An eco-tip that's a little ... batty.

Yesterday, my honey and I installed a bat box! (And by 'I', I mean that I handed him tools while he was 10 ft. up on the ladder.) We are really excited about this because in past summers, our yard has been overtaken by mosquitoes. Since we live in an urban area, it's hard for us to control things (like standing water) that encourages mosquito breeding.

A few bat facts ...
Most US bats eat insects. A single bat can eat up to 1,200 mosquitoes in one hour.
Fewer than 0.5% of bats have rabies. Since 1960 there have only been 40 reported cases of humans getting rabies from bats.
Bats like to come out to eat at night around dusk. Bats flight pattern is much more erratic than birds so look for this pattern.

We bought our bat house at Lowe's, but there are plans to help you build your own! Here's a link to several plans: http://www.eparks.org/wildlife_protection/wildlife_facts/bats/bat_house.asp

Toilet flushing is responsible for about 30 percent of all water used by the average American household, which means that almost 44,000 gallons of quality water is flushed away per family every year.

Upgrading to a high-efficiency toilet would be ideal, but since you & I live in the real world, there are some simple things you can do to improve your current model.
I've used something called a tank bag to reduce the amount of water my toilet uses per flush. It's basically a plastic bag that you fill with water and hook to the side of the tank. You could also submerge a filled water bottle - but add some rocks or sand for extra weight, and place them carefully!

Don't use a brick - this will degrade over time and can harm the toilet.

A leaky toilet can waste up to 200 gallons per day! To see if your toilet is leaking, drop some food coloring in the tank & wait 15 min. If the color shows up in the bowl, you've got a leak. There are some things you can do to fix it, but you might need to call a plumber.

Eco Tip #3! Recycled Paper Products

Conventional paper products use massive quantities of trees! Here's the facts on replacing virgin fiber products with recycled:

Toilet Paper
If every household in the United States replaced just one roll of virgin fiber toilet paper (500 sheets) with 100% recycled ones, we could save 423,900 trees.

Facial Tissue
If every household in the United States replaced just one box of virgin fiber facial tissues (175 sheets) with 100% recycled ones, we could save 163,000 trees.

Paper Towels
If every household in the United States replaced just one roll of virgin fiber paper towels (70 sheets) with 100% recycled ones, we could save 544,000 trees.

Napkins
If every household in the United States replaced just one package of virgin fiber napkins (250 count) with 100% recycled ones, we could save 1 million trees.

Of course, cloth hankerchiefs, rags, sponges, and cloth napkins are even better than recycled paper - but there are some messes you just don't ever want to think about washing off a rag. (I'm sure other pet owners know what I mean.)

Easy to find brands (using at least 60% PCW (post-consumer waste) and processed chlorine-free(PCF)): Whole Foods 365, Trader Joe's, CVS Earth Essentials, & Seventh Generation.

Eco tip of the week - Biodegradable soaps

Start replacing conventional soaps & detergents with plant-based, biodegradable ones. Biodegradable products of any kind will break down into elements found in nature within a reasonable amount of time. 'Conventional' products are made with petroleum and chemicals that will take years to break down, and also contaminate our water supply.

Fortunately, biodegradable soaps are easy to find these days at just about any grocery store. You do need to look a little more closely - and be sure to read the labels. If a product claiming to be biodegradable doesn't have an ingredient list, it almost certainly includes unpronouncable chemicals.
EXTRA CREDIT: look for products that use recycled plastic for their containers - especially those that are using some Post-Consumer-Waste (PCW).

Some easy to find biodegradable products include: Method, Mrs. Meyer's, Ecover, and Seventh Generation. Trader Joe's also has biodegradable cleaning products.

It's easy being green, baby!

Eco tip of the week

I'm trying to start a new weekly feature here - one simple thing that one person can do to make their home (and planet) a better place to live.

Up first, my most recent eco-upgrade - a smart power strip! Like a regular power strip, you can plug multiple electronic devices into the strip, and it protects from power surges. Unlike a regular strip, it can block energy drain from devices that aren't on. It also automatically shuts down connected devices.

So, you plug your main device into the 'control' outlet (for me, this is the tv). The DVD player, speakers, & gaming system get plugged into the 'automatically switched' outlets. The DVR goes into a 'constant hot' outlet. When the tv gets turned off, everything except the DVR automatically gets shut down too.

This is great because, according to the National Resource Defense Council, TV's, stereos, etc, all drain as much power as a continuously burning 60-watt bulb - even when turned off!

I got my Smart Strip from amazon.com. They run between $25 -$40 dollars.

Handmade is the new black

... is the new black

Upscale shoppers are embracing artisans’ wares over those mass-produced. Score one for the American entrepreneur.

