Benzene Exposure In Hot Cars and How To Minimize Risk

I just got this information in an e-mail from a friend and reader of my blog - thanks for sharing Laurie!

 

Your car's manual may say to roll down the windows to let out all the hot air before turning on the A/C. WHY ?

Car Air Conditioning

Please do NOT turn on A/C as soon as you enter the car

 

Open the windows after you enter your car, and then turn ON the AC after a couple of minutes

 

Here's why: According to research, the car's dashboard, seats, a/c ducts - in fact ALL of the plastic objects in your vehicle, emit Benzene, a Cancer causing toxin. A BIG CARCINOGEN. Take the time to observe the smell of heated plastic in your car, when you open it, and BEFORE you start it up. 

 

In addition to causing cancer, Benzene poisons your bones, causes anemia and reduces white blood cells. Prolonged exposure will cause Leukemia and increases the risk of some cancers. It can also cause miscarriages in pregnant females

 

Acceptable Benzene level indoors is: 50mg per sq.ft.

 

A car parked indoors, with windows closed, will contain 400-800 mg of Benzene.

 

If parked outdoors, under the sun, at a temperature above 60 degrees F.

the Benzene level goes up to 2000-4000 mg, 40 times the acceptable level. 

 

People who get into the car, keeping the windows closed, will inevitably inhale, in quick succession, excessive amounts of the BENZENE toxin. 

 

Benzene is a toxin that affects your kidneys and liver. What's worse, it is extremely difficult for your body to expel this toxic stuff from your body.

 

So friends, please open the windows and door of your car - give it some time for the interior to air out - before you enter the vehicle.

 

Thought: 'When someone shares something of value with you and you benefit from it, you have a moral obligation to share it with others.'

 

This is what snopes.com says.  It is not the air conditioning in the car but the Benzene producing agents that cause cancer. Read the whole article here.

I think this is very important to know - please keep in mind with the warm weather (hopefully!) coming up.

About Birthday Presents

My son just turned five. FIVE!!! How did that happen???

 
Usually an opportunity for relatives and friends to show their love and affection by giving him stuff.
We are very lucky to have a family who always asks us (not him! Who knows what he would ask for!) what he needs, and we normally pick activities and/or classes that he likes.

I made him a doll from recycled and reused materials, just like I did for my other son for Christmas, and a crocheted airplane (pattern from Ana Paula Rimoli, again) that he asked for, and he was very happy.
My husband organized a used microphone and microphone stand for him (he loves to sing and perform!).
His best friend's parents gave him coupons for some activities like minigolf and bowling, and guess what? This is, I believe, his favorite gift! He took the coupons to school for show-and-tell and can't wait to actually do it.

My point is that it is very well possible to come up with gifts that don't add to the landfill and don't require energy to be made - aka used or selfmade items.
The sooner our kids (and us, too!) learn that presents don't have to come in fancy packages and that it's ok to receive used items, the better.
Oh, and we don't need wrapping paper or gift bags, either. Unless it's reused, of course.

Waste-Free Lunches

 

Lately I spend quite some time in my son's preschool class - it might be because his younger brother is getting more and more interested in what's happening in there and refuses to leave.

I have to say though that what I see there around lunchtime is devastating: most kids are generating a big amount of waste, as their caregivers pack their food in in single-use plastic bags, aluminum foil, or wax paper, or they purchase single-serving items that come in their own disposable package.

What's the problem with this?

Landfills are getting fuller and fuller. Incinerators pump contaminants into the air. Communities are battling over who will accept the nation's trash. We all enjoy the conveniences of pre-packed foods (or at least some of us do), but very few of us are willing to allow new landfills and incinerators to be built in our own backyards.

I want to say most of the garbage we produce comes from the packaging on the food we buy, and lunch foods are no exception. On average, a school-age child using a disposable lunch generates 67 pounds of waste per school year. That equates to 18,760 pounds of lunch waste for just one average-size elementary school!

What can you do to reduce lunch waste?

Get a good supply of reusable containers (if you buy them new, avoid plastic), made for example of stainless steel. There's a whole bunch of stuff out there, including containers for sandwiches, hot stuff, little eatables like carrots or fruit, sauces, water bottles etc. etc.
Don't buy prepacked foods - they're more expensive and less healthy.
Skip the disposable stuff like napkins, silverware and plastic water bottles. You teach your child (and/or yourself) a valuable lesson and save a lot of money.
I would also stop the habit of juice-boxes. The amount of garbage this habit creates is just ridiculous and having juice every day is just not healthy anyway.

