Just Use: Certified Pre Owned Cell Phones

I have a confession to make.  I jumped on the cell phone band wagon pretty early in the game.  In 1999, we had just begun our little family and were living in Estes Park, Colorado.  Trips down the canyon to Fort Collins for "supplies" were fairly common, and it put everyone more at ease for the new mother/lone driver to have a cell phone in the car.  Then, once we did the math, we realized we could cancel our long distance plan and just use the cell phone to call far away friends and loved ones instead.

However, because I seem to be genetically programmed to not like shopping and not be tempted by new technology and gadgets, I have only owned three phones since then.  Up until last fall, I was still happily using my old flip phone, not as a camera or a mini computer, but as just a phone.  And then I washed it.  In the washing machine.  This particular phone had already survived being dunked in a glass of water repeatedly by a toddler (someone else's) and falling in the toilet (freshly cleaned, thankfully), so I somewhat confidently took it apart and set it in rice, expecting it to dry out and come back to life.  No luck.

As I browsed Verizon's website for my new phone, I just felt sick to my stomach and could not commit to a purchase.  I knew from start to finish the damage a cell phone causes to the environment.  The components of a cell phone read like a Top Ten list of major pollutants:  lead, nickel, beryllium, mercury, cadmium, and plastic treated with brominated flame retardants.  From mining to manufacturing to usage to disposal these devices poison people and places at every stage.  The numbers are staggering.  There are 3.5 billion phones in use world wide.  The average user upgrades every 18 months (U.S. users are closing in on once a year). Only 20% of users get a new phone because their old one isn't working. Tossed cell phones account for 65,000 tons of electronic waste annually.  And yet, my life right now is structured in a way that it would be difficult to go completely without one.

Frustrated, I finally called Verizon to talk to a sales representative about my dilemma.  It turns out they, and all other major carriers, offer Certified Pre-Owned phones.  It takes a little digging to find them on their websites.  Verizon's is listed under "Deals", assuming your motivation is to just save money.  And although I'd love to get to a point where a cell phone is not a necessity in my life, buying a used phone, with the same kind of warranty granted a new one felt like a workable solution for now.

Other solutions to deal with the cell phone crisis:

-treat your phone carefully so it will last, keeping it in a case and not using it precariously where it might fall (no more talking to my sister and cleaning the toilet simultaneously for me!)

-only upgrade because your phone stopped working, not just to get the newest feature or cool kid toy

-recycle your old phone, but be careful it isn't just getting shipped to a third world country, look for a non-profit organization that actually uses them 

Just Wear: Decent Exposures

If you have made some sort of commitment to buying all of your clothing secondhand, you know underwear can be tricky.  Even I get a little squeamish thinking about wearing someone else's underwear.  One solution is to sew underwear (usually out of old t-shirts), but my kids complained they weren't as comfy as storebought, and in the end, they just couldn't hold up to the wash and wear regimen required for them.  When you start hunting for sustainably made underwear, it can get tricky, too.  Although some of the larger companies produce organic cotton underwear, I would still question their labor practices around growing and harvesting the cotton and manufacturing the product.

This is where Decent Exposures, based in Seattle, saves the day.  First of all, it is a one-stop underwear shop, with options for the whole family.  They began in 1986 and have remained committed to the quality of their materials and their manufacturing process.  All of their pieces are made here in Seattle by people receiving decent pay and benefits and flexible schedules.  A friend of mine actually did her internship there and confirmed it is a great environment for a working woman.

They keep a lot of stock on hand, but also do custom orders.  At one point, you could even send them your old t-shirts and they would make them into underwear for you.  Yes, the price for one pair is the same price you might pay for a 3-pack at Target, but the product is of much high quality and will last longer.  Also, I guarantee the people involved in making the 3-pack did not receive a livable wage and benefits.

  

If it is an area of your life that you have considered making a change in, they are definitely worth checking out.  I know I found them because they are local, but I haven't really come across another company like them.  I'd love to hear any other recommendations or suggestions on this topic!

