As you may already know, the first step to obtaining a feng shui life is to rid your home and yourself of all the stale and dead energy around you by getting rid of all the clutter. One really good way to do that is by having a yard sale.

There are many great reasons for having a yard sale. Some people have yard sales before they move so they don’t have to pack and ship belongings they aren’t using. Sometimes they are updating the look of their home and sell their old belongings to make money and room for the new ones. Sometimes your children just grow like weeds and rapidly outgrow both their clothes and their toys. It could also simply be the desire to purge all those items you’ve held onto for so long, thinking you’d find a use for them but never did.

No matter what your reason, having a yard sale is a relatively easy goal to achieve and requires just a few hours of preparation and a few more hours actually selling your wares. You’ll reap both financial and emotional rewards from it. Getting rid of the clutter is your first step towards attaining a feng shui life.

Decide on a date for your yard sale. Visit your local liquor store for boxes or use heavy duty garbage bags to put the items for your sale into. Start by surveying the items you have. When you are going through your house, you will need to be brutally honest with yourself. If you haven’t used it, don’t like it, don’t see yourself using it or don’t know of anyone personally who could benefit from it, then it’s a yard sale item. Sort through every dresser and kitchen drawer, every clothes and linen closet, every cupboard and toy box you have in your house. Don’t forget your basement, attic, pantry, entertainment center, buffet and outdoor tool shed as well. Get your family involved so that if an item belongs to one of them you won’t be making the decision for them. Get their input before placing an item in your yard sale box. Regardless of the time it takes to sort through all your items, make the commitment to stick with it and remind yourself on a continual basis the monetary profit and emotional relief you’ll feel once your clutter has been cleared from your home.

Once the sale is over, make another commitment to yourself not to bring the unsold items back into your home. Make arrangements with your local charity thrift store to donate the items. Most will be happy to make arrangements to pick up large donations. If you don’t have a local charity who will pick up the items just use my method and put a big “FREE” sign out at the end of the day. You will not believe how fast those items will disappear and it will save you a trip to the second hand store or from being tempted to bring the items back into the house.

Once it’s all said and done, you’ll have a few extra dollars in your pocket, and can breathe an emotional sigh of relief that the clutter that’s been weighing you down for so long has been purged from your home. Renew your commitment to remain organized and to combat the clutter on a continual basis.

About the Author:

Visit my Alternative Medicine website featuring Feng Shui life and Herbal Remedy Medicines, Chinese Herbal Medicine and much more: http://www.AlternativeMedicineBasics.com Sign up for my newsletter at altmedbasics@ getresponse.com

Buy the Book: Yard Sale
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Now we can go back outside (if we believe the sun is dangerous to begin with) or at least avoid a sunburn, with the help of Skin Deep’s new sunscreen report. Skin Deep cuts through the mystery ingredients and thousands of brands to bring us a simple and easy to understand rating system for beauty and personal care products.

Zero is the safest product rating they offer, 1 the second safest and so on, with 10 being the most hazardous. Stick with zeros and ones and you will have no problem. The ten safest sunscreens they report are:

1. (0)Keys Soap Solar Rx Therapeutic Sunblock, SPF 30
2. (0)Trukid Sunny Days Facestick Mineral Sunscreen UVA/UVB Broad Spectrum, SPF 30+
3. (0)California Baby Sunblock Stick No Fragrance, SPF 30+
4. (0) Badger Sunscreen, SPF 30
5. (1) Marie Veronique Skin Therapy Sun Serum
6. (1) Lavera Sunscreen Neutral, SPF 40
7. (1) Vanicream Sunscreen, SPF 35
8. (1) UV Natural Sunscreen, SPF 30+
9. (1) Sun Science Sport Formula, SPF 30
10. (1) Soleo Organics Sunscreen all natural Sunscreen, SPF 30+

Check out the Sunscreen Report for 2008 at Skin Deep to learn more about specific products and the top 10 recommended brands.

Author: Cindy Heller

Setting up backyard gardens is the surest way to invite butterflies into your home. If you happen to have a big space at the back of your home, it would be a good idea for you and your family to start planning for your backyard gardens. Buy some books and magazines about backyard gardens to help you and your family to design your gardens in such a way that it will look inviting to different species of butterflies.

