The Green Room

Lisa-Dawn from Kitchener, ON writes:

I love Lindsay Coulter’s Recipes, and I was just wondering if she had any for moisturizers: hand lotion, body lotion, facial moisturizer, etc.

Lindsay responds:

You’ll find my suggestions for lotions and moisturizers in recipe list #4 . My personal favorites are Beauty Balm (for the face) and the cocoa butter lotion for the body.

Another tip is to make your own body scrub (with good oils) and make the body wash (with mild castile soap) - you’ll find then that you don’t need to moisturize at all!

Another thing that you’ll learn is that lotion is lotion is lotion. You don’t necessarily need hand, body and face lotion specifically, we’ve just been marketed to shop that way.

M.M. from Toronto, Ontario writes:

I’ve made a batch of Lindsay’s herbal tea shampoo recipe and I noticed that the castile soap turned into a solid once mixed with the rest of the ingredients. I bought a liquid version of an unscented baby-mild, hemp pure-castile soap of Dr. Bronner’s Magic Soap brand at a health food store. Is that the wrong kind? Should this soap be reacting this way? Would vegetable glycerin have been better?

Lindsay responds:

I haven’t ever had the problem you described. It sounds like you got the liquid castile soap which is great, because they do make a bar version. My batches have always remained liquid but perhaps did yours get exposed to cold? I can imagine it might harden if the solution became too cold. Did you make sure the tea cooled before you added the soap? I’ve only found that adding hot tea to the soap can turn it green, the shampoo that is, not your hair. Finally, were your proportions right? It’s a 1/4 cup liquid castile soap to 3/4 cup distilled water (maybe your water had impurities).

C.D. from Vancouver writes:

I have some old cleaners that I don’t use such as Tilex, Orange Glo, etc. What should I do with them since I now use natural cleaners? I don’t really want to dump them down the drain, but perhaps that’s the only way to get rid of them?

Lindsay replies:

Great question! So now that you’ve made the switch you need to safely dispose of the toxic stew of products. They are likely labeled as flammable, toxic, hazardous, etc. and this means they have to be treated as such — hazardous waste, that is.

Depending on your city or town, you’ll have to check in with your respective depot. Each city or town has a municipal waste facility that will accept batteries, paints, and Household Hazardous Waste (HHW) like toilet bowl cleaner. See if you can drop it off there and good on you for not pouring it down the drain!

Have you considered making your own home cleaners? It’s a lot cheaper and very effective. See our issue of the David Suzuki Nature Challenge newsletter where I show you via video how to make your own and give you the recipes too. Check them out at queenofgreen.org .

Chuck Penner from Ottawa, ON wrote us:

I am a cleaner for schools, offices, restaurants, etc. and have decided to "go green" a.k.a. use environmentally safe products for my work. There are several books on Amazon on the subject of cleaning using "green" products, but I don’t know which one is right for me. Any recommendations?

Lindsay replied:

Your quest to provide your school with safe, chemical-free cleaners is an excellent initiative. Kids are by far more negatively impacted by the harmful effects of cleaning chemicals than adults are. Too often indoor air quality is 2-5 times worse than it is outdoors because of the toxic cleaning products we use, so you’d be doing everyone in the school a service!

I’d say you almost don’t need a book, mind you I have about 3 green cleaning books myself, which are posted on my website . I also have a series of green cleaning recipes posted that will work for your purposes and will soon be posting a "green cleaning" ingredient list.

I can’t say I’ve found "the" book. I often "Google" a lot of solutions and recipes. Besides, it’s not really sustainable to go out and buy 10 green cleaning books. Do sign up for our program called David Suzuki’s Nature Challenge and view the videos where I show you how to create cheap and effective products. You’ll also find more solutions, such as link I provided for the Toxic Smart Guide. Let us know how you do!

A must have here at the David Suzuki Foundation office is a simple hand wash soap.

What’s in it;

• 1/4 cup liquid castile soap: not tested on animals, fair trade, and organic. It’s made with saponified organic oils of coconut, olive, hemp and jojoba coconut, hemp and therefore vegetarian! Water softening and cleansing powers. Doesn’t cut dirt but dissolves it. The mildest soap you’ll find. It comes with essential oils of peppermint, almond, eucalyptus, tea tree and unscented.
• 3/4 cup distilled water : used to dilute the soap concentrate.
• 1 t sesame oil or grapeseed oil: Helps damaged and stressed tissues, and controls skin moisturization. A light and thin oil it contains more linoleic acid than many other carrier oils. Need 1 teaspoon.
• 10 drops of an essential oil (optional). Sometimes I add these because of their anti-bacterial, anti-fungal, antiviral or skin repair properties (some support immune function too).

Mix everything together and viola!

What’s NOT in it;

• Triclosan: found in antibacterial soap products. It’s a broad-spectrum killer so it kills good bacterial too. It’s a chemical pollutant that bioaccumulates in wildlife (acutely toxic to aquatic life) and humans. When mixed with chlorine (like many home cleaners) it forms carcinogenic compounds…and one could go on…
• Parabens: a preservative linked with chronic and acute health hazards.
• Phthalates (Fragrance): a plasticizer and often disguised as fragrance. They also fix fragrance so that the stink stays longer. Linked with bioaccumulation in wildlife and humans, cancer, developmental and reproductive toxicity, endocrine disruption, birth defects, and more.
• Sodium Lauryl (or Laureth) Sulfate: makes the suds and it’s a skin irritant. Still debate whether or not it causes cancer.
• DEA: Another foaming agent, but it’s a severe skin irritant and can have adverse effects on the blood, kidney and liver.

Go for it and make a batch for your home or office. Enjoy, Lindsay

I enjoy reading your articles and try to live a healthy green existence no matter where I am in the world, which is Bangladesh at the moment. Last month I tried the home wood polish potion

(lemon juice and olive oil) within 24 I had an infestation of red ants devouring the wood door frames! It was really rather funny…after the initial shock! Just thought ‘ld share this with you for a laugh… maybe there should be a rider put on some of the info if one lives in a tropical climate, not lovely, temperate Canada!

Shannon Crowards, Dhaka Bangladesh