If there is any book you want to give your child to teach them about environmentalism, The Lorax is it. It’s a classic Dr. Seuss tale about a company swooping in to take what they want they want with no concern for the environment around them, and the people and animals they affect. Wall-E is a similar tale, in movie form. It’s about what, realistically, could happen to the Earth in future generations if we do not begin to take care of it today. The planet could turn into a giant trash heap, with people forced to live on giant space ships.

By no means is this a new movie, but it’s a powerful one. Here’s the trailer:

And I don’t want to ruin The Lorax for if you’ve never read it, but here’s an excerpt:

I meant no harm. I most truly did not.
But I had to grow bigger. So bigger I got.
I biggered my factory. I biggered my roads.
I biggered my wagons. I biggered the loads
of the Thneeds I shipped out. I was shipping them forth
to the South! To the East! To the West! To the North!
I went right on biggering… selling more Thneeds.
And I biggered my money, which everyone needs.

Then again he came back! I was fixing some pipes
when that old-nuisance Lorax came back with more gripes.

“I am the Lorax,” he coughed and he whiffed.
He sneezed and he snuffled. He snarggled. He sniffed.
“Once-ler!” he cried with a cruffulous croak.
“Once-ler! You’re making such smogulous smoke!
My poor Swomee-Swans… why, they can’t sing a note!
No one can sing who has smog in his throat.

How to Win:

I love these stories, and so does my daughter. So I’m doing this giveaway from my own pocket. One reader will receive a copy of Dr. Seuss’ The Lorax AND Wall-E on DVD, and a second winner will receive just The Lorax.

There are several ways to enter:

MANDATORY ENTRY: Leave a comment telling me what you are doing to teach your children to respect the Earth, or, if you are not a parent, to make the Earth a better place for future generations. (NOTE: None of your other entries will count if you don’t do this first)

BONUS ENTRIES!

1. Like Green Your Decor on Facebook and leave a comment on my wall. Then come back here and leave a comment with your Facebook name.
2. Follow @greenyourdecor on Twitter. Then come back here and leave a comment letting me know with your Twitter user name.
3. If you haven’t already, sign up for Green Your Decor’s email updates by 11:59 p.m. EST on Monday, December 13, 2010. You must verify your email subscription to be eligible. Current subscribers must leave a comment saying that you are a subscriber to be entered.
4. If you’d prefer to receive your updates via RSS, sign up for the GYD feed. Then please leave a comment letting me know that you’ve done so, and be sure to include your email address. RSS-only subscribers are anonymous otherwise.

You have up to 5 chances to enter, and the giveaway entry period ends at 11:59 p.m. on Tuesday, December 14, 2010 (MY BIRTHDAY!). U.S. mailing addresses only! A winner will be chosen via Random.org and contacted via email. Good luck everyone!

Other Current Green Gift Giveaways:

• Personal care prize package from Nostalgia Organics (soap, lotion & more!). Ends 12/10/10.
• Organic cotton EcoArt throw pillow from Wabisabi Green. Ends 12/13/10
• Environmental Tales: Dr. Seuss’ The Lorax and Disney’s Wall E on DVD. Ends 12/14/10.
• Recycled paper Doodle List journal from Gadanke. Ends 12/15/10.

© 2008-2011 Green Your Decor. Do not republish any items from this feed without permission.

How many times have you been at the grocery store and wished you had a list of the products and companies that are healthier and safer for you, your family and the planet? We find lists of them all the time, and we bookmark them, promising to print them out and put them in our wallets or purses so we’ll have them close at hand as we shop. Then we get to the store, only to realize we can’t remember what products were on those lists.

It would be nice if we could rely on the manufacturers to actually tell us what are in their products, or retailers to tell us whether they recycle, use wind power or support Fair Trade. But unfortunately, a lot of businesses out there are cashing in on consumers’ desire to go green by using deceptive marketing and making unsubstantiated claims.

