Art | Resources
Non-Toxic Mascara Recommendation?
Question from wt
hello,
i’m looking for a non-toxic mascara that WON’T MAKE MY LASHES DROOP. my lashes are relatively thin, and anything heavy will cause them to droop in a heartbeat. is there such a forumula?
would appreciate a recommendation.
thank you!
Debra’s Answer
My lashes are thick, so I’ve never experienced this. Readers…?
Dishwashing soap
Question from S.L.
On your website under the section “At Home With Debra . . . How I Really Live” you say that you use an unscented liquid soap that you got as a bonus to clean your dishes and countertops. I’m wondering if you’ve run out of that original supply and if so, what do you use now?
Debra’s Answer
We’re still using the dish soap we got with our water softener. Some other products I have used in the past to wash my dishes include Dr. Bronner liquid soaps (now made from organically-grown ingredients) and a dishwashing liquid I got at Williams-Sonoma that they don’t carry any more, which was scented with kitchen fragrances, such as sweet basil and meyer lemon. When we run out of what we have, I’ll probably go back to Dr. Bronner.
Need Help With Kitchen Reno!
Question from V. L.
I find myself overwhelmed with choices for an eco kitchen reno. It seems that either solid wood cabinetry or cabinet boxes made of strawboard with solid wood
fronts are the only eco options. I’ve tried re-covering used cabinets from the paper, but they are always in really bad shape.
Further, are granite or soapstone the best environmental options for countertops, and doesn’t it depend on the granite’s source?
My kitchen is falling apart and I’m afraid to take one step forward!
Thanks for any help you can offer, and I really love your newsletter.
Debra’s Answer
There ARE are lot of choices for eco kitchens, more even than you list.
Building page of Debra’s List has a great article that outlines all the possibilities for countertops, and gives some resources. The best environmental option isn’t necessarily granite or soapstone–I once redid my entire kitchen with salvage gray marble slabs at $5 a square foot. Eco-options for countertops include tiles made from various recycled materials, too.
Both your choices for cabinetry sound fine. There are more options–such as metal cabinets, but wood is much more aesthetic. Consider having cabinets custom-built. I know that sounds expensive, but I had a local cabinetmaker build all the cabinets in my California kitchen with solid wood and my choice of finish, and the total cost installed was less than if I had purchased particleboard cabinets from Home Depot. So check around.
There are no single products that are “the best” choice for everyone. In a personal one-on-one phone consultation, I can help you choose the kitchen reno products that are right for you.
Safety of Rubbing Alcohol
Question from D. M.
I came across a recipe for a homemade shower cleaner using equal parts water, vinegar, rubbing alcohol and a couple drops of liquid dish detergent. Is rubbing alcohol a non toxic ingredient to use for cleaning?
Thanks for your reply and I am looking forward to receiving your e-newsletter as I’m always looking for non toxic ways to take care of our home and ourselves. I make some cleaning and body care products myself. Any that I have to buy I get from the health store and I check those ingredient labels!!
Thanks also for what you do to help educate people and make the environment cleaner and greener.
Debra’s Answer
I don’t consider rubbing alcohol to be a nontoxic ingredient to use for cleaning. The chemical name for rubbing alchol is isopropyl alcohol. The Material Safety Data Sheet (MSDS) for isopropyl alcohol says “No significant effects beyond minor irritation are expected” for skin exposure, but if some accidentally gets splashed in the eye it can cause “Severe irritation and discomfort” and “Reversible and/or irreversible corneal damage may occur”.
From inhalation, “Respiratory tract irritation and/or headaches possible. Significant systemic toxic effects are likely following repeated exposure to high concentrations.”
I’m concerned about using isopropyl especially as a shower cleaner, as a shower is a small area with little ventilation. Therefore you would have a greater chance of inhaling a higher concentration of the alcohol.
I think your recipe would work without the rubbing alcohol. If you have problems with soap scum buildup, your water is probably too hard. Rather than using a toxic chemical, you could get a salt-free water conditioner from Go Beyond Organic.
Nontoxic Lice Shampoo
This product was sent to me by a reader.
Lice R Gone ¨ is an enzyme based product that “has such low toxicity it is essentially harmless to people, pets, wildlife and crops…is completely biodegradable upon application…has no residual contamination…and is quick acting and totally effective against head lice and their nits.” It contains Purified water, anionic / nonionic surfactant blend, glycerin, enzymes, and peppermint oil.
FDA (GRAS) – Generally Regarded As Safe.
Order online at licergone.com/about.htm.
The Safety of Pewter (Old and New)
Question from M. C.
I have an antique pewter salt shaker I bought it at an antiques store in Boston in the 1950s, and gave it to my parents then–it is old, old. I use it at the stove when I add salt rarely to food I’m cooking. Is it safe? It seems to me it has a kind of sharp smell, and I don’t know if that is lead, or tin, or the salt. Any ideas?
Debra’s Answer
Old pewter is made from tin and lead, so I would assume yours contains lead. Since there is no safe level for lead exposure, I wouldn’t use it. Even though you use it only occasionally, in a way that is worse, for the salt has contact with the pewter for a longer period, giving it more opportunity to absorb any lead that may be leaching.
