After reading this post, don’t forget to enter our contest – you could win a new dishwasher. Plus, do you have your own story to tell? Send it to greenchallenge@canadianliving.com (no more than 300 words, please), and you could win one of 30 daily prizes.

Today’s post is by senior editor Donna Paris.

What I should do:
Park my car, smash the headlights, throw in some dirt and plant morning glory seeds so the vines and flowers will twist up and out and all around the hunk of metal and make it look pretty. (more…)

This is Easter Brunch Italian style at my family home. It involves lots of cheese, eggs and bread and more cheese eggs and bread! I think it is my favourite holiday food of all. This year we were missing a double crusted pizza that is filled with (you guessed it) eggs, fresh cheese and dried sausage or it is also sometimes filled with a swiss chard and anchovy filling. Everything on the table is home made except for the Easter bread that was purchased which was actually a Polish Paska, but even that tasted quite good - like some nice Polish grandma made it. (more…)

(Don’t get too in love with this fish, if you know what I mean)

I had originally planned to stretch this fish thing out over a couple of weeks, but it’s going to take so long, even I can’t stand it. Instead, here is a highlight reel of sorts:
• We go back to Walmart, return the filter, feel like a fool (me), buy some cool long blue cylinders that are supposed to, when pricked, provide a “wall of bubbles” for our fishes to enjoy, a fake coral (”real coral will kill them”), two more fake plants (”At least they won’t rot”) and five fish: a shubukin (pictured at left), two coby catfish (no photo, plus I think I made that name up because I can’t find anything in Google Images), a bala shark (above) and a blueberry tetra (at right).
• The fishes are acclimatized, then (more…)

After reading this post, don’t forget to enter our contest – you could win a new dishwasher. Plus, do you have your own story to tell? Send it to greenchallenge@canadianliving.com (no more than 300 words, please), and you could win one of 30 daily prizes.

Here in Toronto, we’re lucky enough to have a pretty good curbside pickup program that takes a variety of recyclables (including many plastics) as well as food waste. What this means, effectively, is that just about everything that goes in my garbage can these days is some sort of non-recyclable plastic, usually packaging but sometimes other goods. One of the culprits: toothbrushes.

Assuming you follow your dentist’s directions properly, you’ll go through about four toothbrushes a year. That might not seem like much waste compared to how much garbage goes to the curb every week, but multiply it by 30 million Canadians and 120 million toothbrushes suddenly seems like a lot. Plus, think of all the plastic that’s created just for those “disposable” toothbrushes. (more…)

Even a kitty like Angel, long-suffering lady of a house with two bunnies, a hamster, 10 fish, two teenagers and a seven-year-old, has had her fill of people ooohing and aaaahing over two floppy-eared rodents just because it’s Easter. Enough already!

Since I was already baking for easter, I made some hot cross buns to bring to “la famiglia.” I love to make bready things and watch the magic of rising bread. I was a bit distracted and added a tiny bit too much flour (serves me right for not measuring!) but they turned out yummy non-the-less. (more…)

After reading this post, don’t forget to enter our contest – you could win a new dishwasher. Plus, do you have your own story to tell? Send it to greenchallenge@canadianliving.com (no more than 300 words, please), and you could win one of 30 daily prizes.

Today’s story is courtesy of Christina Anson Mine, managing editor at Canadian Living.

Just like Jack in Brokeback Mountain, I can’t seem to tear myself away from my taboo love. There’s something so warm, so comforting about the soft light of incandescents that I find myself drifting back to them every time I start flirting with more energy-efficient bulbs. I know I should be going greener, but I just can’t help myself. (more…)

After reading this post, don’t forget to enter our contest – you could win a new dishwasher. Plus, do you have your own story to tell? Send it to greenchallenge@canadianliving.com (no more than 300 words, please), and you could win one of 30 daily prizes.

I have a confession. While I consider myself pretty environmentally minded, I have a weakness for long, hot showers that I just can’t give up, no matter how many times I hear – and acknowledge – that even 10 minutes is too much.

I know that many communities in Canada face water shortages every year. I know that here in Toronto, piping water up from the lake to my house is a drain on our already taxed electricity supplies. And in every other aspect of my life, I’m hyper conscious of wasting water – you could almost say I’m allergic to the sound of an unnecessarily running tap. But… well, for one thing, I’m often half asleep during my morning shower, so it takes me longer. I have long hair – it takes time to wash it. I exercise a lot, so skipping showers isn’t generally an option (so long as I want to maintain my popularity at home, that is). Plus, showers are a little bit of easy luxury to start my day with. So what do I do to lessen the impact of my shower habit and alleviate my guilt? (more…)

Last year, in conjunction with Canadian Living Magazine’s green issue, we invited you to sign up for 30 days of tips on greener living. The feedback was phenomenal and we couldn’t help but come back with something bigger and better for 2008.

Our inspiration was this: instead of just offering tips on greener living, let’s go one step further and share our stories of how we’re trying to live more environmentally friendly lives. So for the next 30 days, that’s what you’ll be hearing about: our attempts and our failures, our eco successes and our eco sins. (more…)

This is the traditional cheese tart my family makes for Easter. It is served at brunch on Easter morning with lots of other eggy, bready, cheese-y dishes. Every year as it is tasted everyone comments on the flavour of the filling, the crust, the texture - is it too dry? to wet? too sweet? not enough lemon? too much cinnamon? etc. etc . I seemed to have passed the test this year, my version went over well with everyone, or I didn’t hear about it if it wasn’t as good as grandma’s! The speculation over how it turns out could be mitigated if there was an actual recipe to follow, but as in most traditional foods, the outcome is determined by how closely you have paid attention to the past and how many times you have attempted it yourself. (more…)