Sustainable trees in SW Portland: The Little Forest

My friend Kim shared a great tip on where to get a sustainably grown Christmas tree in SW Portland for an affordable price. We've never been the kind of people who tromp out to a snowy forest and slay our own tree. But this looks to be the place we will go from here on out. With hand-painted signs, 'The Little Forest,' is owned and run by an older gentleman who grows the trees on his land, using only rain and rain collected in barrels from his roof. He spent a good amount of time telling us about the trees, and little tidbits about the neighborhood. He said he's been growing trees for 20 years, and selling them for eight. Here's the info from a flier he handed us:

We grow our trees which come in all sizes from two to 12 feet. They are completely chemical free. We have U-Cuts and Pre-Cuts which are harvested several times per season. They are stored outside in water to assure freshness. Each tree has been carefully trimmed in early summer allowing time to heal and bud over before harvest. This assures a natural, unblemished appearance. All these trees should easily keep throughout the Christmas season, especially if watered which is recommended. Trees can be delivered if needed , and free cedar greens are available.

Open Mon-Sat 10-6 and Sunday 1-5pm. If you call ahead we will hold open for you: 971-570-7380. SW 57th Ave. off SW Garden Home Road in Portland.

I only wish we had brought the kids (and my camera)! It was just a lovely little lot with trees of many sizes growing in concentric circles around a huge cedar, and it's got a magical feel to the place. We wussed out over the weekend due to the rain forecast, but got a beautiful tree today while the girls were at school. I can't wait until they get home to see and decorate it!

The season of the Elf

We've got an Elf theme running here, and I like it! I'm at a loss to explain any miracles of mood over the last 7 days. But I've got the holiday spirit now, in spades. Whereas last week, I was all boo-boo. Wah, wah, I can't deal with this. Even thinking about the gifts on my list made me want to crawl into a ball and take a nap. Oh, perhaps it's due to Heather's being in a galaxy, far, far away. Whatever the change, I'm happy to be happy right now. And wishing the holiday season was longer! So much to do! So little time!

My husband and I went out on Sunday night (crazy!) to see The Santaland Diaries at the Gerding, put on by Portland Center Stage (and thank you, thank you, thank you PCS for the free tix -- thanks even more for writing 'VIP Comp' on them, because, you know, EnviroMoms like to feel important). It was our first visit to the Gerding in the remodeled Armory. And it's a totally amazing space for live theater, and I just love that they took an old historic building, and turned it into something fabulous and new.

But the play? Oh man, did we laugh. And hoot and howl and cry happy tears of holiday joy. It was that good. Wade McCollum is that actor's actor who makes his job look easy. He takes the hilarous David Sedaris tale of working as a Macy's elf and rocks it. Like many holiday classics, this one takes on the commercialism and craziness of the season, but gets to the heart of what it can mean in a heartwarming, funny and surprising way. I can't recommend this show more heartily enough. Especially if you have a sort of evil sense of humor, like we do, and don't mind a few f-bombs. The Santaland Diaries will run through January 2, but it's a super intimate theater (the Ellyn Bye Studio) and many shows have already sold old.

Typically, I'll get tickets for a holiday kids' show, or a scaled-down version of the Nutcracker. My girls will get glammed up in their holiday dresses. And we'll go get a treat after the show. Nothing original here. Just a family ritual of enjoying a live holiday performance, an experience together, vs. spending all of my dear husband's hard-earned paycheck on stuff. You know? All that awful stuff that the holidays can easily devolve into being about?

I do realize that theater tickets are dear, and times are tough. So, maybe you'll do what we did: save the primo experience for the grown-ups and perhaps, take the kids in their fancy get-ups to a free or low-cost holiday event. There are so many in my town of Portland, right about now. As surely there are in yours. Then, most importantly, give yourself permission not to buy a few gifts. Because most of us don't need them. And we won't remember many of them. But we hopefully will cherish and remember the invaluable time and experiences shared.

