We know it's early to start thinking about Halloween, but as you probably realize, one of the keys to living and celebrating green is to plan ahead.

Swapping, as you also may realize, has come into its own. The stars are doing it (U.S. Weekly reported that Reese Witherspoon loves to get together with girlfriends and swap away!), so why not the rest of us? It makes sense financially, but when you throw in the earth-friendly aspect, it's a no-brainer.

And when it comes to kids clothes and especially something like costumes which most children wear once, it's a double no-brainer!

That's why, Green Halloween, in collaboration with KIWI magazine, is launching National Costume Swap Day on October 9th.

We want to raise awareness about swapping as a habit, but especially when it comes to Halloween costumes. Setting up a costume swap among your friends, child's school, at your church, community center or in collaboration with a thrift store, can be a great way to do something positive for your community with relatively little work (don't you love that last part?).

On the National Costume Swap Day site, you can find tips for setting up, as well as listing a swap. If your swap is only for friends and family, the listing will show the city and state. If it's public, the listing can include all the details about time, place etc. 

And by the way, swapping isn't just for kids. Over the last several years, there's been a surge in adults of all ages buying costumes.

So whether for you or the kids, join the fun. Put together a swap and get a jump on greening your Halloween.

And let us know if you've got questions.

Lynn Colwell and Corey Colwell-Lipson are a mother-daughter team and co-authors of Celebrate Green! Creating Eco-Savvy Holidays, Celebrations and Traditions for the Whole Family, available at www.CelebrateGreen.net.

All of you Green Girls who live in California, Florida and Texas have spring all year long. But for those of us in the Northern climes, spring truly is an awakening, a meaningful time when too few of us pause to truly enjoy and appreciate its meaning. We're stressed, we're busy. A walk usually includes at least one cell phone call. 

This is really sad.

One cure is to insert some time into every day to step outside and notice. Use all your senses to inhale the vision and life emerging before you. 

How about making a daily commitment? If this sounds dry or boring, link the concept to something you enjoy doing like drawing, writing or taking photos. The latter is a passion of mine (Lynn).

Taking photos and seeing them on my computer screen brings me great joy even if I never print them out (which I rarely do). Photographs from nature inspire me every day, so in the spring, I like to spend at least five minutes taking pictures. Then I load them into the computer and create slide shows which sustain me in darker times of the year.

Celebrating spring to me means taking the time to see, smell, feel and shoot.

You don't have to be a great photographer, writer or painter to enjoy interacting with nature in this way. And it can bring you great joy as you celebrate the PERFECTION of the natural world.

These photos I took throughout a spring and summer make me happy and remind me constantly what I am part of.

Twitter is a great invention. We love it. But when it comes to messaging between moms and kids (or dads for that matter), doesn't real world messaging (like hugs and kisses) have a place? We think so. That's why we came up with the idea for a birdhouse that sends a sweet message on many levels.

Think of it as a mailbox where you and your children can leave brief messages (no problem if they're more than 140 characters) for each other to discover.

Here's how we made ours all from recycled materials:

Collect:

• 1 tube shaped can (a neighbor who knows I like to craft and eats a certain brand of potato chips gifted me with this one)
• A lid that is larger than the can (I happened to have the top from a DVD stack with a little handle which is fun because we can hang the birdhouse. But if you don't have this item, you can always poke holes in the one you have and add the hangar.)
• One spool 
• A watch face or gem that can cover the end of the spool
• A tag and something to hang it with (string or ribbon if you don't have the ball chain pictured)
• Paint (or paper to cover the tube)
• Glue
• Scissors or matte knife
• Stickers
• Moss (Avoid purchasing moss. We live in Seattle so our patio is covered with it! Use leaves, sticks or other natural materials.
• A matchbook (Not necessary, you can just put the messages inside the opening without it)

How to:

1. Clean and dry inside of tube.
2. Draw a circle (use a bottle top for a guide) a bit more than half way up the tube and cut out.
3. Paint or cover tube with paper.
4. Add stickers.
5. Glue one end of spool to tube for perch. After that is dry, glue on watch face, jewel or whatever to other end.
6. Print out "Time to Tweet" on printer in size to fit on to tag and on same piece of paper, the word "TWEET" to fit the matchbox
7. Glue words to tag, add string, ball chain and hang.

