The daffodils are blooming and the first robin of the year has been spotted hopping on the lawn — for lots of us that means one thing: spring cleaning!  If you’re like me, you might actually secretly look forward to this yearly tradition of scrubbing your home from top to bottom; the feeling of renewal combined with a sparkling bathroom just can’t be beat.  But is it possible to do it all without harmful cleaning products?

The answer is: of course!  GladRags Gabbers, your Green Goal this week is to try out at least one of the below eco-friendly — and budget-friendly! — cleaning tips.  Be sure to comment on this post to let us know how you did!

• Wash windows and mirrors by combining equal parts white vinegar and water.  Spray mixture onto surface and wipe off with scrunched up old newspapers for streak-free glass!

• Sprinkle baking soda on bathroom countertops, sinks, or in the tub.  Scrub with a damp sponge or cloth to get rid of grime and build-up.  Cut a lemon in half and rub it on tough stains for some extra elbow grease.

• Mix 20 to 30 drops of tea tree oil with 2 cups of water to create a great kitchen disinfectant spray!

• Thirty minutes before vacuuming, sprinkle baking soda or cornstarch on carpets to help eliminate any odors in the rug.

• Add 1/2 cup white vinegar to a gallon of water to safely and effectively mop hardwood floors.  Don’t like the smell?  Add a few drops of an essential oil, like soothing lavender or uplifting citrus scents.

*Image by Suat Eman

Green This! Volume 1: Greening Your Cleaning by Deirdre Imus

Eliminating the “dirty dozen” from your personal care products can be a tough chore that leaves your head spinning with ingredients like imidazolidinyl urea and thimerosol.  Your challenge this week is to check the label on at least one of your personal care products.  Does it contain any of the ingredients listed in the Green Guide’s dirty dozen?  If so, start thinking about how you can replace that product when it runs out — and ask yourself if you really need to use it at all!

One of the most fun ways to ensure your bathroom cabinet stays chemical-free is to skip buying commercial products altogether!  Making your own beauty products is simple, inexpensive, and eliminates any worry that your new facial cleanser contains scary cancer-causing agents.  And when you make it yourself, there’s no added packaging to be tossed into a landfill when you’re through.

Simple Facial Mask & Scrub*

Ingredients:

• 1 tbsp olive oil
• 1 tbsp honey
• 1 tbsp sugar
• dash of ground cinnamon

Instructions:

Mix the ingredients well in a small cup or bowl.  Smooth mixture onto face, avoiding eyes and sensitive areas, and scrub lightly for a moment.  This can be a little drippy, so be sure to apply it while over a sink or in the tub! Let the mask sit on your face for 5 to 10 minutes, scrub lightly again, and rinse with water.  Pat face dry with a towel and enjoy how soft and moisturized your skin feels!

*As with any new skin care product, always do a spot test on a small area of your skin first.

Did you try this recipe?  Leave us a comment and let us know what you thought — or share DIY beauty tips of your own!

• Super Green Girl wonders Does Green = Inconvenient? and what’s wrong (or right) about inconvenience?  This is a great article about things most of us try not to think about.
• This One’s for the Girls: Green Your Period from the Greenest Dollar presents some good reasons not to use disposable menstrual products along with multiple options.
• Fabulous website and post: The Zero Waste Home: Zero Waste Bathroom.  She thinks of everything!
• Learn how to crochet a (non-usable) Moon Cup (see photo) using this handy guide.  This website is slightly naughty, so don’t visit this link at work!
• We are featured in this month’s Mothering Magazine!  Pick up a copy today for a great article about reusables.
• Hilarious: Girl Welcomed to Womanhood with 4-page Pamphlet from The Onion.

Check out the View tomorrow (3/9) for more period talk with the authors of Flow:The Cultural History of Menstruation 11am EST.

Menstrual news, art, entertainment, activism, and more!  It’s a short one today.

• Learn what your vagina thinks of the tampons or menstrual cups debate in Tampon vs. Keeper: One Vagina’s Story on youtube in which “A vulva puppet learns the difference between standard and reusable menstrual products.”
• Sarah Haskins & Friends Talk Periods, Pads, And Poop at what looks like a very interesting panel discussion with Susan Kim (who you might know as the co-author of Flow: The Cultural Story of Menstruation) and  television producer Allison Silverman.  Check out this Jezebel article for videos and commentary.
• Simple Organic has a great article on Green Goal Setting, Part 1: Personal Life in which the author sets out a number of goals to consider for the coming year including switching to reusable menstrual products.  This has inspired us to create some green challenges of our own.  Look forward to joining us in our GladRags Green Goals in the near future.

Joni Christine has won the Moon Cup Kit contest by posting a comment on last week’s Menstrual Monday blog entry.  Please email us by the end of the week at orders@gladrags.com to receive your prize!

Author/Artist: Cathy Leamy

What it’s all about: This cute comic begins with Kitty, who tries her hardest to be green in her daily life, — we see her carrying a tower of empty bottles to recycle, standing on a city bus, shopping at a farmer’s market, and so on.  While browsing for  eco-living tips she notices they never address a certain important topic: feminine hygiene products!

Who it’s for: If you’re new to reusable menstrual products, you’ll love the user-friendly reviews of cloth pads, menstrual cups, and sea sponges.  Each product type has step-by-step instructions on how to use it, plus the pros and cons — complete with cute comics, of course!

Why you should check it out: Leamy does a great job explaining the impact of disposable products in terms of waste, resources used, health, and cost. Her drawings are infinitely likeable, and she presents information in a fun, no-pressure tone.  This zine would be a great resource to help introduce friends to menstrual alternatives!

