Image by Muffet (via Flickr)

Valentine’s Day is coming up in just under two weeks, but if you are anything like me, you haven’t quite had a chance to finalize your plans. Should you give flowers? Candy? Exchange cards? What about green or eco-friendly Valentine’s gifts? Well, there are many different ideas to choose from and many ways you could go, but let me give you a few of my favorite eco-friendly ideas for Valentine’s Day:

1) If you are going to go the traditional route e.g. chocolates or flowers, go for the organic variety. I highly recommend Equal Exchange when it comes to organic chocolate. They have chocolate bars (which are currently on sale until Feb 14th), organic dried berries and nuts, organic hot cocoa, organic chocolate and coffee gift bags, etc. You can even get free-shipping (UPS ground in the contingent U.S. only) if you enter the code: chocolatelove. Go for the chocolate/coffee gift bag….a great eco-tasty choice!

When it comes to flowers, California Organic Flowers is a nice choice as they have a wide variety of organic flowers, with many great options under $50. If you want to make your own living bouquet, take a look at this video from California Organic Flowers as they provide some helpful tips on doing your own arrangements.

2) Get away for the weekend. If you are one of those people who likes to get away for Valentine’s Day weekend, how about a trip to the new Aria™ Resort & Casino at the CityCenter in Las Vegas? The Aria is LEED® Gold Certified and features smoke-free walkways, floor to ceiling airflow (to help remove smoke from their casino), energy-efficient lighting, bicycle valets and much, much more. While you are there, don’t forget to relax and indulge in the Aria’s spa services including a heated-stone massage or unwind and breathe in the air from their infused salt room.

If you are looking for a tropical rainforest type get-away, one of the ones on the top of my to-do list is the Daintree Eco Lodge & Spa in Australia. This eco-lodge is located in a 30-acre rainforest valley in Daintree National Park. Their guest rooms are ecologically-friendly treehouses and since they only have 15 of them, you’ll want to book early.

3) If you can’t take time away or would rather stay closer to home, you can do a day trip to a local eco-friendly or green spa. Spa Index has a list of eco-friendly spas you can choose from. (Hint: many of the spas on their list offer discounts for first-time customers.)

If a spa day at home is more your cup of tea, check out these at home spa tips and recipes. You can easily turn your Valentine’s Day into a spa day, without even leaving the comfort of home!

4) If you decide to stay in, make a meal for you and your significant other. What’s nice about making a meal at home is that you control what goes in your meal. You can include fresh or locally-grown fruits/vegetables, pick out a great organic or vegan wine and design your meal so it’s just right for you.

For example, you could start off with a tomato bisque soup,  make a simple grilled BLT panini or a Butternut Squash Enchilada for your main dish and end off with some chocolate-dipped strawberries. But, if you are hoping for romantic evening, you might want to add one or more of these aphrodisiacs into your meal.

5) For those of you with kids, a creative eco-friendly idea for Valentine’s Day is to get outdoors. It doesn’t cost much, it’s a nice way to get some fresh air and a wonderful way to get the kids (and family) to fall in love with nature again. If weather permits, you could pack a picnic lunch and enjoy a meal outdoors. If not, then maybe just a walk…look at the trees, do some bird-watching, maybe take some pictures or pick up some beautiful fallen leaves. Whatever you choose to do, reconnecting with nature is a wonderful thing to do on Valentine’s Day!

6) Make your own Valentine’s Day cards/gifts. Rather than going out and spending between $1.00-$5.00 on a Valentine’s Day card, just make one. I don’t know anyone who doesn’t have something lying around that they can use to make a Valentine’s Day card. You can take that junk mail you got or an old magazine and cut it up to make a heart-shaped valentine. You can even use the fallen leaves you and your kids collected to make some creative leaf rubbings or press your leaves/flowers onto a votive cup to make a beautiful candle holder.

Well, those are some of my favorite eco-friendly ideas. What are your favorite eco-friendly ideas for Valentine’s Day? If you have a favorite gift, idea or site you think other readers should be aware of, please let me know. Enjoy your eco-friendly Valentine’s Day!

Image by John E. Robertson (via Flickr)

When it comes to the next great eco-friendly invention (or any cool invention for that matter), we often wonder why we didn’t think of it first. Well, this list is probably no different. Each of these were dreamed up by the young minds of students or graduates who were looking for a more eco-friendly option (and in some cases a little grant money too). Each idea was designed/started with sustainability in mind, so much so these inventions and businesses could actually change the way we think about what’s “normal” and turn it into “what’s viable for the environment”.

