Garden Markers By Libby

Garden Markers By  www.LoveLibbyX.etsy.com

 These beautiful pieces of cutlery have been turned into the perfect plant markers. I hand stamp these with whatever words you would like......they are great for marking herbs, vegetables and flowers, or add a special message for someone. These will add a touch of magic to your garden, boarder, pots, hanging baskets or your kitchen and window-sill pot-plants.

Vegan Spell Kits

Vegan Spell Kits made by our resident vegan faes, Moon and Raven.

www.MMRitual.etsy.com

 

Eco Friendly Grocery Shopping!

Eco friendly grocery shopping can be fun!  The Vegan Etsy team makes environmentalism fun and stylish with these cool finds:

Grocery List Notepad from This Is It:

Snail Tote Bag from Sick on Sin:

Reusable Produce Bags from Johnson Family Zoo:

-Kala (Vegancraftastic)

Vegan Etsy Team Member(s) of the Week: Jodi and Dan of This Is It! Creations!

This Is It! Creations is made up of Jodi and Dan – a husband and wife team who have been creating eco products together since 2005. They are both vegan and huge animal lovers, and feel extremely grateful to work together putting products into the world that they are both proud of.

When did you open your Etsy shop, and how did you choose its name?
We opened in September 2007 and chose the username thisisit because our company is called “This Is It! Creations.” We named our company that for a couple of reasons – it’s how we feel about each other, and it’s also the last job we ever plan to have.

What kinds of items do you sell in your shop, and what inspired you to start creating them?
We make ecogifts that inspire – journals, notebooks, notepads, jewelry, and cards. I have always been crafty and used to love making my friends personalized stationery sets. They always told me that I should do it as a business. Dan and I were tired of working at jobs where we had to be apart, so we decided to start a business together and see where it took us – and here we are five years later!

Do you donate through your shop to any charities or do any volunteer work?
We donate 5% of our profits to animal-welfare organizations. We also donate products to just about any animal charity that emails us and asks. We work with a lot of stores who have fundraisers throughout the year benefiting animals, and we also donate products to them.

What are some of your favorite things about Etsy?
The community. I have always felt so welcomed and supported on Etsy. I absolutely love being a part of such a wonderful site. I have met so many wonderful people through the Etsy teams – many have become my friends. I also love the forums, especially the business section. You can learn so much there! It’s also so exciting to see an Etsy order in my inbox!

Do you sell your items outside of Etsy, either online or in retail shops?
We do! Before we started selling on Etsy, we were a wholesale company selling to stores across the country (and a few abroad). Our products are currently sold in over 150 stores. We are almost finished with our website, which will have both a retail and a wholesale shopping cart. And we’re super excited that we were just juried into an amazing local craft show that runs every weekend from now until November! If you are in the area, come see us at the Lithia Artisans Market in Ashland, Oregon!

Have you been featured anywhere?
We have! We’ve been very blessed with love and support from many people. It’s always a thrill to see that we have been featured on someone’s blog or in a magazine. We’ve had our products featured in many places, from New Age Retailer and Niche magazines to Tyra Banks’ website. I get so excited about all of them!

How long have you been vegan, and what made you go vegan?
I went vegan for the animals. I did it in stages; I stopped eating red meat and pork 15 years ago. I stopped eating all other animal products 8 years ago because I would cry every time I ate meat. I learned about factory farming and knew that I could not eat dairy products either. About 3 years ago I learned that there were animal ingredients in the beauty products that I was using – even some products that are considered “cruelty free” still can have animal ingredients. This was a shock to me! Since then I make sure that everything I buy has the cute little bunny logo on it. Dan went veg when he was 16 and vegan at 19, solely for the animals.

What are your favorite foods?
Dan and I adore Indian food – I just wish I could make it like they do at my favorite restaurants! I seriously could eat it every day forever and be so happy. I also have a huge sweet tooth. I just made chocolate chip cookies today! Dan and I were having trouble with our thyroids a couple of years ago from eating too much soy. We have been soy free for the last eighteen months and feel so much better!