This is What "Waste-free Lunches" says a waste-free lunch looks like:

A Typical American Lunch (DISPOSABLE) sandwiches sealed in plastic bags fruits and vegetables in plastic bags prepackaged chips, cookies, fruit bars, granola bars, cheeses, and fruit leathers prepackaged yogurts, apple sauces, and puddings crackers, pretzels, chips, and other snack foods sealed in plastic bags disposable juice boxes, juice pouches, soda cans, water bottles, and milk cartons plastic forks and spoons paper napkins reusable lunchboxes and disposable paper and plastic bags

A Waste-Free Lunch (REUSABLE) sandwiches and other main dishes, fresh fruit, fresh vegetables, and treats in a reusable lunch container cloth napkins stainless-steel forks and spoons reusable drink containers reusable lunchboxes *With this type of lunch, lunch food items can be bought in larger quantities. The packaging can be left at home for reuse or recycling. Waste-free lunches are not only a wise environmental choice, but they are less expensive as well.

 

According to Waste-free Lunches, you can save about $250 per school year by packing waste-free lunches, and that is just the monetary saving, environmental and health savings not even included!

There are numerous ways to get reusable containers, bottles and other utensils. If you live in NNJ, I'd like to recommend go lightly - a green store with an owner that really, really cares about the environment. Another recommendation is Yellow Margosa, founded by a fellow green mom who offers environmentally friendly lunch boxes, containers and other cool stuff.


Happy waste-free lunching! Let me know how your change is going, please!

I Got Hooked!

Hi!
The ones who are regularly visiting my blog might have wondered why there are so few posts lately.
Well, I got a new hobby - I re-learned how to crochet, and I hot hooked :-)
A few weeks ago I got three bags of yarn from a nice lady who actually wanted to throw it all away (totally locked out!), and ever since I can't stop crocheting. This is the first little buddy that I did:

The pattern is from Ana Paula Rimoli, whose wonderful, inspirational books I both own (she's coming out with a third one in April). Ana also has a blog, check it out when you have a chance!

"WauWau", as my boys named him, can be seen at the go lightly shopping window for the next weeks, maybe months as I started doing another round of decoration (it's not completed yet).

I'm amazed at what you can do with very little leftover yarn. Get your hook out, get some patterns and get started - it's so much fun!

I Want You All To Know About Freecycle

Hello there,
A lot of you might know this already, but I still see many people raise their eyebrows in surprise when they hear about freecycle, so I thought I dedicate a post to this eco-friendly movement.
Here's the introduction from Freecycle's start page on their website:

"Welcome! The Freecycle Network™ is made up of 4,918 groups with 8,175,361 members around the world. It's a grassroots and entirely nonprofit movement of people who are giving (and getting) stuff for free in their own towns. It's all about reuse and keeping good stuff out of landfills. Each local group is moderated by local volunteers (them's good people). Membership is free. To sign up, find your community by entering it into the search box above or by clicking on 'Browse Groups' above the search box. Have fun!" 

A lot of my youngest outgrown clothes and toys found new homes, as well as lots of furniture pieces and tons of nic-nacs, such as candles that I didn't use, a jogger radio, clothes that didn't fit and were too good to just use for crafts, etc. etc.

If you have something that you don't need/want anymore, you post to your local group and then pick somebody that you want to give it to.
If you need anything you also post to your local group, and if you get lucky you'll receive the item you're looking for. I received an awesome, working Singer sewing machine this way!

You can subscribe to the group and receive a daily digest, which you can browse and see whether somebody nearby offers something you want. Because sometimes you don't even know what you want until you see it being offered :-)

This is such a great way to reuse things, keep items out off the landfills and help live a budget AND eco-friendly life. Check it out at www.freecycle.org and become a member!

Happy Freecycling!!!

What Do Elephants Have To Do With Greeting Cards and How To Repurpose Teabag Strings

I love greeting cards. A few days ago I got a sweet note from a dear friend in Malaysia.
She knows how important environmental issues are to me, so she picked a very special card, made of - GET READY! - elephant dung.

Imagine?! Elephant dung, yes! And no, it doesn't smell and yes, it looks absolutely beautiful, illustrated by an artist.
On the left you see some products offered by the company, beautiful cards I find.

Of course I had to check this out in more detail (click here for their website), and here's what they have to say about elephant dung:

• On average an elephant will eat 200-250 kg of food a day... from that we get 50 kg of dung

• One elephant provides enough dung to make 115 sheets of paper

• Elephant dung does not smell that bad

• An elephant's dung is just fiber. The elephants are kindly doing the first stage of any paper making process - getting the fibers

• Elephant dung paper does not smell at all

• Elephant dung paper is 100% chlorine-free and 100% bacteria-free

• Dung is a waste product and if not made into paper will contribute to pollution

Here's a collection of their greeting cards (I got "The paiter").