   

   
   

8. Glue larger top to top of tube.

9. Glue on moss.

10. Glue paper on to matchbox, all the way around.

11. Glue "TWEET" on matchbox.

12. Fill bottom of birdhouse with bits of fabric, cotton, kapok, yarn etc. so that when you slip the match box or message in, it will not slip down.

    
    
    
    
    

That's it! What a fun Mother's Day project for anyone. Why couldn't a mom make one as a gift to herself? The messages she gets throughout the year will give her more pleasure than all the online tweets in the world!

Lynn Colwell and Corey Colwell-Lipson are a mother-daughter team and co-authors of Celebrate Green! Creating Eco-Savvy Holidays, Celebrations and Traditions for the Whole Family, available at www.CelebrateGreen.net.

About two months ago, my (Lynn) husband and I got caught up in geocaching. It can give you great exercise for body and brain, but best of all, it's fun!

What is geocaching? It's a modern day treasure hunt. Using a GPS (you can use any portable GPS--from your car, a cell phone, a mini-computer or a handheld), you seek out a hidden container called a cache. More than 1 million caches are hidden around the world! 

Caches contain a log of some type so you can write your geocaching name and date to indicate you made the find. Some caches are so tiny, a rolled up slip of paper is all they can hold. (See photo to left.) Others are large boxes containing trinkets for kids (and interested grown ups), to trade. Some contain travel bugs which you can take and move to another cache, leap-frogging the bug around the world or to a specific destination.

Caches are graded in difficulty of terrain and difficulty in relation to finding them. Most difficult is 5 and least is 1. We're still mostly seeking and finding 1's and 1.5's. Even so, some of them are not so easy. For instance, if you are in the woods, the GPS may or may not work!

You locate caches by visiting www.Geocaching.com Once there, you sign up for a free account, then hook up your GPS device to your computer and download caches, along with maps, parking and even, for some caches, hints. (Gotta love those!)

We started by searching for caches near our house. We livein the country and I was flabbergasted when I found literally dozens of caches within five or six miles of our home! A few weeks after we started, we took a trip to Mt. Rainier and found six within a few miles of the B&B we stayed at. Since then, our weekend jaunts around the area always include geocaching.

Because we're not into plastic do-dads, when we take the grandkids out, they geocache for dollars. Every time they find a cache, we give them $1, but they don't take anything from the cache itself. They are more than satisfied with this approach.

The other day we ran into a couple with two boys, 4 and 3. The mom told me that they had taken the kids geocaching in the mountains where in the past, they'd barely walked a quarter mile before the complaining began. Now that the family is seeking treasure, the boys trek for two hours without a peep!

So what better idea for Earth Day than to give geocaching a try? If you have questions about it, (honestly, it's a bit confusing, but once you get it figured out, it's easy), just let me know in the comments section below or tell us about your geocaching adventures!

Lynn Colwell and Corey Colwell-Lipson are a mother-daughter team and co-authors of Celebrate Green! Creating Eco-Savvy Holidays, Celebrations and Traditions for the Whole Family, available at www.CelebrateGreen.net.

We're thrilled to be part of the Her Insight radio network and are enjoying talking with people who are all about sustainability in their personal lives and businesses. Our guests are entrepreneurs in the green sector making their marks and inspiring others to make changes for the sake of the people and the planet.

Celebrate Green! is live on the internet every Wednesday at 10 a.m. PST, then available by podcast on iTunes and on the radio site.

One of our first shows included the ultimate Green Girl and our fearless leader, Apple!

On today's show, we talked with events coordinator and eco-entertainer extraordinare, April Milliken Trigg, founder of Eventologie, whose fabulous green parties for companies like Coca Cola and Conde Nast as well as environmentally conscious organizations across the country, demonstrate how sustaniable events can be eco-friendly, innovative, exciting and comparable in cost to the typical corporate affair. 

Second up was Diane MacEachern author of The Big Green Purse. If you're interested in spending your money to make a difference, you've got to join her One-in-a-Million challenge whose aim it is to shift millions of dollars into companies and products that are on the sustainability train and away from those stuck on the track of waste and damage to the Earth.

April and Diane are just examples of the type of guests we're looking for. If you're a Green Girl with a message to spread, we'd love to help you do it on our show.

Check out our shows and contact us via our contact form at CelebrateGreen.NET with an intro to you and what you do.

And if you have ideas for guests you think we should invite, just let us know in the comment section here.