 

Just Eat: Local Eggs

Even though I grew up in a city, I have always been drawn to the country lifestyle.  Since I graduated from high school, I have lived the majority of my adult life in towns with less than 12,000 people.  In 2011 we finally bought a house on our little island, and although it is in a neighborhood, our community shares three and a half acres with a neighboring co-housing community that can be used for gardening and keeping animals.  This allows us to keep chickens, but share in the responsibility with four other families.  Although I anticipated enjoying sharing the experience with my children, I underestimated the personal satisfaction I would feel in raising and caring for these creatures.  There is a certain bliss after I have cleaned out the hen house, maybe moved the fence to a fresh grassy spot, and tossed around some extra scraps for everyone to enjoy.  I totally did not expect to feel like that about some birds.  

Also, and Martha Stewart has been saying this for years, fresh eggs taste really great.  You can seriously see the difference as soon as you crack them.  The yolk is twenty times more yellow than commercially raised eggs, as is the intensity of the flavor.  It has given me great pleasure to pass on some extra eggs each week to one of our elderly neighbors who always raised chickens herself, but now is not physically able to.  She had just stopped eating eggs altogether because store bought eggs tasted so bland and rubbery to her after decades of eating fresh.

I know not everyone is in a spot to keep their own chickens, but you might be able to find someone nearby who can. The website Local Harvest is a good place to start.  Most cities in our area actually allow people to keep three or four birds in their backyards.  I used to buy eggs from a local/cage-free/organic egg business.  And while I know the situation of those birds is better than being literally chained to a perch with their beaks removed while they are fed intravenously (the situation for the majority of factory farmed chickens), the above picture is still a little disconcerting to me.  It is actually from an article praising the aforementioned local egg business for their practices.  But after spending the last year around chickens, I know this situation is not ideal.  My goal this year is to move more towards consuming animal products either from animals that I have raised or that I actually know and trust the person who raised them.  It is a lofty goal, and I know we won't always be able to do it, but any purchases we do make this way will feel pretty good.

Just Use: Remnant Fabric

As Project Run and Play draws to a close this month and my Alice in Wonderland collection goes on display tomorrow night, it is time to turn my attention to some sewing projects around the house.  We have been in our home for a little over a year, and although we accomplished some pretty major renovations (knocking out two walls, new flooring, building a peninsula in the kitchen) my husband and I are both feeling inspired to get back at it again.  This winter we hope to finish painting, tile the backsplash, install countertops, and paint the kitchen cabinets.  We have also determined our north facing windows need window treatments after all.  It has been tempting to leave all of our windows exposed to keep an illusion of openness despite the small square footage of our house, but we need a little more privacy and a way to block some neighboring light sources on this side of the house.

In order to keep the lines as clean as possible I am making Roman shades.  Normally, I would have checked at the Pacific Fabrics Outlet on 4th in Seattle for any great deals on remnant decorator fabrics.  Unfortunately, they switched this store to a regular retail location earlier this year and I am not sure where their remnants end up now.

So, I have been researching sites dealing specifically in remnants online.  The two I am most excited about are Modern Fabrics and Warehouse Fabric, Inc.  Both have a pretty wide selection of home decorator fabrics that you can buy in yardage (as opposed to precut one-yard samples).  Also, both are reputable and carry recognizable lines of fabric.  Initially, I looked on ebay, but it was difficult to wade through the choices and none of the sellers instilled confidence in case I did not like my purchase.  I find it intimidating to buy fabric or other textiles online without having seen them in person first.  The color might be off and the weight or texture might not work with your project.  Warehouse has a blanket 30 day return policy and Modern considers returns on a case by case basis.

Although the majority of textile waste comes from the garment industry, it certainly exists in every area that produces fabric.  Both sites are run by married couples, and James and Ewa at Modern Fabrics are very pointed about the environmental impact you can make by choosing to use remnants.  If all goes according to plan, I should be posting soon about my purchase and my finished shades.

