaningless Presents
Americans spend over $18 billion on Valentine’s Day, with 20% of consumers buying jewelry. According to Green Impact, “Mining for precious metals and gems for jewelry can have serious environmental and human rights implications.”
Also, much of what is bought will be thrown away, so carefully consider supporting local businesses if buying a gift, or supporting small entrepreneurs that you know. Sometimes, the most amazing gifts are ones that cost very little or none at all. Here are a few ideas.
Make a local, homemade organic meal that will nourish the soul & body!
Give someone a massage using organic oils & herbs.
Make them some bath salts (Click HERE for our blog on bath salt recipes!)
Make a sugar scrub (Click HERE for our blog on sugar scrub recipes!)
Give someone the gift of time by watching their children, taking care of their pet.
Go sit with someone, have coffee or tea. I promise grandparents, parents would want this over most anything else.
Write your partner, children a love letter telling them why they make your life better.
Take a walk, bike ride, picnic in the park.
Support your local spa, massage therapist, florist and stay local.
Give something that you have made, grown, or cooked. An herb bundle from your yard tied with strings, eggs your chickens laid, some homemade cookies.
Give your sweetie ethical sweets
If you know me personally, you probably know how much I love chocolate. If there was ever a choice of flavor as a kid, I always picked chocolate, cake, ice cream, lip gloss flavor…and to this day I do.
About a year ago, Brad and I watched a documentary on chocolate, called The Dark Side of Chocolate. I highly recommend wathcing it if you are chocolate lover (even though it might make you slightly depressed for a couple of days). Ever since I became a nutritionist, I had switched to a higher quality of chocolate, but I didn’t realize how much our rainforests are destroyed in the name of chocolate, and how much children are slaves to the chocolate industry. The documentary stresses the importance of fair trade, organic chocolate as your main source of chocolate, that way you are not participating in the dark side of the chocolate industry. So I became a chocolate snob, determined to not be part of the problem. Which is an ignorant idealization I know…but the small steps count, and we change the world each day with our choices.
The HuffPost recently stressed, “Your afternoon chocolate bar may be fueling climate change, destroying protected forests and threatening elephants, chimpanzees and hippos in West Africa, research suggests.”
Chocolate is a big deal on Valentines, and there are companies that believe in these values. So support them! www.slavefreechocolate.com and rainforest-alliance.org have great lists of chocolate companies holding good values and making amazing chocolate!! Give them a try. :)
Also, check out our chocolate bark blog, such a great sweet treat! (Click HERE).
Roses Supposes the Earth doesn’t like Valentines Roses
The Romans began the rose & Valentines connection, when Aphrodite turned into the goddess Venus, and kept the rose as a symbol of love and beauty. The rose has always been a symbol of love, and it is one of my favorite herbs and smells in this world.
The kids watched a Ted Talk with the amazing Kathryn Kellogg for homework one night and we started following her on Instagram @going.zero.waste
We learned that most of the Valentines roses and flowers come from Columbia and Ecuador. According to @voxdotcom, “30 cargo jets fly from Columbia to Miami every day in the three week leading up to the big day and a similar amount fly out from Ecuador, amounting to more that 15,000 tons of flowers delivered in less than a month.” And according to Kathryn, “these three weeks of flowers are responsible for more that 360,000 metric tons of carbon dioxide.”
This doesn’t include the chemicals put on the flowers, the refrigeration to keep them fresh.
If you love flowers just like us, opt for local blooms! Maybe they won’t be roses, cause roses really aren’t in season in America in February, but there are other things that could be beautiful. The dandelions are making headway in Texas, as are some fruit tree blooms and branches. If you still want flowers delivered, check out your local florist and ask if there are any flowers that were grown locally or in the USA. We also encourage you to visit www.slowflowers.com and they have great options for vendors and bouquet ideas.
