The Green Parent
Raising kids with conscience
Blog - Tag: garden
-
Mar 18 2012
Enter our awards
There’s a real buzz around our 2012 beauty awards this week. We are currently gathering thousands of products, which will be sent out to a team of natural beauty testers in the first week of April. To find out how you can get involved read on…
Each item has to meet strict criteria regarding ingredients, manufacturing, packaging etc. In 2011, the Green Parent Natural Beauty Awards were highly respected in the industry because we had strict guidelines and only the cleanest, greenest products received awards. Another plus point cited by industry insiders was the fact that our testing process allowed the small scale cottage industries to do as well as the larger brands.
ENTER YOUR PRODUCTS
If you sell beauty products and would like to enter them into our 2012 awards, you still have time. The lifeline for this is 26th March. If you have not received forms for entry please email info@thegreenparent.co.uk and I’ll get more info sent out to you.JOIN OUR TESTING PANEL
If you are a natural beauty guru and would like to be considered for our panel of testers, you can read more about that here.We’ve had an amazing response to our survey, which is now available on our Facebook page – check it out. Tell us what you think of The Green Parent and you could win a whole array of goodies. We are getting lots of requests for more content relevant to those with older children. So we are currently working on a way to make coverage of older children and teens a more regular and more visible part of the magazine. Many of the articles in the magazine deal with all stages of family life; communication, natural home, wellbeing, learning etc. But we do have a special section for Green Babies every issue, which we feel is really important for our new parent readers. Perhaps we need a special section each issue for older children too. Any suggestions welcome!
GROWING THINGS
This week has seen us making a proper start in the garden. I’m planting by the moon so I have sowed leaf (spinach, oriental greens, lettuce) and fruit (sweetcorn, beans and peas) seeds into pots and insulated with a bit of bubble wrap and created some plastic bag mini greenhouses so the soil stays warm enough for them to germinate. Leaves should be sown when the moon is in a water sign (Scorpio this week), and fruit when the moon is in a fire sign of the zodiac (Sagittarius). There is conflicting advice as to whether seeds should be sown in the next couple of weeks as the moon is ascending through the zodiac signs. Some sources say this is the best time for germination, others recommend not sowing at this time as all the energy is concentrated upwards and you end up with tall, spindly plants. Am undecided which source I trust most at the moment. I think if I am tempted to get some flowers in tomorrow (the moon is in Aquarius, an Air sign until Tuesday morn) I just will. I have some exciting flower seeds saved from last year – cornflowers, aquilegia, calendula, nasturtiums and more.We are also building a herb spiral using some discarded stone from a house re-fit up the road. Perfect timing! It’s in its primitive stages but should be up and running in the next week or so which is exciting.
Happy Mother’s day – hope you’ve enjoyed a day full of love and laughter xx
-
Feb 27 2009
Feels like Springtime!
Wow, the weather is gorgeous today – there’s a bumblebee just outside the office window, the chickens are getting excitable (they even came to hang out under the kitchen table at lunchtime) and it’s time to get planting. It feels as though Spring is already here, though it doesn’t officially start until the Spring Equinox on 20th March.
I’m very excited about the garden and all the edibles that I am planning to grow. My current gardening bible is Food Not Lawns by Heather Flores. It is a amazing resource, full of ideas and inspiration, with a permaculture approach. It is unlike many other gardening books in that it is not so much about what to plant when, as a chunky guide to getting involved with your community, growing things for free and how to support the current ecosystem in the garden. Brilliant!
We have just this moment finished another edition of the magazine which will be available in a few weeks time. It was great fun to put together and is packed with articles. Jez has gone to have a lie down in the sun, having not slept for two nights. We have sunk into a funny rhythm the last week or so and I am looking forward to straightening that out and getting back to ‘normal’ life again!
I did a radio interview this morning with a local London station about attachment parenting, peak oil, food systems and the magazine. It was good to debunk a few myths such as washable nappies are hard work and it’s tough being green in today’s society.
Right, am off to sow some seeds…
Page 1 of 1
Welcome to the new blog from the Green Parent office. Here we'll talk about what's going on in the small and quite leafy headquarters of the UK's leading green lifestyle magazine. We'll share news that interests us and talk about green issues and natural parenting. We'll share advice and information from our own experiences of living a green lifestyle. And we'll even tell you what we are reading, eating, drinking and thinking. Hope you get plenty of food for thought here.
Date Archive
Marketplace
The Green Parent is the UK's leading green lifestyle and natural parenting magazine. A truly inspiring read, TGP is like nothing else on the newsstand, with insightful intelligent journalism covering topics from babywearing and attachment parenting to home-education and alternative medicine. Each issue features regular columns on Organic Gardening, Seasonal Food and Drink, Green Travel, Ethical Fashion and lots more.