Just Eat: Ben & Jerry's Ice Cream

In 2010 Ben & Jerry's Ice Cream announced they were working towards using only Fair Trade Certified ingredients in their products by 2013. Longtime supporters of local farms and non-BGH dairy products, the founders always felt uneasy about the origins of their more exotic ingredients of vanilla, coffee, and cocoa, three industries which frequently use forced, and even child labor.  In a press announcement Jerry Greenfield said, "Fair trade is about making sure people get their fair share of the pie. The whole concept of fair trade goes to the heart of our values and the sense of right and wrong.  Nobody wants to buy something that was made by exploiting someone else."

Although Ben & Jerry's is definitely priced as a premium ice cream, our family accepts that we are paying for fair wages for their US employees, as well as, those abroad.  Also, it makes having ice cream a special treat, as opposed to a standard nightly dessert, which is definitely instilling healthy habits and attitudes in our kids.

Forced labor and especially child labor are really tough topics, and most of us want to believe it isn't that much of a problem anymore, but the reality is in 2012 over 21 million people worldwide are being exploited in forced labor situations and a quarter of those people are children (according to the United Nations' International Labour Organization's latest study).  But limiting our consumption of products that typically use forced labor and choosing fair trade when we do buy them is one step towards a solution. 

Just Use: Handwoven Towels

It is a rare occasion that I purchase a new textile product.  Knowing the excess that occurs at all stages when it comes to producing textiles, buying secondhand feels like a stop gap (albeit a tiny one) in that cycle.  However, the dish towels people donate to places like Goodwill are either often a) very worn or b) very ugly.  After several years of settling for un-absorbent and unattractive kitchen towels, I decided to invest in some quality, handwoven organic cotton ones.

Reader, (I've been re-reading Jane Eyre lately) I will never go back!  The difference is a hundredfold.  Just by touch you can tell the item will hold up to a lot of use and will last a long time.  The longevity of a product's lifetime justifies purchasing new.  I think I  found my new go to present when it comes to weddings.

I used the term "invest" when I described my decision, because an individual towel can run between twenty and thirty dollars, but a set of three is likely to last ten years or more and is not contributing any textile waste to landfills.  Also, you are getting something very practical and supporting a local artisan.  While I purchased my towels from the fiber arts and textile collective where I am a member, there are many weavers listed on etsy or to be found locally. 

Just Wear: Spicy Green Mango

Last year I was able to start a fiber arts and textile collective for other artisans in my community.  Some I already knew, and invited personally, but I also made use of some of our town's Yahoo groups and Facebook pages.  As we neared our launch I used the Shop Local feature to search Etsy and stumbled on the shop for Spicy Green Mango.  Anya, the owner, was new to our island, having moved recently from Cambodia.  While living in Cambodia, she saw firsthand the waste generated by the many garment factories located there.  It is not uncommon for these factories to be filling an order for 50,000 articles of a single item of clothing.  They are often working with huge bolts of fabrics with up to 1,000 yards on them.  Despite efficient pattern cutting, it is understandable they end up with thousands of pounds of excess fabric every day.  In fact, the average garment factory throws away about 60,000 pounds of excess fabric every week.

Before this fabric is thrown away, it spends some time in a warehouse waiting for someone to use it.  This is where Anya and Spicy Green Mango enter the picture.  After purchasing the "deadstock" fabric, Anya works with a team of designers and seamstresses to create clothing for men, women, and children.  Since its inception, Spicy Green Mango has been committed to providing their workers with a fair living wage and employment opportunities allowing women to stay with their families.

Now, Anya returns to Cambodia a few times a year to purchase more fabric and develop more designs. Besides mixing and matching various prints and patterns creatively, she utilizes fun and graphic screen printing to make their pieces unique.  A statement from their website sums up their style and mission best:  Spicy Green Mango believes that globalization does not mean cultural homogenization.  That mixing ideas between - across - through cultures, places, and people adds to the amazing kaleidoscope of life, love, and cool clothes!