Do you have any favorite vegan things, like books, websites, stores, etc.?
I love trading on Etsy – it’s so much fun! I get a lot of my vegan bath and body products from trading. We have a great store here in Medford, Oregon called Food for Less – it has tons of veg products. Since we gave up soy, we’ve had to give up most of the processed veg foods that we used to love, and now we cook mainly from scratch. It’s ended up being a good thing!

What other kinds of hobbies and interests do you have?
I really had to think about this one because we’ve been working so hard for so long on our business that we haven’t had much time for anything else. When I do listen to the advice on our journals and remember to breathe and find balance, I love to sing! Dan is a writer and a musician. We get to make music together, which is so much fun. We also love to bowl together. We have an air hockey table that has gotten a bit dusty, but it’s so much fun when we do play! I love sitting down and watching a good TV show at the end of a long day. And going to the movies is always fun! I also like to cook – I am actually writing a vegan cookbook using everyday ingredients. This has been in the works for awhile now, but I promise that it will be available someday!

Do you have any animal companions?
We have 3 furry kids: a sweet dog-ter, Xena (a Norwegian Elkhound) and 2 sweet kitties – Biddle and Buncom. They all provide countless hours of joy and entertainment for us. At the moment, we also have 3 steers (thanks to all of you who helped us rescue them!) that we are hoping to transport to a sanctuary near Seattle this month. We have to move and will no longer have the land to keep them here, but a very generous sanctuary, Passado's Safe Haven, has agreed to take them if we can raise the money to get them there. Fingers crossed that we’ll be able to do it!

Do you have any future plans for your shop?
We do! We’re always working on new products, such as magnets and scrolls, and we’re also making more interactive journals! We are super excited about all of this. We just need to find a few more hours each day to have extra time to finish them and list them!

Is there anything else you would like to add or share?
I just wanted to thank everyone on this team (as well as on EFA and EtsyVeg) who has been so supportive toward us and our company over the years. It means the world to me how we all came together to save the steers from slaughter, how you include our products in your treasuries, blog about us, and just support us in general. Much love to all of you!

Editor's note: YOU can help get the steers to their permanent sanctuary! Click here to view the ChipIn page for more details, or click on the ChipIn widget in the right hand side bar of this blog. Every donation counts!

Two vegans, two years, one wedding - The Saga, part 5.May I have the ring, please?

This is the fifth installment of an as of yet unknown quantity of posts about Melissa Bastian's wedding nonsense, to be posted on the first Monday of each month.

Engagement. The guy asks the girl, and there's only one way to do it. He gets down on one knee, opens up a box that holds a ridiculously huge diamond ring, and "pops the question."

Right? Wrong! And thank goodness. Maybe for some couples this is the ideal scene, and if it works for them, fabulous. But for many of us this might as well be straight out of science fiction. (Guy and girl? One knee? Diamond?!!) Where did this little piece of drama get whipped up from anyway?

Timeless tradition like your mama (and the television and all the magazine industry) says? 'Fraid not. While the exchange of rings may be multicultural as a symbol of friendship, love, and yes, engagement, the diamond engagement ring thing is actually the product of advertising. I know you'll be just shocked to hear it, but the campaign was trying to sell - *gasp!* - diamonds! Yes, that's right. The DeBeers "Diamonds are Forever" ad campaign, which started in 1938, is the only reason that we so staunchly believe that diamond = engagement.

Yup, 1938. Tradition? That's not even a hundred years! But it's long enough that pretty much anyone who actually got married before it started has probably passed on, and as a species we have awfully short memories. While I enjoy the idea and symbolism of exchanging rings with the one you love, I distinctly do *not* appreciate the whole diamond engagement ring shtick. First of all, in case you're not aware, the diamond industry is absolutely rife with human rights and ecological atrocities. I'm not going to go into depth here, but seriously, look it up. (To scratch the surface, I'm just going to give you two words: child soldiers.) It is possible to source "conflict-free" diamonds, but in general only independent artisans tend to do so. (Like some of the fine craftspeople on Etsy, for example.)

