This Holiday Season, Give Kiva Instead!

Ahhh, the holiday season is upon us with all the usual hustle and bustle it involves.  Assuming you survived Black Friday by opting out completely you are probably prepping for the mad gift giving that will soon be upon us.  While many people may be waffling between the automated turnip twaddler and the latest iProduct that the late Steve Jobs has instructed us we need, I'd like to mention a third alternative.  Why not give the gift of Kiva.

For those of your new to Kiva, it's pretty simple (a couple of clicks), environmentally less invasive (no wrapping required) and a great way to help others.  Kiva is a micro lending organization that helps people all over the globe.  Basically what happens is a stall owner in Jakarta wants to grow her business and help herself, her family, and her community.  She doesn't have access to cash to get it going so she contacts Kiva who then vets her and puts her request online.  Then regular Joes and Janes like us loan money (in $25 increments) and when the loan is funded, the borrower gets her money and she's off to the races.  Over time (generally within a year and with an astounding 90 something percent completion rate) she pays off the loan and you get your money back.  Simple, cool, and highly effective.

So how does this help with your gift giving choices?  Well, Kiva has gift certificates that you can buy and print, email, Facebook, or have sent as a card to that special person in your life.  How cool is that?  Instead of some new gizmo that will end in a landfill, or an iTunes gift card (that will end in a landfill by the way) you can give the gift of giving.  But it doesn't stop there my friends!

Consider this.  You give your little niece a $25 gift loan.  She heads on line and is empowered by perusing the loan applicants, reading about them, deciding on who to fund, and then helping them better their lives.  The loan is paid back to her, she gets an email, and then gets to re-loan that same amount to someone else.  Your gift keeps giving until who knows when?  So it's much more than a one time gift and your niece thinks of you every time she heads onto the Kiva site or gets an update.  And as an added bonus, she's so blown away by all of this, that she gives up her dreams of becoming a corporate overlord and instead decides to devote her life to helping others, creates a non-profit that builds houses for the poor and wins the Nobel Prize!!  And all that for $25!  Wow!

But yeah, she'll probably like that iTunes gift card just as much so i could see this being a toss up.

Happy Happy (and check out Kiva!)

Dave

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Plastic Free Alternatives For Food

Check out NoPlastic.Ca for cool non plastic alternatives to food storage and transpo.  They carry water bottles, flasks, kids items, and more.  A lot of the stuff is Stainless, but most importantly, NO PLASTIC!

Dave

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Holiday Tip #17 - Gift Idea: Orikaso Bowl

Trying to figure out last minute gifts on a budget? Why not pick up an Orikaso bowl for that special someone in your life. They only cost about $3, will help that special person in your life cut down on waste, and most importantly are SUPER COOL! REI carries them as does Sport Chalet and several other sporting good/camping stores.

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Holiday Tip #9 - Waste Free Gift Idea - Lynda.com

Here's an easy waste free gift idea, give them a month on Lynda.com. The site is a massive compendium of video tutorials on all things computer. Learn how to edit video, compress files, or even just get your computer running smoother. If you are like me you're much better at watching a 20 minute video that actually shows as it goes than sitting and reading a pdf file. I should point out that I'm not affiliated with Lynda, get nothing from them, but use them quite a bit. You can check out lot of their videos for free but as they get more serious, they charge $25 a month. So save a little cash, help someone you love master a new skill, and waste virtually (pun intended) nothing!

Dave

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How to Cut Out Single Use "Disposable" Items

If you have trouble viewing you can check this out on youtube as well.

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Reusabable Bags Sale

For anyone interested in getting reusable bags and in need of a push, Reusablebags.com is having a huge sale right now. If you can get something local that's made locally go for that first, or better yet, make them yourselves, but if not being able to pick them up is holding you back, here's a good opportunity.

Dave

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Great (Non) Gift Giving Idea

I have been a HUGE fan of Peter Gabriel for quite some time and he has always impressed me with his world views and campaigns towards social consciousness. A friend sent me this from his website today and I thought it was worth sharing.

We're happy to report that Peter and Meabh are proud parents of a second son.

Luc was born on Saturday 5th July, a bouncing 7lbs 2 oz. Big brother Isaac reports that mother, father and baby brother are all doing well, and requests that any congratulatory flowers people may contemplate sending be left to grow in the ground for all to enjoy.

What a great way to welcome a child into the world by asking people not to consume and leave nature as it is. Very cool. As a friend of mine who read this joked "I'm going to go out right now and not send gifts to a lot of people".

Granted, my guess is that PG doesn't need much but for those of us who don't, what a great idea.

When my wife and I got married a few years back, we actually asked guests to donate to a few selected charities in lieu of gifts, or one of their own if they preferred. Those that truly wanted to give something special did, but most donated in our honor and raised a lot of money for some good causes. It was easier on them (not too much back and forth about a gift) and we enjoyed knowing that our occasion helped others.

Way to go PG.

Dave

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Save 25% on Eco Oriented Products

For those of you wanting to try out a new eco friendly lightbulb, compostable bags, or any of a number of other eco products, but don't want to break the bank, check out Let's Go Green. While I haven't gotten anything from them myself, they seem to have a pretty decent range of products and if you type the word FRIEND in the coupon box at checkout, you'll receive 25% off your order. 

How cool is that? Go green and save a little at the same time.

Dave

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Foxy Frocks Dresses!

A little shameless plug here but for a really great homegrown enterprise that fits in nicely with the general concept of re-purposing, and then does it one better.

My friend Shannon, her sister, and her Mom started a dressmaking business a while back called Foxy Frocks. They hand make (themselves mind you) awesome little one of a kind dresses for little girls. And if that isn't cool enough, they make them out of remnant cloth from the garment district in downtown LA, so they are essentially using stuff that would be discarded anyway. Very cool (and great dresses to boot).

If you check out the site, you may notice that the dresses are slightly more expensive than you can get at a place like the GAP, but I think what you need to ask yourself is are these too expensive, or are those prices too low. I think you'll find the latter as these dresses are worth it and then some, and the fact that they are one of a kind, only adds to their value.

Here's what Shannon has to say about them:

"We see dressmaking as an art form, something that should be done with care and not in a sweatshop! We use a minimal amount of materials in crafting each dress and we buy our fabric in the Garment District here in Los Angeles, the same city where we make our dresses. Whenever possible, we try to purchase the bolt end pieces of fabric...aka the "scraps" - tiny pieces that usually end up in the trash! We make something beautiful from leftovers, what better way to care for the planet! We also use recyclable packing - feel free to request less packaging and we'll be happy to ship your frock in a recycled bubble wrap packet. Every frock is a handmade, one-of-a-kind little treasure. We try to keep our prices low so that our frocks can be available to everyone. Our goal is not to become rich, it's to celebrate the art of dressmaking, and to inspire others to create their own individual works of art."

Foxy Frocks - check it out.

Dave

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