Eye Opener: Photo Essay

                For my photo essay I chose to report on my experience shopping at consignment stores and also at a furniture store that raises money for breast cancer.

 

The picture above illustrates a consignment store that I shopped at in Eden Prairie called Encore.

I went to three different stores, Encore (Eden Prairie), Nu Look and Fashion Avenue (Edina) and found great deals on mostly designer brand clothing. Everything was gently used clothing and accessories such as jewelry, purses and shoes. It was great to shop at these places because we have been learning in Environmental Health about re-using certain goods. While everyone else was shopping at the shopping malls for new items on black Friday, I was shopping for re-usable, yet fashionable clothing.

The picture above illustrates me shopping at Encore. I am proud to report back that I found a great pair of designer jeans that originally cost $160. I bought my pair of jeans for $58 (what a steal!).

Above is a picture of the "Hope Chest" located in Orono, MN. This is a very inspiring/unique store. They take donations and donated upscale furniture. All the money goes to women that are affected by breast cancer and to research in hopes of saving lives.

I was home two weeks ago. My Mom and Dad were talking about getting rid of our kitchen table because they found one they had liked better. Instead of throwing it away I suggested they bring it to the hope chest so we could donate to the cancer society. The picture above is a picture of me standing by the table that we donated! It was great to know that we are helping cancer patients by donating a simple table. I wish more stores were like this!

Reusing is very important these days. It helps not only the economy, but the land fills as well because we are not throwing away as much if we reuse. I definitely will shop at consignment stores more often. Not only is it cheaper, but healthier for our environment!

Eye Opender: Junk on the Brain

Part 1: Definitions


Antiques: a work of art, piece of furniture, or decorative object made at an earlier period, and according to many customs laws, at least 100 years ago. According to http://antiques.about.com/od/resourcesforbeginners/g/bldefantique.htm


According to http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/junk, Junk/Junking is any old or discarded material, as metal, paper, or rags.

A Flea Market according to http://www.wisegeek.com/what-is-a-flea-market.htm , A flea market is a large, traditionally open-air market where people sell a wide range of goods, typically used.

Thrift Shop: A shop that sells used articles, especially clothing, as to benefit a charitable organization.
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/thrift+shop

Wikipedia defines Upcycling as: Upcycling involves processing used materials into new products, or the re-use of a product with crippled functionality for alternative purposes, to prevent waste of potentially useful materials, reduce the consumption of fresh raw materials, reduce energy usage, reduce air pollution (from incineration) and water pollution (from landfilling) by reducing the need for "conventional" waste disposal, and lower greenhouse gas emissions as compared to virgin production, with the intent of creating a product of higher quality design and artistic value.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Upcycle


Resale: the act of selling a second time.
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/resale

Part 2: The words defined above all relate to environmental health. All of these places above make it so that articles of clothing, and other materials can be re-used instead of throwing them away. Some people throw clothes away because they do not fit, or throw away some sort of decoration they are not longer interested in. The environmentally friendly thing to do would be to bring those belongings to a shop that will take them and sell them for you so someone else can use them.

Local Resources:

Antique store: Canal Park Antique Mall
Address: Located in Canal Park. 310 Lake Ave. S.
Phone: 218-525-2596


Junk/Junking:There is a Junk Yard called Jadco Special Haulers
Located: 4011 Rehbein Rd, Duluth, MN
Phone: (218) 724-5538‎
E-mail: N/A, better to call

Flea Market:
I couldn't find one in Duluth but I found this website that showed a few locations in Minnesota that had them. The closest one I found is in Blaine MN

Address: 10980 Central Avenue NE, Highway 65, downtown
Phone: (612) 757-9906


Resale Shop: Plato's Closet
www.platoscloset.com
5115 Burning Tree Rd
Duluth, MN 55811-1876
(218) 733-9455

Thrift Shop: Goodwill
www.goodwill.org
Address:700 Garfield Ave
Duluth, MN 55802-2695
Phone:(218) 722-6351

Upcycling: I couldnt find anything about upcyling in Duluth, but here is an example and a fun idea :) http://www.moonbattery.com/upcycled-garbage.jpg



I have donated some of my clothes to the Salvation Army and Goodwill. I have also gone to rag stock to find things such as halloween costumes. I really like the idea of upcyling, it allows you to be creative. All of these stores help out the environment and I feel that it is important to use these stores more often :).

Part 3: http://www.junkmarketstyle.com/item/16914/button-necklace I thought this picture of the necklace was really cool. They used old buttons to make it, which was a smart idea and it looked pretty sweet! This is a great example of finding a certain object and putting it to use!

http://www.junkmarketstyle.com/item/16524/gas-lamp-to-candlestick-quick-easy-and-pretty-too

This was a pretty sweet idea. They used an old gas lamp and used buttons and an old necklace to decorate it. I thought it was a really fun idea. It's fun to see what you can put together :).

http://www.junkmarketstyle.com/item/16559/time-to-hit-the-sack

I thought this was an awesome idea! They used burlap sacks as door mats, signs, and poseters. Great for the environment, and different/creative thing!

