Tony Brewer

For years I have bought a variety of plants from the local hardware store to put in my garden. It is easier to get plants that already have a head start on their growth than to start them from seed.

My gardens have always done well with the plants, but this year I think I will try to start a few of them from seed. I have been saving the cardboard egg cartons and next weekend I will buy a big bag of potting soil mix from Lowes or Home Depot. The seeds should be sprouted and tall enough to transplant into the garden by mid-March.

Depending upon the weather, I’d like to get an early start with many of the vegetables and try to get a second crop of some things this year.

I was reading an article on the Time.com website about how a lot of companies are participating in what is termed “Greenwashing.”  I had never heard of the term “Greenwashing” before, so I was curious and read the article.  It seems that “Greenwashing” is the term used to describe the action of promoting a product or service claiming that it is better for the environment than it really is.  The article included links to other articles that showed instances and examples of greenwashing by real companies.  I found the article to be informative, and have bookmarked the links for future reference.  It is disappointing to see how many companies are so shameless in their false promotions!

My brothers, sister and I grew up in a wonderful house in a great neighborhood, my parents still live at the house that all of us kids all grew up in and one day I’ll most likely be living there myself. My Dad has put a lot of blood sweat and tears into the place and I’d be proud to take over where he leaves off. The backyard is spectacular, my parents and their friends and neighbors still enjoy spending time back there all most all year round.

My father and the neighbor next door took a lot of time looking into wooden garden arbors back in the day and they both decided that they could build bigger and better wood gazebos then what was available for sale at that time back then. My dad’s gazebo is still standing strong, while the neighbor’s has been long gone, a vegetable garden taking up the room that once held one of the nicer gazebos in the whole darn neighborhood. Both of the beautiful arbors are still in place though. Those wonderful wooden arbors will always have a soft spot in my heart for as long as I live.

I’m told that our long time neighbor has just placed a “For Sale” sign on his house. They are heading south to Florida, looking for better weather to live their golden years out in. We will miss our long time friends and neighbors and we can only hope that our new neighbors are friendly people that we can get to know. It makes such a big difference if you can get along with your neighbors, we have always been lucky in that way at the old homestead.

I was shopping at the local tie dye store earlier today, and was tempted to buy a really soft and silky feeling shirt for Teri to wear as a sleep shirt. I was quite surprised when the shop’s manager informed me that the shirt was made from bamboo! I have seen bamboo fencing, bamboo furniture, and bamboo paneling in the past, but I had never heard of clothing being made from bamboo!

Well of course I had to buy that shirt, and Teri loves it! Seems that I’ve won some brownie points by buying it. Teri is always telling me that she wants to try to avoid wearing synthetic products as much as possible, and she had never had any clothes made from bamboo in the past. I wonder if this is going to be a new trend in the fashion industry. I started to do a little bit of research in the Internet about whether bamboo clothing is part of the “green” movement, and I’ve been reading mixed reviews. Seems that although it is a renewable resource, the chemicals used in the production are not environmentally friendly. I hope that they can do something to correct that situation.

I was interested in finding a place to take my used and unwanted rechargeable batteries and found a link to call2recycle.org which is a great site to utilize for just that purpose. You just type your zip code in and it shows you you the various places for their drop off locations that you can not only take those batteries but your old cell phones as well which is good to know.