There are also some real socioeconomic implications here. For example: what, only people who can afford a diamond solitaire are worthy of the rite of marriage? Talk about your elitist nonsense. This concept is only heightened by yet another ad campaign, also started by good old DeBeers (don't you love these guys?), stating that an engagement ring should cost two months' worth of the asker's salary. To which I say, are you effing kidding me?! Artist Lee Gainer recently explored this absurdity in her eponymous series, which depicts what types of rings this might mean to hopefuls of various employments.

Besides these major shortcomings, there's just something very exclusionary about the whole diamond ring thing - even beyond monetary considerations. It assumes so many things. Such as that 1) the asker is always a man, 2) he is always asking a woman, and 3) she's always a woman who will just swoon at the thought of wearing a giant diamond. If that's what you want, this system works just fine for you. But what if it isn't?

I'd say that there are plenty of us who want something different. I'd say it's well past time to forge new ground. (And of course, many people already have.)

I have to say, if Jonathan had even suggested spending two months of his salary on a piece of freaking jewelry, I would have asked him if he had gone completely out of his mind. Of course, he never would have. He's too practical for that, and knows me better than to think I would want it. Yeah, I did want a nice sparkly engagement ring. I admit it, and I'm not ashamed. But we have some serious ethics when it comes to what we consume, so deciding how to go about choosing an engagement ring was no small task.

Our first thought was to go vintage. Great! No new materials used, nothing being wasted, no risk of purchasing a conflict diamond or other unethically obtained gemstones, right? I wish. Vintage rings are really, really popular these days, and unfortunately when a market becomes popular it often also becomes tainted. First off, you have to be terribly careful to make sure you're getting a ring that's actually old and not one that's just a remake of an old design. Second, sometimes it's an old setting with a new stone - and then you're into conflict diamond territory. Third, even among jewelers who sell genuine vintage and antique pieces, they generally also sell new things. So while you may not personally be buying a gem of dubious origin, you're still supporting a business that is working in that market. Basically, it's a mine field, and in short time our vintage plan was scrapped.

Fortunately, we came upon GreenKarat. Based out of Texas, this company deals only in lab-created stones and recycled precious metals. Purchasing from them, we knew that we wouldn't be supporting anything that we were ethically opposed to. Plus, their rings are gorgeous! My ring does have two diamonds in it, plus one sapphire. But since all the stones are lab-created, not only are they worry-free but they're also cool colors! The diamonds are light blue and the sapphire is only slightly darker. The stones are set in recycled white gold, so no mining there either. We're happy with our choice, and I love my ring.

Photo Credit: J. Matthew Turner

Somehow, though, through this whole process I never realized how many great engagement ring choices are right under my nose on Etsy! I guess when we first started talking about getting engaged I hadn't become a full-fledged Etsy addict yet. But poppets. I've been checking it out lately, and man are there some fantastic options! Let's explore, shall we?

{Note: for the sake of simplicity I have sometimes used male pronouns for the giver of a ring and female pronouns for the receiver in the following section. But let me make utterly clear that I wholeheartedly support the right of all couples regardless of orientation to celebrate their love with the bond of marriage (legally if they so choose, darnit!), and also have the utmost respect for the bolder-than-me ladies who propose to their men. Celebrate your love, peoples! And send pictures! Wedding pictures always make me cry, in a good way.}

So. OK, I get it. You're a classic kind of couple, and you like the look of a white diamond. But you also have ethical concerns about diamond mining, and don't want to break the bank before you even start planning the wedding! So how about this shining, elegant ring from Silverwoods? Featuring a sparkling white sapphire in a lightly hammered sterling silver setting, this solitaire is sure to please and will never become boring.