Modern pewter is lead-free and safe to use. It is made from 95% tin, plus copper and antimony. According to one manufacturer, “The products are guaranteed lead-free and quite safe to be used for all kinds of food and drink.”
I noticed that most pewter websites give no information on the pewter or its contents. Warnings are still given to watch out for pewter items which may contain lead. So if you are considering a purchase of pewter, ask if it contains lead.
Sofa Cushions
Question from M. G.
I purchased a used sofa and would like to replace the seat cushions. What can I use instead of foam?
Debra’s Answer
You could use natural latex foam like the kind used in beds or cotton or wool batting.
Many years ago, I replaced the foam cushions on a sofa with big pillows I made from cotton canvas stuffed with organic cotton batting. It worked just fine.
What Pillow Do You Sleep On?
Question from S. M.
We are curious – what pillows do you sleep on?
Debra’s Answer
Organic wool pillows from Shepherd’s Dream. I have slept on cotton and feather/down pillows, but when I tried wool, I fell in love with them. :- We have the standard size bed pillows and also the wool neck rolls. I love my neck roll so much I carry it with me when I travel. Even though I don’t have back or neck problems, I just sleep better with that extra support.
Floor Wax Stripper
Question from S. P.
I own a small janitorial company. My mother and my wife both experience symptoms of chemical sensitivity and over the past year I have been converting to all green products. I enjoyed your book on the non-toxic home and office. I liked the fact that instead of dwelling on negatives until the end of the book, you offer solutions right away to each issue.
In my business I have to strip and wax large floor areas, I have found some “green” products for this but many still contain up to 6% VOCs. Do you know of any truly natural alternatives for this?
Here are a couple of the companies I have found so far:
If you would like more info on the company I am working on please visit our site: All Green Cleaning.
Debra’s Answer
I took a look at the products you mentioned.
Coastwide Labs has a Sustainable Earth® Wax Stripper #83 that lists some hazardous ingredients on the MSDS, but then says that skin irritation is the only health hazard, which is minor. This product looks relatively safe for a wax stripper, but, as you say, has limited availability.
National Chemical Labs makes some interesting statements about how they are envrionmentally-friendly–fortunately they also give the Material Safety Data Sheets right on line for all of their products. They have a number of floor stripper products. All the MSDSs I looked at for them contained hazardous ingredients. Some of their other products, however, contain no hazardous ingredients. So it’s a matter of checking all the MSDSs to find the products with no hazardous ingredients.
There’s a company called Safe Source that makes a commercial-strength VOC-free floor finish and stripper. There are no MSDSs on the site, but it states, “The developer submitted its formulas to the relevant federal agencies, which determined on the basis of independent chemical evaluations that their cleaning products are not hazardous and therefore do not require [hazardous] labeling.” The site says the stripper is designed to work with their VOC-free finish. Contact them to see if it can be used with other waxes. You may need to use a more toxic stripper to remove existing wax, then you can use this finish and stripper.
You might also take a look at Green Seal Environmental Standard for Floor Care Products. Though there are no products listed, they do give guidelines for floor care products and a list of ingredients they do not approve, which would be easy to identify if they appeared on an MSDS.
Silicone baking mats vs parchment paper
Question from S. T.
Why do you recommend silicone baking mats? Isn’t cooking parchment safer?
Debra’s Answer
Cooking parchment also called parchment paper, kitchen parchment, greaseproof paper and cooking paper is a sheet of paper impregnated with silicone, which makes the paper grease- and moisture-resistant as well as relatively heat-resistant. It is commonly used to eliminate the need to grease baking pans–allowing, for example, repeated batches of cookies to be baked without regreasing the pans–and it can also be folded to make moisture-proof packages in which foods can cooked or steamed.
Parchment is made with bleached white and unbleached brown paper. Since the bleached paper might contain toxic dioxin, it’s better to use the unbleached parchment paper if you use it.
Silicone baking sheets are a sheet of silicone that can be reused over and over again.
Silcone is safe to use for baking and cooking, whether impregnated in paper or in a sheet by itself. Silicones are made chemically by creating a “backbone” of silicon from common sand, the same stuff from which glass is made and oxygen molecules, a combination that does not occur in nature. Then various other synthetic molecules are added branching off of the main silicon-oxygen line to create hundreds of different silicones that range from liquids to rubbery solids. Though this is a completely manmade product, it is completely inert and will not transfer to foods (more at Q&A: Is silicone cookware safe?).
I use both silicone baking sheets and parchment paper. I use my silicone baking sheets to line pans whenever I bake something which might stick. They have saved much time, effort and water from clean-up, and are much safer overall than using baking pans with other non-stick surfaces. I use parchment paper now only when I want to specifically use the cooking technique of baking in parchment, as when I make a recipe such as Fruits Baked in Parchment, or as a substitute for waxed paper waxed paper is covered with paraffin, a petrochemical wax.
The advantage I see to using silicone baking sheets over parchment is that they can be reused up to 2000 times. Though the mats cost more than parchment paper, there is a great savings overall. A box of unbleached parchment paper costs $5 and a silicone baking sheet costs $20, but a box of unbleached parchment paper will cover only 32 baking sheets, and a silicone baking mat will cover 2000 baking sheets. It would cost $310 to buy enough parchment paper to replace one silicone baking mat.