Eye Opener: Environmental Working Group

The cosmetic item I chose to evaluate is Victoria Secret's Dream Angels "Heavenly" perfume. I chose this product because it is something I use every day . I was a little shocked when I saw the results because I never really thought of perfume as being hazardous to the environment. I found out that the ingredients in this product are linked to developmental/reproductive toxicity, allergies/immunotoxicity, and other concerns for ingredients used in the product such as neurotoxicity, enhance skin absorption, and occupational hazards. On a scale from 1 to 10 my perfume was ranked at a 5 which is considered to be a moderate hazard. It is crazy to think that our every day objects are hazardous to the environment.

Eye Opener: CSPI

CSPI, which stands for the Center for Science in the Public Interest is something I was not aware of until just now. The organization focuses on nutrition and health, the alchol policy, and food safety. I decided to Tour the Food Supply and found some shocking statistics. 

I learned that in 2002 alone 140 million cattle, sheep, and pigs were slaughtered in the United States and 9 billion chickens and turkeys were killed. Statistics from http://www.cspinet.org/EatingGreen/tour.html show that this converts to 30 birds for every American. I also learned that diets rich in Dairy products and meat products have a greater obesity rate because it can make you have high blood pressure, an increase risk of having type 2 diabetes, heart disease or cancer.

  A very shocking thing I found was that there are over 1,000 Americans that die each year from food bourne illnesses.Also, less than one quarter of americans eat the recommended servings of fruit and vegetables. 

Another interesting statistic I  found is that foods such as hamburgers, egg yolks, whole milk, and other fatty meat and dairy products can lead to some types of cancer and then saturated fats and cholesterol in these products 50,000 to 75,000 fatal heart attacks annually.

These are all shocking statistics I was unaware about. I am glad I am more educated on these topics and will continue looking at this page in my spare time. I realize it is important to "eat green". Organic foods can be pretty spendy, but I realize I should cut down on some meets. I learned how much the U.S. food supply is hurting our country and I feel it is an issue more people should be aware of.

Eye Opener: Ecological Footprints

Before reading about Ecological footprints, I was not sure what it was. I went to wikipedia's ecological footprints and read what it was and found it to be very interesting. I learned that Ecological Footprints is a measure of human demand on the Earth's ecosystem. According to, http://www.rprogress.org/ecological_footprint/footprint_FAQs.htm the Ecological Footprint measures the amount of natural resources an individual, a community, or a country consumes in a given year. Each person living on this planet has a huge impact on how this earth is today.

I took a quiz and thought it was extremely interesting. It asked me what country I lived in, how much meat I ate a week, what kind of house I lived in, how often I use my car and do I carpool, and how often do I fly each year.  At the end, the results told me that if everyone lived a lifestyle like mine, we would need 5.4 planet earths to provide enough resources. This was a huge eye opener for me. I realized I should be more cautious to my everyday lifestyle choices such as what I eat and how much I drive.

After being in Environmental Health for a couple weeks I have already started to change some of my daily routines I felt I should change because of the environment. This quiz really made me realize its not just about recycling, its about driving, eating, flying, living in a house.

Welcome to Carrie's Environment

                                                       Welcome to Carrie's Environment!

My name is Carrie Jones. I am a Junior at UMD with a Community Health major and a Psychology minor. I love to work out, hang out with family and friends, travel, and cruise around the lake. This is the second blog I have ever made, so I am still new to blogs. I have already learned a lot of new and exciting things. My blog is going to be about tdifferent things we can do to help the environment such as recycling everything that needs to be recycled, car pool, and use the reusable bags for the grocery store. My main goal is to start drinking a lot more water so I am going to buy a reusable water bottle instead of throwing the plastic ones away every day. :)



There are 6 possible types of posts on my blog. They include:

1. Advocacy Project
2. Eye Openers
3. Reflections
4. Eco-Chic Lifestyle Change
5. Read 'n' Seed
6. Share and Voice

If you notice at the bottom of this post, the categories will be listed as labels. This post is has been labeled with all five kinds of posts.


       1.Carrie  http://carriesenviornment.blogspot.com/
       2. Kayla http://kaylasgreenland.blogspot.com/
       3. Danielle S http://daniellesdandyenvironment.blogspot.com/
       4. Rita  http://ritasrealm.blogspot.com/

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I plan on learning a lot in Environmental Studies and I Know that my "bad habbits" will start to change very quickly and I will try to educate my friends, family, and other peers on what I can to help change the environment.

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