Take a look: Pick up a copy of Greenblooded from Metrokitty.com and be sure to check out Leamy’s other comics while you’re there!

Make a zine you’d like to see reviewed on our blog?  Have a suggestion for a great book we should read?  Let us know in the comments!

Girl Zines: Making Media, Doing Feminism by Alison Piepmeier

Welcome to Menstrual Monday!  Not to many stories for you today, but all good ones!

• Ascics shoe company comes out with a running shoe that changes shape based on where a woman is on her menstrual cycle.  Read more about how our arches change here.
• Blogger Stumptown Crunch has a great article on why the Diva Cup is so awesome!  The article include some striking visual aids (see photo).
• Frugal for Life reviews GladRags and offers Color Sampler Pack giveaway in a recent post!
• Crunchy Chicken discusses a new product, the glass menstrual cup.
• More menstrual humor (this time from a woman!) in the video Aunt Flow from Let’s Talk….Period from humorist and blogger Bern This.

Coming at you from GladRags Headquarters in sunny Portland, Oregon is Menstrual Mondays, your one stop for the latest in menstrual news, art, activism, and more!

•  Mommy blog, Our Sentiments, has a great entry touting the amazing DivaCup.  While she agrees that it may be hard to get used to in the beginning, she is sure to note the benefits far out weigh those early troubles.
• Li’s New Years’ Eco Tips! not only encourages the use of cloth menstrual pads, but has tons more suggestions to make 2010 your greenest year yet!
• Shemiranibrahim.com shares with us a very in-depth article: Menstruation: The Sacred Cycle in which she approaches PMS in a whole new light.
• In a more compact article, Pamela Madsen of DivineCaroline brings us a way to Think About Menstruation As Providing Wisdom.
• Re:Cycling, the awesome menstrual blog, points out the obvious: menstrual activists are ahead of the game.  Blood red lips are now in fashion (see pic)!
  
• Nature Moms Blog has a great post by Tiffany Washko on alternative menstrual products & why you should use them.  Check out Alternative Menstrual Products – Ditch the Disposables.
• Frugal Megan writes about persistence when using a DivaCup or other menstrual cup in this great article: For Woman Only: The Diva Cup.
• Crunchy Chicken announces the winner of their GladRags giveaway here.  Congrats!  If you didn’t win here, check out this weeks bonus below!

**Extra Special Bonus: The Eco-Babe’s Guide to Greening It! is hosting a great giveaway for our Color Pad Sampler Kit!  Check out her great website here and click on “Enter to Win Free Green Products” for more details.

While we stand by our statement that GladRags are economical and money-saving, we know some people like to keep their purchasing and consuming as local as they can.  One way to reduce your environmental footprint to make your own menstrual pads.  Treehugger has a great article that includes links to sewing patterns for menstrual pads along with suggestions on how to be an effective menstrual activist.  Making your own pads can be especially eco-friendly if you use old towels or other discarded fabric – in fact, the prototype for GladRags was made with one of my old towels. And it worked great – I used it for years.

But of course we think you should spend your crafty skills on some making fun clothes and hats and just buy your GladRags from us!

Welcome to the second to last Menstrual Monday of the year and the first official day of winter!  Enjoy this week’s dose of menstruation facts, art, news, and more!

• From Halle Tecco at the Huffington Post, an article about menstrual products in Africa entitled “When Menstruation Means Inequality”

• We found this intro to menstrual cup use through MyFrugalTips on Twitter: Using a menstrual cup instead of tampons: be eco-friendly while saving money

• Did you know that a recent female climber of Mt. Everest brought the DivaCup with her to prevent having to bury or carry out disposables products?  Cool!  We learned this neat fact from Carlin Ross’ interview with the women behind the DivaCup.

• The Society for Menstrual Cycle Research has put out a call for creative works!  They’re looking for poetry, fiction, creative non-fiction, and menstrual memoirs    for a special issue of their interdisciplinary journal, slated for publication next fall.

• Check out this fascinating article about menstruation in ancient civilizations, snake goddesses, and the “Isis knot” — an early form of tampons used by women suffering from irregular menstruation and to prevent miscarriages!

• Strange but true: you can now (for quite a price!) harvest your own stem cells from your menstrual blood to save for “the future [when] these cells may be the basis of medical treatments for threatening diseases, personalized cosmeceuticals and regenerative medical procedures.”  The Society for Menstrual Cycle Research has more info — plus a funny video courtesy of In Living Color.

• An Ad a Day shares amusing advertisements for “sanitary napkins” as part of its Vintage Friday series.  Aren’t you glad we don’t have to figure out those belts anymore?

• Artist Amy E Fraser has a series of abstract paintings based on the “inner turmoil of the uterus.”  Strange, beautiful, and interesting!

Hello!  We are back with your guide to recent menstrual news, art, and more!

• The British blog PositiveLife presents us with a thoughtful article on the negative taboo that surrounds menstruation, what we can do about it and how to think positively.
• GeekFeminism geeks out about menstruation in this blog post.  In the comments section, the author includes this link which has some fascinating photos of human ovulation caught on camera during a surgery.
• Factoidz and GreenLiving101 encourage you to go green and save green with the menstrual cup in this article.
• Period Positivity website My Moon Days presents the idea of a period flag and why it’s useful.
• YouTuber Glozell gives us an awesome video about her thoughts upon starting use of the Diva Cup.