CSA Year 4: the good, the bad and the beets

Yesterday, I went down to our local farmers' market in the pouring rain. A river practically ran through the middle of the market. I expected to see Pooh and Piglet float by, with Pooh's head firmly stuck in that hunny pot. It was the kind of day I really appreciated having a CSA subscription. I walked briskly to our farm stand. Picked the box with the least water pooled in the lid. Stuck it all in my bag. Checked our name off the list. And I was back on my way home, with this gorgeous and slightly soggy bounty in tow:

You may recall that last year Heather gave up on the CSA. Too much produce to deal with in a timely manner. So I was left in a bit of a pickle. I toyed with the idea of doing the whole share on our own, but truthfully, didn't think we could handle it. A few friends said they were interested, and one family agreed to go in with us. They have loved it. We have loved it. We've worked out a similar system to what Heather and I used to do. We usually pick a time each Sunday to meet at the market. We divvy it up as close as we can down the middle. The other family is required to take the beets every time they appear. And we're all happy.

We are two weeks away from our CSA ending, and coming from how overwhelmed I was with it the first few years, I'm proud to say that I'm sad! I will miss these lovely, local, in season and organic veggies. The first week or so, when I switched from buying produce at the store to getting the box at the market, there was a little hiccup in my meal planning. Working with what I had instead of what I could simply plan to buy. But all in all, year four had been the charm.

So, if there's any take away from this post (besides the pretty picture of the fall harvest), it's that you may really have to give yourself time to grow into your CSA. If this was your first CSA year and you felt overwhelmed, don't kick yourself too hard. If this was your second year or beyond, and you're thinking about bailing out? Well, you know yourself better than I do. You decide what's best. I can honestly say, that on our fourth year, we are seasoned CSA pro's. It's been a dream. In two more weeks, when it's finished, I will miss that CSA box dearly until it starts up again next spring.

Green birthday: locally made hula hoop, experience party, and a classroom book to share

We've just celebrated my first-born daughter's 8th birthday! Eighth! It seems so old, that I might as well be saying 80th!

First off -- thank you EnviroMom readers for the great classroom celebration idea! To avoid both the sugary treats and token giveaway at school, my young bookworm talked to her teacher about picking a book to donate to her class. We got a really nice young learners' biography of Helen Keller, whom my daughter admires, and read a bit from it to celebrate with her class. Kudos also to her teacher who talked about how instead of bringing a treat that would be gone in the blink of an eye, we'd brought something that the class could share and use forever! They also did a fun exercise where the students paired up and tried finger spelling on each others' palms, demonstrating the first way Helen Keller learned words.

My daughter chose an experience party with her family instead of a friend party -- so we swam our hearts out last weekend at the local community center. As for her gifts, is there anything cooler than finding the perfect gift for someone that you know they are going to love? Just so you know, my 8-year-old has a knack for the hula-hoop. She learned it at one of her last summer camps and blew my socks off the first time she showed me. Trouble is we only have a very heavy and adult-size home-made hula hoop, which doesn't work well for what my daughter calls 'neckers' (twirling the hoop around her neck). So check out this hoop of beauty...

It's a locally hand-made kid-size hula hoop by the Mayor of Hooperville, Portland-based Erika Fey. Ha! And I feared my only hoop choices would be banged up second-hand (if I could find one in the right size) or mass-produced made in China. Not so! Hooray for Hooperville! Hooray for locally made gifts, books to share with school kids, experience parties and all manner of green birthdays!!

PS If you want to put some spring in your step, check out this awesome video of the Mayor of Hooperville… Makes me want to step into a hoop (but not look anything like the video) and totally make an utter fool of myself. But hey, it'll be fun!

