I love NPR. I love Celebrate Green. I don’t love birthdays so much (all that work) but I know my son Cedar loves them. In any case, smoosh NPR, Celebrate Green, and birthday parties together and you get a killer interview with Celebrate Green authors Corey Colwell-Lipson and Lynn Colwell plus regular mama contributor to NPR Jelene Ivey about how to plan a low-cost, eco-friendly, imaginative birthday party for your kids.

Some of the handy tips include:

A cardboard box maze.
Buying thrift store plates and cups instead of paper then re-donating them when the party is over (just as cheap as paper …read more

If you follow me on Twitter, then you know from my TwitPic that Sunday I was making Old School Chicken and Sausage Jambalaya from the new cookbook Real Cajun by Donald Link. It was fabulous, by the way. Worth every second of standing by the skillet while I deglazed and deglazed and deglazed.
I think cool, rainy, lazy Sundays call for slow-cooked and fussy meals. Warm, sunny days, of course, demand something grilled. And once Pepper Place farmers market opens here, we’ll have locally grown fresh vegetables all weekend long. (Last year I did a Summer Soup Series with a new …read more

On NPR this morning there was a segment on “smart drugs” or “study drugs” on college campuses. This isn’t a new issue, but it’s still an important issue. One that we need to continually talk to our college-age kids about.
College students are using Adderall (or it’s cousin Ritalin) to help them study. Adderall and Ritalin are commonly prescribed to kids with Attention-deficit disorder (ADD or ADHD). It helps a person stay on task, boosts concentratioin, and helps him/her stay focused. All things college students are looking for when studying for a big test.
One girl said “Addy” (as college students often …read more