The Better World Shopping Guide is an awesome, pocket-sized guide to help you tell the “good guys” from the “bad guys”, in every category from cookies and cosmetics to office supplies and cars. It gives you a brief list of the major players in each category and assigns them a grade based on their corporate practices. This book focuses mostly on traditional products and companies, so you won’t find Pixel Organics, Gaiam or Miessence listed. The book is meant to help you sort through items and products that are traditionally available in the market — not the ones you’ll find at your local farmers’ market, co-op or health food store.

For example, the hair care page looks a little like this:

A+: Druide
A: Aveda
A-: Jason, Aubrey Organics, Kiss My Face, Burt’s Bees, Body Shop

B+: EO, Nature’s Gate, Ecco Bella, Pure & Basic, Paul Mitchell, Pure Essentials
B: Alba, Avalon, Giovanni, Emerald Forest, Shikai
B-: Aloe Vera 80

…and so on down to the companies that get an “F” (L’Oreal, Garnier and Biolage, in case you’re curious). On the opposite page in the spread are buying tips, as well as some information about the highest- and lowest-ranked companies. There is also a list of online resources for the highest graded companies.

It is important to note that this guide uses a variety of factors to determine a company’s grade. Human rights, the environment, animal protection, community involvement and social justice are all considered. The charts below show you those factors and what each of the grades mean (click the image for a larger view).

Personally, the book has been a huge help for me on those days when I only have time to go to a traditional grocery store like Kroger. There are some products on the shelves that I KNOW are greener, and those are the ones I buy. But there are a lot more products that I’m clueless about, and it helps to have a guide to reference that is small enough to fit in my purse.

The book doesn’t go into detail about every product, so you don’t always know specifically why a company got a particular grade. But based on the rating system, I would much rather have this guide to go on than just reading product ingredients or details and hoping for the best.

A couple of issues: The Better World Guide includes cigarettes. Seems to me like smoking is one of the least green things you can do. But if I were a smoker, I guess I’d want to know that American Spirit is the only producer of organic cigarettes, doesn’t test on animals and uses additive-free tobacco; and that Marlboro is considered a “Top 10 Greenwasher.” In the guide’s defense though, there was only one cigarette company that scored an A and one B. The rest were Ds and Fs, for obvious reasons.

Also, it excludes some major categories, like furniture and bedding, for example. If airlines were included, I believe these other categories that relate directly to our homes should have been as well.

My final verdict: This is a great guide for people who have recently started going green and people who often shop at traditional grocery and superstores (though it does point out that Wal-Mart is rated the #2 worst company on the planet (I wonder what company is #1). It includes a lot of major brands and will help you navigate the sometimes treacherous waters of greenwashing. But if you’re a veteran greenie who shops at co-ops, makes your own cleaning products and generally distrusts anything that’s not local and/or handmade, it won’t be of much help to you: Unless you’re in the market for electronics or a car.

Why It’s Green:

• Helps you be much more aware as a consumer about what products are better for you, the environment and the world at large.

Price: $10 (You can also get the Revised Edition for $9.95 at Amazon. The the original was published in 2006

WANT TO WIN ONE?

The author was generous enough to send me a second copy of the book to give away to one of my wonderful readers. Entering is simple. Just visit BetterWorldShopper.com, then come back here by 11:59 p.m. on Monday, September 15, 2008, and tell me one thing you learned about the author, the book or the issues the book covers. Simple enough. Irrelevant comments will be deleted.

Want to enter more than once? Boost your chances of winning by completing one or more of the tasks on this list.

1. If you haven’t already, sign up for the Green Your Decor newsletter by Monday, September 15, 2008. You must verify your email subscription to be eligible. After you sign up, FeedBurner will send you a verification email. Please do not ignore it — your entry will be invalid if you do not verify. All current subscribers are eligible to win. And there’s no need to leave a comment letting me know you subscribe by email. I’ll know you’re a subscriber
2. If you’d prefer to receive your updates via RSS, sign up for the GYD feed. Then please leave a comment letting me know that you’ve specifically signed up for the feed, and be sure to include your email address. RSS subscribers are anonymous otherwise. If you’ve signed up for both the email updates and the RSS feed, you only need to leave a comment about the RSS feed.
3. Blog about GreenYourDecor.com and post a link to your blog entry here.
4. Stumble or give a thumbs up to any page at GreenYourDecor.com via StumbleUpon and post a link to your SU profile to verify your thumbs up.

