I'm not sure if it was the footage of oil spewing out of the pipes in the Gulf of Mexico or the article I read on chemicals and cancer (scary, trust me), but somewhere along the line I recently hit a tipping point. Over the past six years I had seen enough trash cans at weddings spilling over with paper goods headed to the landfill, tubs of food being thrown away, and had put thousands of miles on my car driving to faraway destinations. I was trying to practice eco-conscious choices in my personal life, so it was time to add them to the way I run my business. Many of the things we were already doing, but as I began to read more and learn more about changes we could make, the ripple has moved outward.

Here are a few ways that we are creating a sustainable, eco-friendly business and life:

• we use only rechargeable batteries
  
• we use CFL compact flourescent light bulbs (even though I don't like the way they look!)
  
• all contracts are executed electronically
  
• we print in-office documents as little as possible, and what paper we do use is recycled and printed on both sides
  
• we compost our kitchen waste and have a garden
  
• we work out of a home office, which saves energy (and time), and means that my daily commute is 14 steps from my kitchen
  
• we carpool whenever possible
  
• I no longer book weddings that will be taking place beyond a 60-mile radius from my home -- it saves gas and my sanity, and encourages couples to shop locally.
  
• we provide the digital files and an online gallery instead of paper proofs
  
• when we create wedding albums, we use the most highly-regarded eco-conscious printer in the industry
  
• we buy carbon energy credits through carbonfund.org to offset our footprint
  
• we encourage our clients to use other vendors who share the same philosophy (see list below)

Some recommended venues for planning your green wedding:

Proximity Hotel
Green Planet Catering
The Iron Hen
Sweet Basil's
Goat Lady Dairy
The Mill House at Richland Creek

Invitations:
Earthly Affair

Want to learn more about planning a green wedding? Check out:
The Green Bride Guide


We are proud to be a Premier member of Greener Photography, a pioneering organization founded by two of our colleagues working to educate other professionals on ways to be more eco-conscious.

"Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants."

So begins Michael Pollan's incredible book {In Defense of Food}, which I highly recommend. It is a good counterpoint to what is seemingly our accepted manifesto of American eating now, which might be "Eat whatever, as much of it as you can, rarely plants." Listen, I'm not casting stones here -- my kids have eaten McDonald's more than I care to admit, I have a tremendous weakness for Edy's DIBS ice cream, and as a result I could stand to lose 10 lbs. My food pyramid is top-heavy with cheese and pasta, and sometimes I'll go days without eating plants.

But I recently had the privilege of listening to {Alice Waters} speak when she came to town. (If you are not familiar with her, check out this "60 Minutes" interview .) She was in Greensboro for the groundbreaking of our very own {Edible Schoolyard} which will be at the {Greensboro Children's Museum}. Our community's kids will learn how to grow their own food, how to harvest it, and how to cook it. The potential impact this has on how we eat is tremendous. Alice Waters' visit heightened my awareness about food, and how central it is to our well-being and yet how cavalierly we treat it.

When I first met Paul 12 years ago and visited his little apartment on Elm Street, I first wandered over to the bookcase to see what he was reading (Wendell Berry, Kathleen Norris, David McCullough, Calvin & Hobbs). And then when he wasn't looking, I opened his refrigerator. Yes, I was being rude and nosy, but I knew that it would tell me so much about him. I pretty much expected to see what most single people have in their fridges: perhaps a Chinese takeout container, half of a dessicated lemon, 3 beers and a carton of almost-out-of-date milk. If memory serves, Paul had a carton of grapefruit juice, Seven Stars Farms maple yogurt, and some fresh-looking apples. My single-girl fridge was pretty much the same, and while it's not the most romantic part about our lives, I think it's one of the main reasons we get along so well to this day. One of the things Alice Waters said which stuck for me was "whatever it is that we eat, we are eating the values behind it." Another way of saying, "you are what you eat."

If that's the case, I am one part Clean-Eating-Aspiring-Farmer's Market Locavore and one part Just-Give-Me-the-Carton-of-Ice-Cream-and-Nobody-Gets-Hurt.

Here she is talking to Maurice "Mo" Green, Guilford County School Superintendent:

Charlie Headington talking to Greensboro Mayor Yvonne Johnson. Check out Charlie's's blog { HERE }

Alice talking to Steve Tate of { Goat Lady Dairy }

Last Thursday the {Greensboro Montessori School } hosted a talk by Richard Louv, bestselling author of { Last Child in the Woods: Saving Our Children from Nature-Deficit Disorder } as part of a week-long { "No Child Left Inside" } initiative. He is a fascinating and thoughtful guy, and won the 2008 Audubon Award for his work spearheading this all-important worldwide dialogue about how to better connect children with nature.

I enjoyed hanging out with a lot of the kids from the school, whose energy was not in the least bit tempered by the gray skies and threat of rain. They were all a great example of how important it is to get outside!!