Inspired by Crunchy Chicken’s recent funny posts – Planning a Green Valentine’s and Sex is Greeny, I assembled my own green list for last-minute Valentine’s day preparations.
- Chocolate – In my opinion you can never do wrong giving chocolate as a gift, just make sure it is the fair trade (slavery-free) variety. Here’s a list of companies known to sell fair trade cocoa products:
- Clif Bar
- Cloud Nine
- Dagoba Organic Chocolate
- Denman Island Chocolate
- Gardners Candies
- Green and Black’s
- Kailua Candy Company
- Koppers Chocolate
- L.A. Burdick Chocolates
- La Siembre
- Montezuma’s Chocolates
- Newman’s Own Organics
- Omanhene Cocoa Bean Company
- Rapunzel Pure Organics
- The Endangered Species Chocolate Company
- Candles – Candles are great for setting the mood for a relaxing, romantic dinner and evening, but there’s nothing sexy about the smoke and strong odors given off if they are petroleum based. Instead look to soy candles as a natural alternative to light up your life. Soy candles burn cleaner and last longer than petroleum wax. Soy is a renewable resource, is biodegradable and is non-toxic and non-carcinogenic. There’s a great local company here that makes wonderful soy candles called Naked.
- Cards/love letters – Save the trees and send a Valentine e-card or write a love email instead.
- Care2 E-cards – For every eCard sent, Care2 makes a donation to an environmental nonprofit to save a square foot of rainforest. How cool is that?
- Charitable giving – Show your loved one that you care for them and others by giving to the charity of your loved one’s choice. Network for Good allows you to choose the amount to give, and your Valentine can select the charity of their choice.
- Sweet Treats – If you want to tint your cookies and treats shades of red, skip the artificial food coloring (Red No. 40) and unwanted side effects – hyperactive kids, anyone? – and go with a natural coloring instead. Check with your local health food/natural grocer.
However you celebrate this Valentine’s day, hope you have a good, green lovin’ one!
Photo credit: Tim Brown Photography
Stumble it!
N. & J. says:
Instead of soy candles you could buy beeswax candles. Traditionally harvested soy is still hard on the environment whereas bees have a positive impact and the candles burn longer.
February 13th, 2008 at 8:22 pm
Summer says:
Great list!
February 13th, 2008 at 10:45 pm
Tanya says:
Natural Food Coloring: I’m fairly certain that still comes from the crushed bodies of swollen pregnant cactus bugs.
As an alternative, how about creating edible heart stamps onto cookies with a strawberry cut in half? I mean, if your kids are hyperactive, why use sugary frosting anyway, pigmented or otherwise?
February 13th, 2008 at 11:55 pm
amygeekgrl says:
N&J – thank you for the tip!
Tanya – Actually the food coloring I had in mind is made from black and red currants – http://www.naturesflavors.com/product_info.php?cPath=166&products_id=5805
And I was thinking of using it to color the dough, not to make a sugar frosting, but to each her own. ;) Love the strawberry idea! :) That’s a great alternative.
amy
CDG
February 14th, 2008 at 12:30 am
Mandy says:
These are great ideas! Love your blog, it’s very inspiring!!
February 14th, 2008 at 11:53 am
Cat says:
I don”t know about the rest, but Dagoba was bought by Hershey’s a while ago…
http://tribes.tribe.net/dagoba/thread/50ec8758-11a2-47f5-974e-9b99ae2c18b7
I don’t know how true to the original principles that they have kept it, but hey!
In other news, something for next year…
http://www.organicbouquet.com/
February 14th, 2008 at 3:10 pm
Anonymous says:
Ummmm…Chocolate.
It all sounds very yummy!
I second the idea of beeswax candles. I burn them often and love their very light scent.
February 14th, 2008 at 4:08 pm
Tara says:
A great site for natural colorings:
http://indiatree.com/index.html
These are also sold at our Whole Foods.
February 14th, 2008 at 5:27 pm
Katja from skimbaco.com says:
Thanks for great tips! I got some Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory goodies today – at least it’s local!
Happy Valentine’s Day my friend!
February 14th, 2008 at 8:10 pm