So that means every participant can receive up to 5 entries. You have until 11:59 p.m. EST on Monday, September 15, 2008, to enter. U.S. and Canada mailing addresses only. A winner will be chosen via Random.org and announced here, and the winner will be contacted via email. Good luck everyone!

© 2008-2011 Green Your Decor. Do not republish any items from this feed without permission.

Inspiration comes in many forms. It can come from an innocent bedtime story with your kids, a stroll through your neighborhood, or from a more obvious source like my Green Rooms in a Box series. Thanks to eco designer (and one of my eco heroes) Kelly LaPlante, one lucky winner will walk away with a source of free inspiration, Kelly’s new book, écologique.

With a total of 669 entries in the giveaway, including subscribers and commenters, it did take a bit of luck to win. Thanks to the random integer generator at Random.org, one lucky reader will walk away a winner.

And the winner is: Entry #655 from Linda Pinto, who left this comment about how she is greening her home:

I am using non-toxic cleaners, growing herbs and tomatoes and peppers etc. in my garden and using (painting and refurbishing) items that I might have disposed of before this. Waste less has become my motto.

I will contact Linda directly via email. For everyone else, you can still purchase your own copy of écologique. It’s for a good cause! All proceeds benefit Global Green USA and The Blank Theatre Company in Hollywood.

More great green giveaways are coming from Green Your Decor in the near future, so be sure to stay on the lookout. In fact, if you’re not already a subscriber, you can always sign up for Green Your Decor via RSS or via email to make sure you don’t miss a thing!

© 2008-2011 Green Your Decor. Do not republish any items from this feed without permission.

Some of you may be familiar with Josh Dorfman, the creator and host of “The Lazy Environmentalist,” a nationally broadcast radio show on Sirius Satellite Radio that serves to inform listeners about eco-friendly products and services, much like Green Your Decor does, but on a larger scale. Dorfman is also the founder & CEO of Vivavi, a retailer many of you also may be familiar with that makes contemporary, green furniture and home furnishings (GYD has featured several of their products).

Dorfman also is the author of this handy guide, “The Lazy Environmentalist: Your Guide to Easy, Stylish, Green Living.” The book is broken down into 22 sections, from clothing to decorating and more. Each of those sections gives a quick rundown of the issues and provides resources for further learning and shopping.

Here is an excerpt from the introduction:

“Designers are saving rain forests. Fashionistas are clearing toxins from the soil. Architects are rolling back global warming. A new wave of eco-conscious activists is stimulating fresh approaches to environmental challenges. The market is their arena. Organic cotton, bamboo, and certified sustainable woods are their materials. Hybrid engines and solar power are their technologies. Stylish, high-performing products and services are their tools of change.

The Lazy Environmentalist is your hands-on guide to the best of easy, stylish, green living. You can start today.”

Some people will inevitably argue that a shopper’s guide that encourages consumerism is in no way “really green.” I, however, realize tthat there are people who care both about style and substance, and “The Lazy Environmentalist” provides good information about how we can all easily integrate more eco-friendly practices into our everyday lives.

Price: $10.46

© 2008-2011 Green Your Decor. Do not republish any items from this feed without permission.

If you have always dreamed of having a home that produces energy instead of consuming it, with eco-friendly features at every turn, you will be happy to know that many companies are creating new products to help you do so every day. But if the multitude of choices has left you feeling a bit overwhelmed, Green Remodeling: Changing the World One Room at a Time by David R. Johnston and Kim Master is here to help.

It is not a how-to manual, but it will serve as an in-depth guide on building construction. The book will clue you in on the items and areas of your home that suck up energy, like old refrigerators and products like vinyl siding whose manufacturing releases dioxins. It also provides a bunch of healthy alternatives. One chapter also breaks down remodeling from room to room, including checklists for every nook and cranny.

Price: $19.77

© 2008-2011 Green Your Decor. Do not republish any items from this feed without permission.