Did the two of you fall in love during your endless summer nights together, lying on the beach perhaps or strolling through fields of grass, and staring up at the moon? Let her know you'll never forget those precious times by proposing with The Jewelry Pitt's Rainbow Moonstone Ring. Moonstone is such an awesome stone, and one believed to impart protection. What better to give to the one you love best?

So maybe you like the idea of a solitaire, but want something a little bolder? Maybe you share a mutual love for the color blue. Either way, this giant "London Blue" topaz will probably do the trick. The seller, One Garnet Girl, makes sure to mention that the photos of the ring haven't been edited for color - that's all the rock. Which is probably why she has named this ring "Rock Love". Appropriate name? As a girl with a minor in geology, I vote yes. (Geology rocks!)

Want to tell mom you're getting hitched but don't know how to break the news? If you've got this on your finger, it's pretty likely that she's going to take notice. And so will everyone else! This stone is actually a lab-created sapphire in a little-seen orange-amber color called Padparadscaha. Thank you, Doug Peterson Jewelers, for showing up with such a showy number. So saturated! So saucy! This ring is definitely a showstopper, and is sparked off nicely by being set in gold. And anyway, why be shy? You're getting married honey! You're in love! Flaunt that thing, and be happy!

Well, maybe a huge flashy stone just isn't your thing at all. Maybe you want something subtle, but intricate and elaborate. Something that reflects all of the beautiful delicacies of the relationship you share with your partner. No problem, says I. Etsy and I have you covered too. How perfect is this Lilac Branch ring from Sarah Hood Jewelry? The word stunning comes to mind. Difficult to wear alongside a wedding band, maybe, but then who's to say that it can't be your wedding band? Nobody, that's who.

Looking for a ring with a central feature that isn't a stone? If you want something extraordinary and delicate and fascinating, you can't beat the metal crochet work of Hilary Koster. I don't know about you, but I've never seen anything like it! A piece from this shop could be a particularly good choice if your partner is one of the many who have recently realized that activities like knitting, crochet work, and needlepoint are actually pretty rad. She'll know you've been paying attention. (You'll know he's been paying attention!)

What about something that looks like a stone, but isn't one? There are a couple of Etsy shops making really amazing rock-like pieces that I simply can't get over. My two big favorites are Macha Jewelry out of London making sort of rough cut numbers in her "Rockwell" line, and the ultra-polished "Modern Rock" line coming out of Metalicious. These are very similar concepts with very, very different executions, and I personally think both takes are brilliant. An acquaintance of mine recently received one of the Macha Rocwells, actually - along with a proposal from the love of her life, awww - and believe me when I tell you that she is more than happy with her partner's choice of ring. (Naturally she would have been thrilled to be proposed to by him regardless of whether he'd offered her a piece of tin foil instead. But hey, who doesn't enjoy a pretty ring attached to a wonderful sentiment?)

Here is a truly interesting number for someone like me who is obsessed with symmetry and line. Unique in the truest sense of the word, the seller tells us that she has never made and will never make another one! As she puts it, "It's a little bit geeky and a little bit retro and is completely unisex." Fabulous! It's a tiny size 5 at the moment, but if you need it bigger (or smaller, for someone with very tiny hands?) she's willing to size it free of charge. And you can feel particularly good about purchasing from Apache Moon, as she donates 100% of every sale to animal rescue and sanctuary. Talk about good karma - the perfect way to start off the lifetime bond with the one you love.

Let's get beyond the idea that an engagement ring even needs to have a central stone or focus piece. Why not a solid band to represent your solid bond? (Sorry, these things just come to me. I can't help it.) How about this stunning and unique piece from Gretchen von Eberstein? If your lover is a creative artsy type or just has a inclination toward interesting shapes, how can she not love this ring - and you (even more) for giving her something so special?

