In continuing with my reviews this week, I thought it would be nice to look at a holiday-minded product. On with the show…

Product: Celebrate Green! Creating Eco-Savvy Holidays, Celebrations and Traditions for the Whole Family by Corey Colwell-Lipson and Lynn Colwell

Basics: Celebrate Green is a mama-daughter book collaboration – the title is fairly self-explanatory – this is a book about all things related to green holiday celebrations.

Cost: Family friendly at only $17.95. Plus for a limited time, you can score an even better deal. “Right now when you order a copy of Celebrate Green! from our website, you can choose between a box of organic truffles from Sjaaks for one penny plus shipping or a free jar of fair trade whipped shea butter from Vintage Body Spa for nothing but shipping.” That’s a great value. Especially during the holiday season.

What I think:

There are many outward positive aspects of this book. For example, it’s printed on 100% recycled FSC certified paper, which more books should be. There’s also a highly interactive website going on for this book. Plenty of green tips, author info, and fun stuff is offered, along with a value on reader participation.

Pros:

I like how the book is set up: The table of contents is divided into seasons, and then sub-holidays under each season. Spring through winter holidays are offered and a cool section with year round holidays -such as birthdays, family reunions, and baby showers. The last section is very nice with a great big list of helpful green websites (three pages worth) and a green-smart glossary. There are also blank page sections in the back of the book where you can make notes about each season. This book is super easy to skim through and find what you need, and their index pages are actually very well done (I’m sick of poor indexes).

I like the design: The design is simple but easy to follow. The colors flow through the book in soothing sage and browns. Important information is either in a solid color block, or has a great big header; both of which really break up the text in a bite size way. Also, each holiday is clearly marked in the bottom page corner – which is nice, so if you’re flipping through spring, you’ll see where Easter topics end and Earth Day begins.

The holidays are covered well: It would be impossible to go through how they discuss each holiday, but trust me, plenty of green tips are covered for each holiday. I’m going to use Cinco de Mayo and 4th of July as examples.

In the Cinco de Mayo chapter some of the various items covered include:

• Eco issue facing Mexico in general, and how you can help.
• Organic veggie enchilada recipe.
• Paper bag pinata instructions.
• And more.

In the 4th of July chapter some of the various items covered include:

• The dish on if fireworks are green and air quality and child labor issues related.
• Alternatives to fireworks and how to safely manage them.
• Recycling bin contest idea.
• Three worthy summer eco-causes you can support.
• How to organic up your picnic.
• Choosing eco-friendly summer drinks including where to score eco-beer.
• News about tap water.
• Organic Red, White, and Blueberry muffin recipe.
• Fun family activities that don’t kill the earth.
• And more.

So, as you can see, each holiday not only focuses on the green aspects of the holiday, but also on other green issue important to the season – that is pretty cool.

Cons:

I couldn’t really find many cons about this book. My only issue is that the text is a little wordy. (Like I’m one to talk though). The intro was really long, a little too long for my taste, and there’s a back story behind almost everything in this book, and in some cases I felt they could have just offered the tip and moved on. On the other hand, some people like that kind of thing, and as noted, I’m not exactly the most succinct human ever, so… take this with a grain of salt. It is what it is.

Celebrate Green final score:

Five out of five happy trees. This is one of the most in depth green holiday resources I’ve seen. It’s also perfect for families. Very well balanced with both kid and adult friendly aspects. It’s not just for one member of the family. Also, right now, with the special deal going on, this is an extra great value for a green book. It would make a great holiday gift.

Learn more at Celebrate Green

Buy the book

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That said, we’re going to do a boring, random name generator. Not as much fun as a video, but still, nice if you win. Two of you have won a very cool prize – the Hallmark Card Studio Deluxe 2009.

And those two winners are…

Numbers 12 and 3. In case you didn’t memorize your comment number, this would be readers Sara and Carla.

Sara’s family is keeping it green this winter by, “Making some organic treats to give as gifts to our friends and neighbors! Oh, and lately we’ve been making peanut butter/birdseed pine cones for all of our furry friends!” Carla says, “We aren’t using our heater or watering our grass. We bought extra blankets to keep warm and we will let the rain keep our grass watered!”

Very nice green tips, as were everyone’s actually. I may have to create a link love post of everyone’s comments because you’re all doing some very cool green things this year.

Congratulations to both Sara and Carla, I’ll email you asap, so be sure to check your spam filters. Thanks to everyone else who entered and left green tips. Big hugs to our prize sponsor Hallmark Software – I’m sure our winners will be able to make some amazing projects all year long thanks to this family friendly prize.

[images via Hallmark Software]

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To learn more about this cool prize, read, Hallmark Card Studio Deluxe 2009 – A Great Family Time Product.

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The folks from Night Owl Paper Goods posted the code, but then emailed me an even better one. I’m pretty glad about this, because it gives me an excuse to show another cool product from them. Since it’s a nice holiday code, you should know that they have these adorable wooden santa owls cards made from eco-friendly, sustainably harvested yellow birch available. Look:

YOU know you want one.

Here’s the new code they sent me…
::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
:: Night Owl Paper Goods Owliday Discount :: www.nightowlpapergoods.com

:: Receive 25% off ALL ORDERS now thru Dec. 31st! :: Coupon Code friend08

:: Share with friends! :: Use over & over! :: It’s easy to be Green & Save Green!
::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

AND, heads up, another featured item here at Tree Hugging Family is on sale right now. Remember the B Hive Designs post I did a while back? Maybe not, it’s been a while. Let me jog your memory with some new organic items I adore from the shop… (click on the image to learn more).

