Review at Giveaway at Open Hands Blog

Check out the great review of A Happy Green Life Laundry Wash and enter to win a bag of laundry wash http://openhands31.blogspot.com/2012/02/happy-green-life-was-started-by-amanda.html

A Happy Green GIVEAWAY

A Happy Green Life just reached over 500 fans on facebook! As a thank you to everyone who has joined the fun on our page we would like to GIVE YOU PRIZES!! Enter below it is super easy!

Scent

Are scents in A Happy Green Laundry Wash Bad?

Kristin and I LOVE having scent left behind in our diapers and clothes so when making our laundry wash we  looked into ways that we could have a fragrant laundry wash without the detrimental build up. We first started with the chemicals used to make the wash, each one of them cleans without building up (they are free of optical brighteners and soap, both have been proven to build up in your clothes, prevent absorption and hold onto stink). We then turned to the scent. A lot of cloth diapers say that their warranty is void if they are washed with a detergent containing perfumes so we needed to find fragrance oil not perfume oils (the difference is in the chemicals). We found an amazing scent company that makes all of their own scents as fragrances oils not perfumes.

Fragrance oils are broken down into three parts, the top note, middle and base note. Each “note”  is made up of different scents, and is mixed to last longer, the base notes are designed to last the longest, this is what you are smelling when you pull your clothes out of the dryer. The scents are designed to evaporate (the top notes faster than the bottom) and not build up in your clothing, this is why they are so strong when you first take them out of the washer and almost nonexistent by the end of the week. The company that we use employs some great chemist and perfumers. They work really hard to create scents that won’t evaporate too fast, but won’t stay long enough to negatively affect your clothing.
-Amanda

Laundry Balls!

We are a staticy family (well, our clothes are). At least once a month my poor husband finds an article of clothing stuck in his pant leg as he is walking around work (it is usually a pair of my underwear, my poor hubby is in the army so you can imagine how embarrassing it is for him to have a pair of hot pink women’s underwear sneak out of the leg of his military uniform). To combat our static problems we have always used dryer sheets. On average they would cost us about $3 a month, not too much, and they saved us total embarrassment (think pink panties and combat boots, not a good combination). Then one day I decided to look up what exactly in a dryer sheet, as you can guess it is not pretty:

Benzyl Acetate (linked to pancreatic cancer), Benzyl Alcohol (known to cause upper respiratory tract irritant), Ethanol (a chemical listed on the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) Hazardous Waste list and capable of causing central nervous system disorders), A-Terpineol (another cause of  respiratory problems, including fatal edema, and central nervous system damage), Ethyl Acetate (a narcotic on the EPA’s Hazardous Waste list),  Camphor (it causes central nervous system disorders), Chloroform (a lovely neurotoxin, anesthetic and carcinogen), Linalool (a  narcotic that causes central nervous system disorders), and  Pentane (a chemical known to be harmful if inhaled).

Like I said it’s not pretty. So what is a staticky family to do? The answer is something I am very excited about, Dryer Balls!

A dryer ball is ball that when placed in your dryer with your wet clothes helps to lift and separate the clothing, reducing static and drying time, and leave your clothes soft and fluffy-without all of the horrible toxins (the technical explanation for a dryer ball is that it improves the circulation of heat and air through the wet clothing).

Dryer balls run about $10 on average and last approximately one to two years, a much better deal in the long run than those toxic dryer sheets. Even better they reduce drying time by up to 40%. This will cut the cost of your energy consumption and your electric bill!

I don’t know about you but I think that toxin free and economical are two great reasons to make the switch. There are many different dryer balls out there, our favorite are Bouncing Woolies! Not only are they free of chemicals, these are 100% natural wool. Even better they can come scented so that your clothing smells amazing when they come out of the dryer!

To purchase Bouncing Woolies check out www.bouncingwoolies.com or check out http://www.ahappygreenlife.com/ where you can find woolies scented to match your favorite laundry wash!
-Amanda

Giveaway!!

A fellow mama blogger is hosting A Happy Green Life Laundry Wash giveaway right now!! Head on over to A Crunch Beach Mama http://crunchybeachmama.com/2012/02/a-happy-green-life-natural-laundry-wash-2-winners/ follow her amazing blog and enter to win a bag of laundry wash!

Bouncing Woolies

A Happy Green Life is excited to announce that we are now carrying Bouncing Woolies dryer balls! We LOVE dryer balls! They are a natural and GREEN alternative to dryer sheets and fabric softeners.



