The Carnival of All Things Eco is up at Focus Organic.
Not the Jet Set has a review of Home Depot’s FreshAire brand no-VOC paint. I just noticed this paint last time I was at Home Depot – I don’t think it was there in early 2007 when I painted the interior of our house. I would consider the extra $10/gallon to be worth it. What about you?
And sticking with the paint theme, I came across this article about paint swaps (thanks to Twitter) by Derek Markham. My parents live near two Habitat for Humanity Restores that sell partially-used cans of paint. Swapping or selling or donating it is a far better use for old paint than just letting it solidify for years in your garage while people are out buying gallons of new custom paint and only needing a quart. We repainted our front door a couple years ago, and had to buy a gallon of paint in order to custom match the color to the storm door we had picked up at the Habitat thrift store. Three quarters of the can of paint is still sitting in our garage. I’m thinking that I could fill a canning jar with paint from that bucket (for touch ups, if needed) and pass the rest on to a paint swap.
If you’ve got something you need to paint, you might want to look for a Restore or a paint swap first, before you drop big bucks for a new can of paint and only end up needing half of it.
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Getting paint at Restore is a great way to save money and resources. Also, my sister gave me the idea of mixing two cans of paint together to create a new color for small projects. Say you have a little green paint and a little yellow paint left over from something else–you can mix them together, creating a greenish-yellow, and paint a shelf or something. Obviously you cannot mix vinyl and oil paints together, though.
We just added you to our blogroll over at the Green Baby Guide. I’m sorry it took us this long–we love your ideas!
Rebecca – thanks for the idea!