Barbara from B Hive Designs says that her lovely items are on sale right now through Dec 7th. 25% OFF all Women’s shirts, plus FREE SHIPPING on everything! That’s a great deal on organic clothing. You can also find B  Hive at Etsy (which rocks – I have a major Etsy crush).

If I see any more green deals soon, before holiday shopping time is up, I’ll throw those your way too. I know for sure that I’ve got details about a great 3R Living code in the The Gigantic Green Holiday December Kick-Off! post

[Images via B Hive Designs & Night Owl Paper Goods]

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The prize, in case you forgot, is a copy of the #1 card making software, Hallmark Card Studio Deluxe 2009. I’ve got two copies up for grabs.

The only downside I see to this product is that system requirements are Windows XP or Vista – sorry Mac lovers Other than that, if you happen to be a PC user, this product is way cool.

Perks of the Hallmark Card Studio Deluxe 2009:

Easy as pie – if you visit the Card Studio website, you’ll see that kids, non-computer savvy adults, and anyone else can easily learn to use this product. There are just three simple steps from start to completed project…

1) Choose from one of over 9,000 projects – holiday cards, invitations, stickers, 3D cards, scrapbook pages, calendars, envelopes, gift tags, mini albums, photo cards, photo frames, postcards, and lots more.

2) Incorporate your own unique messages, photos, colors, fonts, or images into your chosen project.

3) Print that project out. You can also directly email your project or create a PDF of it.

Lots of great clip art – Included with the software is this amazing array (16,000+) of clip art graphics; way better than the basics that come on most computers. Look how cute these sample images are:

Fix your photos – This version of the software comes with a nice Digital Photo Editor. You can crop, remove red eye, and more.

Here are some project samples that I think are extra cute: 

What’s green about this? 

Being that this is a green blog, I like to do green and family product minded giveaways. At first glance I wasn’t thinking this was an especially green prize, but then after thinking about it some more, I realized the following:

1. This product encourages family together time – something I push, push, push here at THF.  I like that you and the kids can get together on a chilly winter day and have some fun making special projects.
2. You can use the materials you choose. While recycled greeting cards get more and more expensive, recycled paper in bulk, is not all that bad. You can use recycled paper and recycled embellishments to make a truly unique green gift for someone.
3. You can save some cash AND make homemade gifts that are more personable, extra special, and fun to create.I am always saying going homemade is best – you save gas, save product resources, and save money. This software allows you one means of doing all this.

All in all, a great family-minded prize. If you haven’t entered to win this software yet; what’s stopping you (besides the Mac issue).  Click the penguins below to learn how to enter.

[images via Hallmark Software]

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What you can win:  Two lucky Tree Hugging Family winners will win a copy of the #1 card making software, Hallmark Card Studio Deluxe 2009.This software is super slick, full of features, and family friendly. (Watch for my upcoming review of this software’s full features).

Who can enter: Not me. If you happen to be a girl named Jennifer who blogs here at Tree Hugging Family; well, don’t enter. Are you someone else? You’re good to go.

Giveaway duration:

• Starting… now (go)!
• Ending December 7th, 2008 at midnight Pacific Coast time.

How to win this giveaway:

What I like best about this software is that it promotes family together time and allows you to make some great projects at home using recycled materials if you so choose (recycled paper, buttons, and more) plus your own creativity. In that spirit, if you’d like to win this software, head to the comment section of this post, and tell me one green activity your family will be doing together this holiday season.

Will you be having an organic cookie baking day or will you be taking a nature hike in the snow? Are you all making homemade eco-gifts?

Additional rules: 

I’ll be randomly drawing and posting our winners by the afternoon of December 8th.  If you win, I’ll be sending you an email that day. Please respond within 3 days, or I’ll draw another winner. I know that’s a short time frame for responding, but being that this is a holiday project gift, I’d like the winners to get this before mid-December (plenty of time to make cards).

Also, please note that sometimes b5media emails go to spam. If you’re listed as a winner on the 8th, and you don’t have an email from me by that evening, check your spam or toss me an email at jennifer.chait@b5media.com.

Good luck! Don’t forget to watch for a post that discusses this nifty software’s features.

November current events at Tree Hugging Family – themes, reviews, news, and more…

[image via Hallmark Software]

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What comes in the Eco-Camp Kit:

• “Solar shower – One Solar heated reusable shower. 20L capacity, sufficient for 2-3 showers.
• Water-powered digital alarm clock – no batteries required.
• Solar powered iPod charger – One hour of sunshine gives about one hour of play time of Apple iPod’s.
• Organic cotton roll-up bed – Hand made from high-quality hand woven organically grown cotton using natural colourfast dyes. Easy to carry and much more sumptuous than a camping mat.
• Soft shetland wool throw – hand knitted throw made from soft, undyed Shetland wool. Can be used as a blanket or luxurious picnic rug.
• Self-powered LED Lantern – wind-up technology lantern. 60 seconds wind-up provides one hour of illumination.
• One bar of organic soap
• One Organic cotton bath towel – available in natural.
• All contained within an eco-friendly Biome Lifestyle bag.”

This is the perfect holiday gift for your green-minded outdoor loving friends.

If you need a little more help Biome Lifestyle has a great all-in-one Christmas survival kit and advent calendar.

Listen to their cool description:

“Each day will bring you a fairtrade chocolate coin and a helpful eco-tip/guide to help you through the period. The kit will also contain a variation of small surprise gifts. The calendar is made from sustainable materials and designed to be re-used every year.

Therefore, not only is the kit a sustainable and reusable advent calendar, it also provides green-survival tips and fun activities for all the family, to make Christmas just a bit more educational and eco-friendly.”

Nice. Visit Biome Lifestyle to see more green gift giving options.

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