With the holiday season upon us, why not pack a more natural mosquito repellent on this trip.

Citronella, basil, anise oil, balsamic vinegar and fresh garlic are all effective mosquito repellents (all in their own right – you do not have to mix them together you’ll be glad to hear).

They are all less harsh on your skin than the conventional pharmaceutical variety.  However, the fresh garlic alternative may acutally repel more than the mosquitoes!

The right to dry movement

Between the economic meltdown and the push for green buildings, saving energy, water and money in your home is more popular than ever. Fortunately, greening your home doesn’t have to be time consuming or expensive. We caught up with Eric Corey Freed, principal of Organic Architect, and author of the new book, Green$ense for the Home. Here’s his list of nine simple things anyone—renters and homeowners alike—can do in their homes today.

1. Change your light bulbs already! How many environmentalists does it take to change a light bulb? There are several answers to this joke (none of them that funny), but the real answer is: “all of them.” In your home, lighting accounts for nearly 30% of all electricity use. By using compact fluorescent bulbs, you can cut lighting costs by 30 to 60 %, while improving the quality of the light and reducing environmental impact at the same time.

2. Convince your toilet to use less water.  More than a quarter of all of the water used inside the home is flushed down the toilet, which is, literally, a waste. The toilet is the single largest user of clean drinking water inside the home, and it is also the easiest place to conserve water. Before you run out and replace your existing toilets, there are simple and effective things you can do to trick your old toilet to use less water, from flush adapters to flusher adjustments and tank tricks. And when the time comes to replace your working toilets, make sure you buy a low-flow or dual-flush model.

3. Use less water in the shower. Showers add up to nearly 20% of all indoor water usage and are the largest users of hot water. By simply installing a low-flow showerhead, you can save up to 4,000 gallons of water annually, and for every gallon of hot water you save, that’s gas or electricity you don’t need to use to heat it. If your average shower is 10 minutes long, upgrading your old showerheads to a low-flow model will save 25 to 55 gallons of water for every shower you take, and potentially shave 30 percent off utility bills!

4. Keep vampires at bay. In the average home, 75% of the electricity used to power home electronics—cable boxes, DVD players, video games, stereos—is consumed while the products are turned off. That’s money that could stay in your pocket. If something is plugged into the wall—a TV, a cellphone charger, an appliance- even if it’s not on, it draws electricity. We call this demand of energy “phantom loads” or, more appropriately, “vampire loads,” since they suck energy. While the amount of power used is relatively small, they can add up to more than 10 percent of your electricity bill.

There are several simple ways to slay vampire loads: Unplug any appliance with a standby light. Get a power strip for appliances, and flip the switch off when not needed. Or, consider Smart Strips, which sense when power is being drawn and shut off automatically—as simple to install as a regular strip, and you don’t need to worry about vampire loads ever again.

5. Install a programmable thermostat. A programmable thermostat operates only during the times you set. For example, a programmable thermostat could lower the heat at 10 p.m. every night, when you’re bundled under the covers in bed. It could also be programmed to return the room to a more comfortable temperature 30 minutes before you wake up. Once set correctly, a programmable thermostat can cut your heating and cooling bills by 20% to 30% annually.

6. Put a coat on your hot water heater. If your home is like most, hot water is produced in a hot water heater. This large tank usually sits in a garage, closet, or basement and slowly heats up a vat of water, and keeps it hot all day and night. Nearly 20% of all of the energy used in the home goes just to the water heater, making it the second-largest energy user in homes after heating and cooling. Insulating a water heater tank reduces the heat losses by 25% to 45%. This translates into as much as a 9% savings in total energy usage.  If everyone in the U.S. insulated their hot water heaters, nearly 11 billion kilowatt-hours of that energy would be saved—enough to power 11.9 million homes in a year.

7. Weatherise windows. The largest source of energy loss in your home is your windows. If you add up the area of all of the cracks and leaks around the windows of your home, it would total about the size of an entire window. Installing new windows can solve much of this problem, but that can be a big job. Simply weatherising—sealing the cracks and leaks around your windows and exterior doors—can have an immediate impact on your energy savings and can be completed in an afternoon.

Purchase only caulk with low or zero Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs).  Six to eight tubes at a total cost of no more than €70 should be enough to seal a 3,000-square-foot house with 15 to 20 windows.

8. Install a solar powered clothes dryer: a clothesline. Today, 80% of households have a washer and dryer, but this convenience comes at a price. Electric clothes dryers eat up 10% of a home’s energy. Each load of laundry gives off around 5.6lbs of carbon dioxide per load. That adds up to more than 2,000lbs of CO2 a year just from drying clothes. A solar-powered clothes dryer is a smart and highly energy efficient way to dry your clothes. Also known as a “clothesline,” this idea has been around for centuries and provides an affordable, easy alternative to the high cost of clothes-drying convenience.