By Laura Vanderkam

Like many parents, when Joe and Amy Sharp of Columbus, Ohio, had their first son years ago, they soon found themselves "disgusted" by constant recalls of his cheap plastic toys. Unlike most parents, though, Joe, a carpenter, did something about it. He began making simple wooden rattles and blocks, discovering, says Amy, that "kids like using their imaginations if parents will let them." Friends clamored for the toys, too. And so, when the Sharps faced two mortgages after an investment property failed to sell, they wanted to turn this hobby into cash.

But how? Opening a store required capital. Selling at fairs took time. Maintaining a website necessitated skill — plus marketing expertise to draw traffic.

Fortunately, there was another option: launching a store on Etsy, an online portal founded in 2005 to sell all things handmade. The Sharps opened Little Alouette on the site in late 2007, uploading pictures and prices into the system. Within two years, with sales rising 600% from 2008 to 2009, it had become their full-time business.

They're not the only success story. As retail overall has been flat, Etsy's sales have risen fast enough (more than 100% in 2009 to $181 million) and enough other players, from BigCartel to iCraft.ca and Lov.li,have entered the craft portal space to suggest that consumers who still have disposable income increasingly want items like the Sharps' toys — that is, goods with stories behind them.

Buying in a 'special' world

"There's a little bit of a big-box backlash going on," said Jennifer Perkins, host of the DIY network show Craft Lab (and proprietor of the Naughty Secretary Club story on Etsy). It is, in some ways, simply a redirected snobbiness in an era when, as designer Tory Burch said recently, "it's not cool to be excessive anymore." But since the lust for all things handmade is giving American artists a real chance to make a living in these bleak times, it's far preferable to wanting to tote the same Louis Vuitton purse everyone else has got.

Etsy — founded by 20-something Brooklyn guys with eccentric tastes and sharp business instincts — and its brethren arrived at a fortuitous time. Consumers have grown accustomed to having high quality goods available whenever they want, and so, next, "we are increasingly engaged in making our world special," noted economist Virginia Postrel in her 2003 book, The Substance of Style. Corporations have obliged by, say, letting you choose the design on your credit card. But what could be more special than a handmade item? It truly is one-of-a-kind, a trump card in the ongoing game of signaling one's individuality and values. If you get bragging rights for serving your friends fair-trade coffee, you'll get even more bragging rights for serving said coffee in ceramic mugs hand-spun on a wheel by Alina Hayes, a Los Angeles-area artist whose work has been displayed at the American Museum of Ceramic Art in Pomona (and is also on Etsy; $37 for two cafe au lait cups). "More and more people want to connect with the person they're actually buying the goods from," said Hayes.

At the same time, Americans like Hayes, who did medical billing before heeding her calling as a potter, increasingly want to do creative, fulfilling work. That desire coincides neatly with a widespread need, in tough times, to augment the family budget. Throw in technology platforms that are relatively cheap (Lov.li and Etsy both charge 3.5% commissions, well below the 50% galleries often charge) and nearly idiot-proof, and soon you have hundreds of thousands of people listing their jewelry, pottery, wall art, hand-knit scarves and sweaters, and clamoring for inclusion in a weekly feature on Etsy's blog, The Storque, called "Quit Your Day Job" featuring sellers who've done just that.

Growing more hands

Of course, the majority of sellers on craft portals such as BigCartel or Etsy don't make enough to turn their decorated salt shakers or embroidered picture frames into livelihoods. Even the successful ones soon bump into the reality that we transitioned out of a handmade economy back in the 19th century for a reason: It's beastly hard to scale up.

Brandi Nelson and Brent Koby, whose Kukubee line of cartoon-covered pouches ($12 each) has been another top Etsy seller, told me that they are struggling with this question — how to meet burgeoning demand while staying committed to making affordable handmade goods. Koby joked that Nelson, the company's seamstress, should get a "six-arm implant." More realistically, "for us to expand, we will eventually need to bring in people who share the same passion for handmade as we do." The Sharps likewise plan to add staff to their workshop in Columbus, where they continue to crank out heirloom teethers and rattles ($12-$24)made of wood sourced from a farm 45 minutes from town. That's great, except that hiring Americans is expensive. That's why many manufacturers eventually outsource production to overseas factories. Long run, it will not work for Etsy to bill itself, as it has in puzzling fashion until recently, as a place for bargain hunters.

But that's not a bad thing — no one needs anything sold on most craft portals anyway. Instead, they're a great alternative for recreational upper-income shoppers who, as Saks CEO Stephen Sadove recently said, want to "get something they can't get elsewhere." He wanted them to fill that need at Saks. It would be better for America's growing artisan class if shoppers filled that need at places like Etsy instead.

Laura Vanderkam, author of the forthcoming book 168 Hours, is a member of USA TODAY's board of contributors.

Now on Twitter ...

I finally caved and started Twittering. I didn't really want to start yet another form of electronic communication to keep up with, but I figured I'd give it a shot.

Now, of course, I'm really liking it - I'm following some of my favorite local resturants/bars, the North Market, and lots of local artists!

Feel free to follow me - or make suggestions of other fun Twitter-ers I should be following!

http://twitter.com/ecomaram