I just think this is such an interesting concept. I love it, and I love the card and learning about this. How innovative!

In the meantime, while we figure out how we can (or can't :-) make our own paper, here's an idea how to upgrade a simple blank card (I stock up on thrift stores!):
Do you drink tea? Ever thought about what to do with those teabag strings? Nay? Thought so. This is something only somebody like me can come up with :-)

This is what one of my creations looks like. Not quite as fancy as the elephant dung cards though :)

Well, I separate them from the actual bag, take letters (cut out from magazines, for example) and glue them to the string. Then I take a sticker (whatever you have will do) and attach the string to the upper corners of the open card. You can do anything from birthday cards to Thank You notes and it makes the card somewhat special.

Always good to come up with ideas how to re-purpose things from our daily life that would otherwise go to the trash, right?

Please feel free to share your ideas here.

The Secret Weapon for Ear Infections and The Healing Power of Onions

I don't know how, but we get struck by sickness like crazy these days. And, thanks to Murphy :-), it always happens either at night, on weekends or on holidays.
This time it's the youngest member of the family, our 18 month old, with an ear infection, spiking on a Friday in the late afternoon.
Due to a medical condition, I'm very reluctant to give him pain killers and fever reducers but of course it breaks my heart to see him suffer and cry so much. Needless to say we had a rough night with lots and lots of nursing (yes, we still nurse. Hey, remember - not only is it a healthy thing to do, it's also very green!) and I found myself taking him downstairs with me, sitting in front of the computer and searching for home remedies.
I landed on My Home Remedies  and saw some good stuff. Suitable for the night was one tip - boil water, put a washcloth in, then remove the washcloth and place it in a cup. Hold the cup against the ear (make sure the hot washcloth doesn't actually touch the ear or any skin!) and let the steam soothe the ear. I did that and it gave my poor baby some relief.
But I also eyed this post from a user named Darlene:

"Gramma Mary's Ear Ache Remedy

For ear aches, ear infections, even an infection of the inner ear that is un-responsive to antibiotics. I'm the youngest of eleven children and I had ear aches as a child and this always worked for me.

My mom would bake a medium sized onion(with outer peeling removed) in the oven @ 350 for about an hour or until it would prick easily with a fork.(I cannot vouch for microwave). Remove the onion, place it at the bottom of a canning jar, wrap the jar in a towel so as not to burn your hand, prick the onion to release the steam. Place the affected ear over the opening to allow the steam of the onion to sooth and penetrate the ear. You can use a smaller onion and a smaller jar for a small child, the opening will be better for their little ears) Leave it in that position until the steam is no longer being released, the heat alone feels wonderful. It almost immediately eases the pain.

I know of a child scheduled for tubes to be surgically placed in her inner ear for drainage due to repeated infections that were un-responsive to antibiotics, who responded to this treatment the night before the planned surgery. When the doctor checked her ear the infection was completely resolved and the surgery was cancelled. The childs mother wanted to know if she could pay my mom,just knowing a child was no longer suffering was more than enough payment. We know now that onions have a natural antibiotic property and the heat may also help to improve circulation. It won't hurt to try, and it just may help. So what have you got to lose, onions are cheap!
Happy Healing!
Make it a Great Day for yourselves!!
Darlene"

Well, when we got up in the morning, the poor boy was still in pain and just super cranky. I baked the onion and did as told in the post. At first, he didn't like having the cup against his ear (I switched sides every few minutes). Then he kind of fell asleep for a few minutes. Woke up shortly after like nothing ever happened!

Thinking about ear infections and that they are the most common childhood illness, this might be a thing to consider. Why not talk to your doctor about it next time you speak to him/her?
Ear infections are 80% viral. Yet antibiotics are prescribed in most occurring cases. That is totally contra productive,  since antibiotics won't work for viruses and we hopefully all know by now that over consumption of antibiotics is simply not healthy in the long run, for different reasons.
If you are also reluctant to work with pain killers and want your or your child's body to resolve the illness by itself, try this remedy.

Onions have strong healing power. They are green, always available, easy to prepare, wont' create any extra waste or require extra energy to be produced. Unlike prescription or over-the-counter medications they don't come in plastic bottles that add to the landfill and they won't pollute the water and the earth with more or less toxic chemicals.
I'm so thrilled I came across this remedy (Thanks Darlene!) and hope you find it as helpful as I do (hopefully you won't need to use it anytime soon!)

Stay healthy and warm :-)