Green Moms Carnival Launches; Tackling Global Warming
Today OrganicMania is featuring some great contributions from around the green blogosphere. We’re blogging about how we can make a difference in the fight against global warming. Most of us are Green Moms (aka Eco Moms), but we’ve got a few “Mothers of the Earth” and “sons of Moms” joining us too.
And yes, I know that this is supposed to be a web log – and not a diary – but these posts were so fantastic, I got carried away! So sit back, relax, grab something to drink, and enjoy!
Why a Green Moms Carnival? Well, as La Marguerite so aptly puts it, “Moms need to have a bigger role in the climate discourse. We are talking about Mother Earth after all. The qualities that come to us as mothers, as in giving, protecting, nurturing, and sustaining life, are the same ones that are needed to remedy climate change.” Read more here.
It was that post from La Marguerite which inspired this carnival, along with some encouragement from Alana at Gray Matters. While there are many, many “Green Moms” or “EcoMoms” blogging about everything from recycling to gardening, very few of us have been blogging about global warming.
Jennifer – aka “The Smart Mama” came to the same realization I did. As she put it, “Okay, here I am trying to protect my children from toxic chemicals so as to reduce their risk of adverse health effects, but it won’t matter much if they don’t get cancer if they can’t live here on Earth. If you read the reports on what will happen if we don’t do something right now, it is frightening and depressing… being non-toxic isn’t always the same as being green, so I decided to pay more attention to being both green and non-toxic.” Jennifer shares 10 simple steps any one can take to fight global warming.
Beth at Fake Plastic Fish is known for her campaigns to reduce personal plastic consumption and to lobby Clorox to recycle Brita water filters in North America, as they do in Europe. In this post, Beth presents a well – researched explanation of how plastic use contributes to global warming.
MamaBird at SurelyYouNest muses about her grandmother’s Depression-era sensibilities and how a respect for the mundane may be the simple solution to shrinking our carbon footprints. Enter a comment to win a copy of The Pocket Idiot’s Guide to Your Carbon Footprint.
Over at Green Bean Dreams, the Mommys are Roaring. Discover how you can find the strength to combat global warming and deliver a healthy planet to our children. Helicopter parent? Hover over something truly worth worrying about: global warming.
Wondering how to talk to your kids about global warming? Mindful Momma has some solid tips for you, as does MC Milker of Not Quite Crunchy Parent. And eco ‘burban mom shares how her kids responded to watching “An Inconvenient Truth.”
But get your act together first. Here are OrganicMania’s 10 Things You Can Do to Help Fight Global Warming. And Matthew, who is as he puts it, “the son of a mom” shares three things you can do to fight global warming over at Conservatives and Normals. Our other “token male,” Lane of veganbits.com, blogs about ways to reduce your carbon footprint.
Anna at Green Talk questions whether or not we as a society have changed our behavior in response to the threat of global warming. She is tired of waiting for change. She offers simple suggestions, and challenges you to do the same.
And while we’re all trying to reduce our fuel consumption, many of us are wondering how. Read these tips from “Big Green Purse” author Diane MacEachern and you may just save $20 to $50 per month on gasoline.
Leave it to Jenn of Tiny Choices, one of our Mothers of the Earth, to use humor to ask two very serious questions: Do you think global warming is generally accepted as truth by this point? Have you run into skeptics, and if so, what’s the conversation been like? While you’re thinking about it, check out the video Jenn posted of humorist Jill Sobule singing “Manhattan in January.”
Tiffany of Nature Moms brought up the “climate crisis hoax” issue in a poignant post that received more than 19 reader comments! Seems she catches a lot of flack from her neighbors for fighting global warming, but as she points out, she values her environmental actions on many levels. Its simply the right thing to do.
Mary Hunt of In Women We Trust points out that while making sense of green claims can be tough, as more and more products with Product Life Cycle Assessments like the SMaRT Sustainable Product Standard are brought to market, it will be far easier to measure and quantify the pollution and carbon footprint of a product across an entire supply chain.
And if all this talk of global warming stresses you out, remember gardening is a great stress reliever. Did you know that you can reduce your community’s carbon footprint through gardening? Ivory of Little House in the Suburbs shows you how.
Because remember, at the end of the day, don’t you want to be remembered for treading lightly on this fragile Earth, our island home? That’s the question Karen of Best of Mother Earth asked herself after reading an article in National Geographic which “took all the plastics found in a typical American home and put it all out on the front lawn. It was a 2 page spread of junk, or things at the time I didn’t even know were plastic or petroleum derived. I was shocked….I personally want to be remembered for the footprint I don’t leave behind.”
Well put, Karen.
Finally, a big THANK YOU to all the bloggers who participated in the launch of this carnival. Special thanks to Green Beam Dreams for making a cool Green Moms Carnival badge which you’ll see posted on many of the Green Moms sites participating in this carnival, and muchas gracias to eco burban mom for sorting through the many submissions that came in to the carnival mailbox. (Not all were on global warming, but we’ll add yours in if they match a future topic). There were even a few who helped along the way, but could not get a post up today – so Gray Matters, EnviroMom, and Crunchy Chicken, we still love ya!
This will be a monthly event, with topics chosen by each month’s carnival host. So on the second Monday in September, join MamaBird at Surely You Nest to discuss green topics around “Back to School.”
Want to submit a post for next month’s carnival? The theme will be “Back to School,” and it will be hosted by SurelyYouNest. To submit, just go to the carnival submission link here.
Whew! Please leave a comment and let us know what you thought about the Green Moms Carnival.