9. Compost and recycle.  Landfills pollute our water, take up enormous amounts of space, and (surprise) no one wants to live near them. Most people don’t realize the biggest problem with landfills is the emissions they generate, namely methane and carbon dioxide gas, which contribute to global warming. By composting and recycling, we can reduce the trash in landfills and do long-lasting good for our environment.

Recycling and composting require nothing except the desire to do it. Contact your local rubbish pickup or recycling company and request a free bin (you may also be able to get a free compost bin).

Each of these steps will pay for themselves in less than a year. Plus you’ll rest easy knowing you are doing your part for our environment.

via: www.Good.is

In the last few years particularly, I have found myself easily spending €50 to €70 per week on my daily lunch. If you eat your lunch out every day, you might not realise just how much it is costing you. A soup, sandwich and a drink doesn’t give much change from €10! I very much doubt I would spend that same amount if I pepared these lunches at home!

If you take this saving and calculate what you could put away over a 5 year period, it equates to quite a tidy sum!! Perhaps the Take your Lunch to Work campaign can take over from the heady days of SSIA schemes!!

I admit, taking your homemade lunch takes a little bit more organisation, but once you get in to the habit of it, it′s both financially rewarding and generally much tastier and satisfying!! My first tip is to invest in some good reusable containers and perhaps a flask if you fancy a hot drink – this also makes sure you′re cutting down on waste – so it′s a double whammy!!!

I already hear some of you groan at the memory of the soggy tomato sanger at the school lunch break!! But fear not, there is so much more choice there now!! Fill you lunch box with some fresh cut bread and a slice of parma and brie, and you have an epicurean feast to compare with the best deli in town!! I personally love to make a bowl of pasta twirls every few days, keep them in the fridge and use them to make a different pasta salad each day (you can′t beat tuna, sweetcorn & a good dollop of low fat mayo!).

Also don′t forget leftovers, this is definitely the easiest way to organise your take to work lunch. This is the easiest way to make your lunch: just make extra dinner the night before. Nearly every office has a microwave oven and you will be happy to have a bowl of last night’s beef stew, which will probably taste even better than it did right from the oven. Other leftovers don’t even need to be re-heated, such as poached salmon or a piece of cold chicken. By planning ahead you can steam some extra broccoli, saute an extra chicken breast, add another sweet potato to the oven, or boil some eggs while dinner is on the stove.

Two other suggestions that I think important, if you want this to work for you – firstly, just because you bring your own lunch doesn’t mean you shouldn’t really enjoy what you’re eating. Prepare and eat meals that you will look forward to eating and you won’t feel hard-done by nor be tempted to toss your homemade food in exchange for a slice of pizza.

Finally, even if you don’t have to leave the office to buy your lunch, give yourself a break. Take your lunch, and a friend, with you to a park bench, or do a quick visit to a nearby museum, browse in a bookstore, or just walk around the town. We need our lunch breaks not only to refuel our bodies but also our minds! So come on, join me Save money, Eat Better and Get Greener!!!

No, GreenMe are not advocating a slovenly lifestyle, just encouraging you to take it outside!! Cancelling your gym membership will not only save you money, it will also lower your carbon footprint!!

Typically gyms are stocked to the brim with bikes, rowing machines, treadmills, stair climbers, TVs and much more plugged in equipment! Not to mention the air conditioning for your comfort! On top of that, you will have piping showers, saunas, steam rooms and jacuzzis all guzzling copious amounts of water and energy.

I know it sounds harsh, and the warmth and luxury of the gym does seem an inviting alternative to the winter elements, but believe me, the great outdoors can open up a whole new world if you let it!

Having ditched the gym myself over a year ago, I can honestly say that I would never go back. I’m not sure if I’m imagining it but I feel fitter from my outdoor pursuits that I ever did pounding the treadmill! Not only that, getting out and about is much more sociable!

So whether you join the running club, jump on your bike, tackle your local tag rugby team or grab the dog for a vigorous walk in the park, you can be happy that your health and fitness in not contributing to the gym industry’s woeful carbon emissions!

Caulk it

This winter I have found that my house seems to be leaking. By that I mean that I have noticed little drafts in certain rooms that I never noticed before.  Small spaces and gaps around windows and pipes and wires entering the home create create energy wasting drafts that can cut the efficiency of your heating system. Most caulking products are cheap costing under €10. It’s a no brainer for a cosier home and your saving on your home heating bill too!