1) During the last few month of 2009, The University of Michigan held their annual “1000 Pitches” competition. Students were asked to submit a 1-3 minute video “pitch” of their idea for a new business or product in a variety of different categories. Over 2,100 pitches were received in total. The winner in the Environment category was Shahnoor Amin, a graduate engineering student. He pitched the idea of a portable solar-powered device that would provide lighting and electricity to households in developing countries. Take a look for yourself and see what you think of his idea.

2) Started by two good friends (Bob and Rich) in a dorm room office at Yale University, the next creative eco-friendly invention is YouRenew.com.  As described on their website, YouRenew is “the easiest, fastest and greenest way to turn your old electronic devices into cash.”  Essentially they want to pay you to be good to the environment. Pay you to recycle your old electronic devices and keep them out of the landfills. They want to cut down waste by making “ReCommerce” the commerce of choice.  You can find out a little more about YouRenew.com from this CNN video. But don’t miss checking out their website for corporations too, at CorporateRenew.com.

3) The next one comes from Eben Bayer and Gavin McIntyre, two RPI (Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute) graduates. You might know them better as the creators of Greensulate™, the mushroom based eco-friendly insulation. This is a particularly creative eco-invention in that they didn’t just come up with a new kind of insulation, their “composite materials are literally grown, harnessing the incredible efficiency of nature”. As a result they ended up with an extremely energy-efficient product made from natural materials. How eco-friendly is that?!

4) Because they didn’t stop with just insulation, this one also goes to Eben and Gavin from ecovativedesign.com for their EcoCradle™. EcoCradle is an environmentally-friendly packaging material grown (yes, grown) using agricultural by-products. But it gets better than that…when it comes time to dispose of EcoCradle packaging, instead of just throwing it in the trash – which you can do, as it will decompose quickly – you can use it as a mulch in your garden or toss it in your composter.  Any way you look at it, EcoCradle is a creative invention that replaces commonly used packaging with an eco-friendly solution.

5) This last one on my list (note: these were in no particular order) came about during a late-night dorm room bull session at MIT. Five students collaborated on what later came to be known as “GenShock“, an energy-producing shock absorber. But not only did they come up with the idea, they went all out and “developed and patented a novel, green technology that can improve a vehicle’s fuel economy by harvesting wasted energy in the suspension.” They estimate their energy-producing shock absorbers will increase a vehicle’s fuel efficiency by 2-10%. Nice! That’s one I’ll have to add to my list of Tips to Lower CO2 Emissions too.

Now, I know there are many more eco-friendly inventions that deserve mention, but these are a few of the ones that caught my eye. Do you know of any recent eco-friendly inventions you feel are worth mentioning? Do you have an eco-invention of your own? Let me know!

Image by nsgbrown

It’s the perfect time of the year to go camping, the kids are hopefully still off for summer vacation, you could really use some time off work or maybe you just want to spend some time in the great outdoors.  Camping is the perfect trip.  It’s low cost, family-friendly and if you plan right, you can have a great green camping trip!

No, camping green doesn’t mean using a green tent or staying at an “eco-friendly” lodge…of course that might be nice!  What I mean is doing things like: find a camping location near your home, buy fresh fruits/vegetables at a local or roadside stand on the way to your destination, leave no trace that you were there, etc.

Here are a couple of tips when planning your green camping trip:

• Find a campground or state park near you, so you cut down your travel time (eg emissions). In California you can go to the California State Parks website to find great campgrounds across the state.
• Make a list of all the items you need to pack.  I found a good list here.  They also remind us to bring biodegradable or environmentally-friendly toiletry items!
• Pack re-usable utensils and plates.  That way you can wash and re-use them rather than using plastic or Styrofoam and just throwing them away.  You’ll want to bring a bin to wash them in too.
• If you need camping gear or need to update your camping gear, check Best Green Gear.  They have a great selection of EcoFriendly Products including solar camping gear.
• To ensure you get to your destination safely, get your car tuned-up, check the pressure on your tires, fill up, use a proven fuel additive (to increase fuel efficiency and decrease harmful emissions) and make sure you’ve packed an emergency kit.  Some extra water is always smart too.

When you go for walks/explore around your campsite, be sure to respect the environment around you.  At the end of your trip, please clean up after yourself.  Throw away or recycle everything you used.  Try to leave your camping spot as if you had never been there.  To put it simply, while you are enjoying the environment around you, doing these simple steps can help make sure it is still there, just as green, for the next person to enjoy.