M&M Meat Shops with their annual barbecue fundraiser raised over $2 million for the Crohn’s and Colitis Foundation of Canada this past Saturday. Staff and thousands of volunteers at more than 465 M&M Meat Shops locations across Canada joined together to beat their own charity barbecue day record. To date M&M Meat Shops’ franchisees, customers and volunteers have raised more than $16 million for this vital cause!
Saturday marked the 20th annual event, and Canadians from coast-to-coast including myself, were out enjoying thousands of hamburgers and hot dogs in support of the CCFC. Every cent raised will go directly to the CCFC to help find a cure for IBD, a disease that affects more than 200,000 Canadians. (more…)
I hope everyone had a great Mother’s Day, or Grandmother’s Day, or Auntie’s Day. Mine started with breakfast in bed (actually, mine started at 2:00 a,m. when Tessa came rushing into my bedroom in a panic over a fish-tank trauma, but I’m saving that for another day. This is an uncomplicated Mother’s Day post). I was served smoked salmon and capers with cream cheese on a lightly toasted sesame bagel, accompanied by a champagne flute with bubbly.
I got a hand-painted flower pot with seeds (not the original forget-me-not seeds, because Luka dropped his present on the way home and all the soil fell out onto the road and I’m told it as a very tearful time, but a friend helped get more soil and put in some seeds of unknown origin—could be cabbage, flowers, carrots, grass, my friend is no gardener and popped what ever she found in an unmarked seed envelope into the pot) and a pretty paper flower (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 winner is Karen Ferri.
I’m a new first-time mom and was rather unsettled about using disposable diapers and wipes after I heard about their terrible environmental impact, not to mention the negative impact on your wallet. I did some research and quickly realized that the alternative options were delightfully numerous – from the old-fashioned folding cloth diapers to the all-in-one diaper with a cotton insert.
In the end, I chose an all-in-one diaper. There is no folding required and I only do one load every three days. I can’t believe how easy it actually is! I use face cloths to wipe my baby instead of wipes – she really appreciates the warmth. She never has diaper rash and the money you save is well worth it. I’m really happy that I made this choice.
Thanks to Karen for sending in her story – and don’t forget, if you still haven’t entered, there’s still time to send your own story to greenchallenge@canadianliving.com.
Karen wins a TS-1200TG Green Calculator, courtesy of Canon, and a copy of The Lorax by Dr. Seuss, courtesy of Random House.
Today’s code word: baby
Read more:
• Make your own baby food
• Raise your baby the eco-friendly way
• The great diaper debate
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 winner is Myrna Sandle of Komoka, Ont.
After enjoying those tasty greens, there is still more “green” in that box. Re-purpose it as an ideal shoebox and enjoy a more organized closet with your shoe collection easily visible. An added bonus is that you will probably gain extra space in which to store more shoes and have to eat more lettuce to get those boxes…it’s a great cycle!
Thanks to Myrna
(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 winner is Lianne Jones of Calgary.
I’ve always loved pink, as evidenced by all the pink at my wedding almost 20 years ago. I still like pink A LOT, but I’ve made a dramatic shift:
I’m learning to love green. Not just as a colour, but as a way of life. Now I get excited when I see things like
(more…)
My food find for the week is Poplar Grove’s Tiger Blue cheese. Gitta Sutherland is making this creamy blue at Poplar Grove Cheese in Penticton, BC. I visited her while in the Okanagan Valley last week and have posted pictures of her operation. I saw Tiger Blue all through the area as well as in Vancouver’s delis and restaurants. A distributor has picked up this artisan cheese so look for it in Ontario as well. Better yet, have it at Poplar Grove when you are there and you can pair it with a glass of yummy Monster Merlot from their vineyard!
Here are pictures of Gitta and her cheese.
Tiger Blue is the wedge
(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 winner is Tiina Rebane.
With our constant focus on being green, I find that some things are going to the extreme – for example, greeting cards. There’s something so special about receiving an envelope that isn’t a bill. With virtually everyone using emails these days, I really look forward to the old-fashioned birthday card. That said, there is a way around the dilemma of sending proper cards without promoting the ever-wasteful greeting card industry –
(more…)
Hi! To tie up Children’s Mental Health Week, I welcome a guest blogger to Canadian Living’s Mom Blog. Let me introduce Darlene, who has been advocating for her daughter for more than three years now. As Darlene knows, you can (and she has) read textbooks on anxiety disorders, but in the end we seem to learn best from other people’s stories. So here is Darlene’s and her daughter’s.
Guest blogger Darlene’s journey
We knew from the start that something wasn’t right with our daughter because she was always so sad. At the age of 1 1/2 the crying was more than just colic, and even the slightest changes in environment would catapult her into a frenzy. (more…)
This is NOT one of those bloggy things where I take a photo of my bedside table and then dissect the books piled there (you lucky people!) (the list includes more Grade 2 books than mine, and more magazines than books). In keeping with Children’s Mental Health Week, I’m going to share a few of the books that have helped my kids in their development and offered them some neat insights and ways of looking at mental health.
Edward the “Crazy Man” by Marie Day. This is the story of 12-year-old Charlie, his friends and Edward, a man in the neighbourhood who makes fabulous costumes out of discarded things and lives in an alleyway. The illustrations are wonderful, and the story shows how mental illness can enter a person’s life, affect the lives of friends and family, and the person ends up not sick, but different. (Major bonus to anyone in (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 winner is Kathy Stevenson.
I live in a fairly new subdivision that has a no-clothesline restriction. With the laundry of three children, and us, I asked my husband to install a clothesline. I could not imagine
(more…)