Service Club: Volunteering time and emphasizing reuse

I'd like to nominate a fellow mom to genius status. She is lead organizer of our elementary school's service club, and this year had the fantastic idea of using the teacher inservice days (when kids are out of school) to take the club to local service organizations and volunteer our time where they need it most. Last year, you may remember when I wrote about cleaning up donated board books for the Children's Book Bank. Another time our service club got together to make birthday kits, which we then donated to an organization that would get them to kids who might not otherwise have parties. Both activities taught our kids not only about volunteering and sharing their time, but to reuse things already on hand, and give creative new life to stuff if we bundle things in new ways.

Back to our most recent activity... A few weeks ago Friday, two groups of about 10 families from our elementary school went to the Northwest Children's Outreach. We brought with us carloads of clothing, diapers, strollers, car seats, high chairs, cribs, toys, books, etc. Our family in particular brought four bags of clothing, shoes, coats, socks, books and what felt like the world's largest collection of well-loved My Little Pony toys. We took a short tour and learned about this organization, then we rolled up our sleeves and helped sort and organize the donations into kits that they in turn hand off to other service organizations. I was in a group comprised primarily of second graders who counted out diapers from big donated boxes, and repackaged in smaller amounts. We were stunned to hear that 1,000 diapers are donated and delivered to families from this organization each week. Each family's baby can only get 20 diapers, which gives an idea of the vast number of people this organization helps.

Buying in bulk: shopping for groceries and household goods

Over the weekend, I often found myself hunched over a newsprint book, feeling like I was cramming for a test. Muttering to myself. Jotting down notes. Adding things up in my head. The book is the Azure Standard catalog. Why the intense study of it? I feel like I've got to make it work. I've been ordering off and on from this Oregon-based wholesaler for over a year, and so far, much to my chagrin, it hasn't really been a love connection.

In case you're unfamiliar with it, Azure Standard carries a wide variety of natural and organic foods and household items. They supply many eco-friendly grocery stores -- selling bulk quantities for bins, cases of stuff and really big restaurant supply quantities of some items. What's cool is they let us end users buy in this bulk capacity as well. Some people swear by this grocery delivery service, and do most of their shopping here. I'd kind of hoped I could achieve that. At least it could become my new Costco after I stopped shopping there. At the very least, I could get my recycled content toilet paper by the case. In reality, that's about the most I've ever ordered so far. Oh, I've split a 25-pound box of granola with Heather a few times. And I got a few of those jugs of organic maple syrup. But that's a far cry from doing the majority of my grocery shopping there as some of my friends manage to do every month! (Here you'll find me bowing to your superiority! You know who you are.)

EnviroMom salutes Pizzicato!

Folks, what I'm about to tell you will hopefully alter your perception (if it exists) that you, as a consumer, are powerless to enact change. Or possibly it will inspire you to take steps the next time you encounter something you feel is wrong or misleading. No one is more surprised than I am at this outcome.

A few weeks ago I noticed a 'please recycle this box' message printed on the lid of a Pizzicato pizza box. I'd never noticed it before since I'm generally more interested in what's inside the box. But it frustrated me. Why? Because the Portland Metro-area curbside recycling guidelines clearly state that pizza boxes are not acceptable (they are generally contaminated with food and grease), and the Pizzicato chain currently operates exclusively in the Metro area. Kind of a confusing message, wouldn't you say?

It's like when manufacturers of frozen foods stamp 'please recycle' on their boxes. Yes, somewhere you can recycle frozen food boxes. But many municipalities (like Portland) across the US don't accept them because the boxes contain a chemical contaminant that enables them to hold up under cold and wet conditions. Unless you take the time to really understand the recycling guidelines in your area (which in my Master Recycler-educated opinion we should all be doing) most people will see that verbiage and just recycle the box. Contaminants in the recycling stream are costly -- they can ruin entire batches of otherwise clean recyclable waste and end up with everything getting sent to the landfill. In Portland, you can rip off the clean sections of pizza boxes and recycle them, but most people don't know to do this. They either 1) toss the whole box into the recycle cart, or 2) throw it in the garbage. (You can also compost cardboard in your backyard composter by ripping it into pieces.)