Dryer Balls are a green alternative for a couple of reasons. First, they are reusable and instead of throwing a dryer sheet away after one use, you can use a dryer ball again and again. Second, they are free of many harsh chemicals that are used in common fabric softener products. Third, they actually will reduce the time it takes to dry your clothes, reducing the amount of energy (and money) wasted! And fourth, they are made from wool, a renewable resource!



We hope that you will try them out and we know you will love them as much as we do.
Have A Happy Green Dryer with Bouncing Woolies!

Wordless Wednesday - Retailer Exclusives

Meatless Monday

Its Meatless Monday and we are hungry! Tonight we are having:

Twice-Baked Sweet Potatoes with Spinach and Coconut Milk

Serves 4

4 sweet potatoes

2 tablespoons canola oil

2 tablespoons minced gingerroot

2 teaspoons Thai red curry paste

1 ¼ pounds flat-leaf spinach (stems remove removed unless very thin, then chopped)

Salt

1/3 cup unsweetened coconut milk

2 tablespoons chopped fresh cilantro

1.      Move an oven rack to the middle position and heat the oven to 400. Lightly rub each potato with a little oil. Place the potatoes on foil liked baking sheet and bake until the skin is crisp and skewer slides easily through the flesh, about 1 hour and 10 min. Remove the baking sheet and set aside to cool. Increase oven to 450

2.      While the sweet potatoes are cooling, heat the 2 tablespoons oil in a large saucepan over medium heat until shimmering. Add the ginger and curry paste and cook until fragrant. Add the damp spinach, cover and cook, stirring once or twice until completely wilted, about 5 minutes. Add salt to taste, then set aside.

3.       Using a folded kitchen towel to hold the hot sweet potatoes, cut each one in half lengthwise. With a spoon, scoop the flesh from each half in to a bow, leaving ¼ inch of flesh and skin in each sell, place potatoes back on baking sheet.

4.      Mash the sweet potatoes in the bow with the coconut milk until smooth. Stir in the spinach mixture and cilantro Adjust seasonings to taste.

5.      Mound the sweet potato filling into each shell. Bake until the top is firm and crisp, about 15 min.
-Amanda

urban gardening

We love this! If you don't have room to garden make it with things around your house! We found this great idea of using empty soda bottles to grow your veggies from http://www.urbanorganicgardener.com/ this is awesome!

Farmers Almanac

According to the farmers almanac we can start planting this weekend! Before the Super Bowl we will be prepping our veggie garden! Check out the Farmers Almanac Gardening Calender to see when you can start planting in your area http://www.farmersalmanac.com/calendar/gardening/

A Happy Green Cause

If you haven’t noticed yet we here at A Happy Green Life like food, in fact we LOVE food. Chef Mike is a professional chef and the rest of us are professional eaters. When we heard the statistic that 1 in 5 kids, over 16 million children, don’t know how they are going to get food each day we were shocked. Between our two families we have four kids and tons of nieces and nephews; the idea that any of these innocent children could be hungry or that any of their friends might be, broke our hearts.

We know how tired and cranky our own kids get when they are hungry, heck we know how crazy and cranky we get when we are hungry, imagine feeling that way all the time. Imagine being too little to get food, or too embarrassed to tell people that you need something to eat.

Kids who are hungry are sick more often, recover slower and are more likely to be hospitalized. They get headaches, stomachaches, colds and ear infections. They cannot learn as much, as fast, or as well and they lack the nutrients that they need to concentrate and perform well at school.

There are more than 16 million children in our country suffering from these problems. These kids are the hope for the future, they will one day be our doctors, scientist, and teachers but they are not going to make it if they don’t get something to eat.

We here at A Happy Green Life have decided that we need to do something. We are partnering with SHARE OUR STRENGTH NO KID HUNGRY to end childhood hunger by 2015. We ask you to take the pledge with us to end childhood hunger. http://nokidhungry.org/

In addition to everyone at A Happy Green Life taking the pledge, we will be donating a portion of the proceeds from every Doodle Bug Natural Laundry Wash purchased to the SHARE OUR STRENGTH NO KID HUNGRY program.

Just $1 can help a child connect to up to 10 healthy meals through the program. Hopefully we can get these kids not just 10 healthy meals but three healthy meals every day for the rest of their lives.

Wordless Wednesday - Share Our Strength