I'm in love with a shop, and it's called singleB: beautiful. She makes what's beautiful! Her rings are just, I dunno, spiffy. Like, for instance, check out these Twin Stars Bands. How cool are these? (Bonus: if you're anywhere near of my generation, you're probably thinking about those goofy cartoon icons right now. Hee.) Propose to each other why don't ya? Then use the rings as your wedding bands. Who says you need two different rings anyway? His and hers? His and his? Hers and hers? Pretty much regardless of the setup, it just works. Star crossed lovers? Hardly. More like a match made in heaven.

The aptly named Union Ring by Naturaleza makes a bold statement. You love each other. You're dedicated to each other. And now you're getting married. Yes. Yes. Yes. Clean and sleek, this ring can be ordered in any ring size and is hand carved "from the rich black coyol seed" and then inlaid with silver. A seed from which a great tree can grow? Go ahead. Make the analogy. You know you want to. This seller is quite dedicated to sustainability and environmentalism - just like you and your partner, right?

Believe it or not, even with these dozen gorgeous choices I've only just begun to scratch the surface of all the great engagement ring alternatives that Etsy has to offer. Go have a look for yourself! Enjoy! Remember that this is about you and your partner - NOT about what DeBeers or your mom or your office mates or even your best friends think an engagement ring "should" be. Find something that you love, something that reflects the values you hold as a couple. Once you let go of the notions which were forced upon you without you even noticing, finding the right symbol of your love isn't actually as hard as you think.

Don't want to go it alone? Lots of couples pick out rings together these days. Why not use this adorable Pink Rose ring from Starrlight Jewelery to pop The Question, and then look for the ring together? I promise that when a proposal of a lifetime together is made with sincerity, no one will be disappointed.

Until next Monday,

hearts,
Melissa Bastian

A BIG smile from a little dog.

Here is Maggie. She's getting on a bit now, as her grey hair shows. She's a bundle of fluff on legs. She was brought home from an animal shelter. She had been treated very cruelly and didn't know what it was like to go for walks, or sit on a sofa, or run around. Those days are a long time ago now. Just one look at her happy smiling face tells me how secure she feels, and how much she enjoys her life now. My precious little Maggie is so cute. She likes to sit on my lap, facing outwards, so she can see the room and all that's going on. She can be a cheeky little madam when we're out, and thinks nothing of going up to big dogs and barking (well yapping really), then running to hide behind me. She makes us laugh.
A couple of times a year, I get her coat cut, as it's very unruly. She then looks like a little teddy bear, and it seems to change her personality, she behaves like a puppy. Maybe she's glad to get all the weight off her. I'll post a picture when she's next 'clipped'. The 'salon' we go to, is lovely. The people who work there are very friendly, and love dogs. And the dogs love going there. They seem to know when they are going there, as they jump out of the car and run up to it, tails wagging. Not at all like when we they go to the vets.
Ah, Happy Days :)

Aunt Flos Pads my brand spankin new etsy handmade shop!

My reusable menstrual items were taking over Holistically Heather, and we are in the process of selling my pads at a few co-op groceries in the area. So we figured, no better time than now to start a seperate website for our reusables!

Never tried reusables? Here are a few things people have said about my pads:

So soft and comfortable

I forgot I had a the hemp fleece pad on, it is like sitting on a pillow

Thank you so much for the exceptional service! The pads are perfect & very well made. I couldn't be happier! Shipping was fast, I got all of the information I needed for using & cleaning them and all of my questions were quickly answered. Thank you so much!!!

Just a few responses to give you an idea!

What do I offer in my new shop? Where can you find it?
In my new shop you will find a variety of reusable menstrual items: pantyliners, all in one pads, envelope style pads (where you can adjust the thickness based upon flow, and pull apart all sections to wash individually), cramp pillows you can heat up or keep in the freezer, and coming next week organic cramp massage oil!!

Aunt Flos Pads

Mention Vegan Etsy Team in notes to seller, wait for a revised invoice and receive 10% off your entire order!!!!