So I sent a three-sentence email to Pizzicato's general info address asking why they print this 'please recycle' message, which goes against the recycling guidelines. I did not mention that I write a green living blog. A couple of weeks later I got this amazing response from Felix Rippel, Operations Manager:

Bank local, anyone?

I've never put much thought into picking a bank before. Usually I go for the convenience factor. Is it close to my home, work, or where I shop? Free-ish checking? OK, sold! When we moved to Oregon nine years ago, we picked Washington Mutual because it was close to us and had a branch in the place we figured we'd do most of our grocery shopping.

Flash forward 9 years. Perhaps you've heard of this global financial meltdown crisis thingy? With no effort on my part, my bank accounts at Washington Mutual have now become part of JPMorgan/Chase. Similarly, our Countrywide 30-year fixed rate mortgage is now being serviced by Bank of America. Has something like this happened to you too? I'm less bugged by the mortgage. You get used to the mortgages being sold between banks. But the regular bank accounts? I don't know. I'm starting to think if we spend time and effort supporting local businesses, shouldn't we also support local banks? Yet, does that even exist any more? Long gone are the days where you could walk down to the Main Street bank and get a loan from George Bailey based on a hand-shake because he knew you were good for paying it back. I have used a credit union in the past -- again, because it was right where I worked, so it made more sense than a bank at that time in my life. Truthfully, I don't know if credit unions are very different from banks, and right now I'm feeling too uninspired to do much research into it. Are they more local? Does it make a difference? Sadly, with economics and me, after a while it's all just blah-blah-blah-global crisis. Blah-blah-blah-blah-blah recession. I'm not pooh-poohing that it's a real thing, seriously screwing up the lives and security of many people. I get that. But back to banks. There's a part of me that thinks we should just stick with the big guys. The ones who ate the little fish that we used to have. Aren't they like the knights in shining armor? They've passed their stress tests, right? Blah-blah-blah. I don't know.

Sponsor giveaway: Milagros Boutique

We first met Tony Fuentes from Milagros Boutique when he offered to let us host a kids and maternity clothing swap in his NE Portland store. We had two clothing swaps under our belt, and had no idea what to expect. What we found was a lovely, welcoming place filled with well-made natural products for parents and babies, and owners who emulate everything the 'shop local' movement is about. Tony and his wife Jennifer are activists in the community where they live and work, keeping it vital, connected and healthy (their gorgeous kids are modeling some of their wares in the photos). Having recently expanded this local shop to an online presence, Milagros is not just about selling diapers, baby carriers or nursing bras -- it's about fostering community. Milagros offers a bricks-and-mortar community gathering space for parenting support groups (and for kids to play), as well as a blog and active email list on events, classes, activism opportunities, craft fairs and great new products.

Milagros has generously offered to do a giveaway to EnviroMom readers. Leave a comment on this post between now and midnight Saturday, April 25, for a chance to win a $20 gift certificate. The winner can choose between an in-store gift certificate or a certificate to use in the online store. You must leave your email address (which will not be publicly published) in the comment form so that we can contact you! The winner will be randomly selected and contacted via email on Sunday, April 26. Good luck!!

UPDATE: The Random Number Generator picked #20, and Molly J. left the 20th comment. Congrats, Molly -- you are the winner of the Milagros gift certificate!

(photos by Milagros)

Eco-friendly fund raising: silent auctions

There's only one word for it: relief. Over the weekend, we had our preschool's annual silent auction -- the non-profit's primary fund-raising event. Heather and I, along with a few other hard-working individuals comprised the auction committee. What does that mean? Living, breathing, and stressing over auction details pretty much since last September, with these last few weeks being utterly insane. The good news? We made our financial goal. We made less money than last year, so in that regard, it was a bit disappointing, but with the economy in the crapper, it was a real nail-biter of a worry if a fund-raising auction could even work in a recession economy.