— Lynn
22 Responses to “Green Moms Carnival Launches; Tackling Global Warming”
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Great carnival! I’m kinda bummed that I didn’t realize non-moms could participate, or I would have contributed a post!! I think this is a really important carnival/gathering of minds. Women (and moms) have been the backbone of every social movement in America. Abolition, women’s suffrage, child labor laws, all these movements got their start in sewing circles and Ladies Aid meetings. And I very firmly believe that the fight against global warming will not be any different. Every single one of us, whether we are SAHMs, or CEOs, whether we are moms or not, need to make our voice heard. I look forward to reading all the entries!
Arduous, thanks so much for stopping by and for sharing your thoughts. Great points – well put. Everyone – check out arduousblog.blogspot.com! — Lynn
Great lineup, Lynn. Thanks for pulling this off.
Ah, thank you – Marguerite! You inspire us all. — Lynn
Thanks for all of your hard work on your brainchild, Lynn. Loved the congregation of so many thoughtful (powerful) voices and I am looking forward to more collaboration within the group.
Thanks Lynn, for opening this up to non-moms. We appreciate being included and be a part in such a cross-section of ideas.
Hey, you’re an Earth Mother if I ever virtually met one, Mary…I was going to say “saw one,” but I realize for all our blogging and emailing and talking over the phone, we’ve never actually met! — Lynn
[…] honored to have participated in the brand-new Green Moms Carnival, started by Lynn of Organic Mania. The topic this month was “Global Warming,” for which […]
This is such a great post about a topic that’s been on my mind these days. I’m so glad to hear the perspectives of all of these great like-minded Green Moms!
Thanks, Jenn – thanks for joining in! — Lynn
Wow; this was fab and I wished I known it was going on so that I could have joined in.
Well done everyone and congratulations on this being such a success. I look forward to the next one and hope to participate
Hey, Mrs. Green, thanks for stopping by OrganicMania! We’d love to have you participate in the next one – it will be on green back to school over at Surely You Nest. I’ll get a calendar up soon with topics and schedules. — Lynn
Kudos, kudos, and more kudos to all you amazing moms! You are doing stellar work and building a community to be reckoned with. I’m the Senior Writer for Healthy Child Healthy World (and a mommy!) and we wanna get in on this. I’m going to do three things right away:
1. Highlight this fantastic carnival of blogs on our blog.
2. Sign up to start writing posts for your carnival.
3. Start trying to figure out how to pool our wisdom and efforts to collaboratively make this a better world for our kids. Any ideas on how to better bridge the non-profit sphere with the grassroots green moms sphere??
Thank you, Lynn, for pulling this together. It is impressive and inspirational and I can’t wait to get more connected!
Janelle, thanks so much and thanks for highlighting us on your homepage! I’ll be in touch!
Congrats on your first green carnival with lots of interesting blog posts to check out.
I too blog about green over at Traveling the Green Way and host the Green Travel Carnival that runs every two weeks. I’d like to invite you all over to check it out (will be up tomorrow) and also participate in the next one if you are interested.
I know I’m far, far too late to participate in the carnival, but I decided to post on the topic anyway.
P.S. I hope all the green mom carnival goers participate in the APLS Carnival in a few days!!
Great first carnival post! Global warming is certainly something the next administration will have to deal with and I’m glad you’re bringing this topic up for discussion. You’re exactly right, it won’t make any difference if we fight toxins in our environment and our climate and earth can not or only barely supports human life. As my dad is fond of saying: “In a hundred years the earth will be just fine-it’s the humans I’m worried about.”
Must be a bit of black humor, but that made me laugh. Sad but true. Once you become aware, you see everything through a different prism. It’s very hard for me to “enjoy” watching sports like powerboat racing, car racing, jet skiing, and other events that use fuel and encourage people to travel to be spectators. Such a waste. History will judge us for this. — Lynn
Lynn,
Thanks so much for pulling this together and I am so excited to be working with a wonderful group of women ( and some men).
Most of all thanks for thinking of including me when you pulled this together. Always a fan.
Anna
You’re very welcome, Anna! Thanks for all you do! – Lynn
[…] honorary contributor to the new monthly Green Moms Blog Carnival, the first of which was hosted by Organic Mania this week. The organizers dubbed me and a few other child-free women “mothers of the […]
I missed out! Got swamped with work/life/everything. What’s next month’s carnival topic (after Back to School) and how can I participate? Could I host one?
[…] nearly a year now, but never more so than since the launch of the Green Moms Carnival, I’ve enjoyed the company of a like-minded sisterhood of Green Moms. These sympathetic souls […]
Green Moms, what a great idea. Moms are possibly one of the most powerful lobbying forces ever created!
Love the idea of recycling, some say this could be the major way to prolong our natural resources.
The planet needs you… keep up the good work.
[…] On a side note, Happy Birthday to the Carnival! It’s hard to believe, but we got started a year ago August when we launched our very first carnival, “Tackling Global Warming.” […]
[…] green blogephere is hoppin’ this week with all sorts of fun stuff. Organic Mania, she’s having a Green Carnival and the moms are addressing global warming. Hats of to Lynn […]
[…] honorary contributor to the new monthly Green Moms Blog Carnival, the first of which was hosted by Organic Mania this week. The organizers dubbed me and a few other child-free women “mothers of the […]
[…] post was included in the first Green Moms Blog Carnival at Organic Mania on August 4, 2008. tweetmeme_url = […]
[…] blogged about climate change before. We kicked off the carnival back in August ‘08 with this carnival about climate change, before tackling it again and yet […]