Designing Your Backyard Gardens
There are many things that you need to consider when designing your backyard garden. First, you need to take into consideration the present condition of your backyard. If you backyard already have existing plants, you need to take an inventory of the plants and decide which ones you are going to keep and which ones have to go.

The second thing that you need to consider when designing your backyard garden is your budget. You need to ask yourself how you can afford to spend on your backyard garden. To know how much money you can spare for your garden, check your monthly income and savings against your usual monthly expenses. Make sure that you do not drain your finances just to make your backyard garden look beautiful. Yes, a beautiful backyard garden is important but you don’t really have to go broke just to create a lovely picture at the back of your home.

The third thing that you need to consider when designing your backyard garden is the type of plant that you need. If you want to invite butterflies into your garden, you need to use plants that are attractive to butterflies. Some plants that are attractive to butterflies are milkweed, aspen, chokecherry, dill, parsley, marigold, aster, lilac, cottonwood, pansy, clover and others. To attract a variety of butterflies into your backyard, try planning different types of plants. Add native plants into your list of planting materials. Native plants are good at attracting species of butterflies that are endemic in your area.

“Butterfly gardens can be any size - a window box, part of your landscaped yard, or even a wild untended area on your property. When planning your butterfly garden, the following pointers will help. Learn the common butterfly species in your vicinity and include both their adult nectar plants and caterpillar food plants in the garden. Adult butterflies will visit for a longer period if they find plants to lay their eggs on.” Butterfly–garden.com

Nothing signals the coming of spring more than butterflies flitting through your yard. Watching them waltz from flower to flower can bring endless pleasure. If you want to entice more of these colorful guests to your yard, consider planting a butterfly garden. A butterfly garden that is planned and planted correctly will bring a wide variety of butterflies to your yard year after year.

Butterfly Gardens Are Diverse
There are many types of butterflies in the world and each type prefers specific flowers to gain nutrients, lay their eggs, and feed their young. If you want your butterfly garden to attract many different kinds of butterflies, make sure that you plant many different kinds of flowers. Scientists aren’t sure why, but they have found that certain color butterflies prefer certain kinds of plants. Perhaps they are drawn to like colors for their camouflaging abilities or perhaps certain colored plants taste better to them than others. Whatever the reason, you will see many different butterflies in you butterfly garden, if you plant many different plants.

Some wonderful plants to include in butterfly gardens are coneflower, blackeyed susan, marigolds, butterfly bush, lantana, hibiscus, verbena, lilacs, lavender, and rosemary.

Butterfly Gardens Provide Shelter
There are butterfly predators in your neighborhood and as a result, butterfly gardens should contain suitable shelters for your winged friends. A butterfly hutch is the perfect safe resting place for the butterflies in your garden. You can purchase one at a local nursery or even make one yourself. You can leave it plain or decorate it in a whimsical fashion. The main things to look for in a good butterfly hutch are slits that are big enough to let the butterflies in but too small for nasty predators to gain access and an interior that contains pieces of bark for the butterfly to nest on.

Butterfly Gardens Give Nourishment

If you want a butterfly garden that will attract many butterflies and nourish your soul make sure you provide food and water for the many butterflies that will descend on your yard. Many of the flowers you plant will provide nectar for your butterflies, but you can also help nature along by providing feeders full of sugar water. You can even leave out little bits of sugar water in saucers scattered around your plants or place a piece of over ripe fruit in your garden to attract many butterflies. Butterflies also need water, so placing a small birdbath in your garden is a great idea.

“Butterfly gardens are a great source for your own enjoyment, photo opportunities, or an outlet for artistic talent. These gardens can also be extended to interest youth in nature, by providing a small window of native inhabitants of the local environment. On a final note, it’s important to conserve butterflies when possible since their habitat is constantly diminishing due to the increasing needs and consequent development of roads and housing.” How to Make Butterfly Gardens

About the author:
Cindy Heller is a professional writer. Visit one stop gardens to learn more about flowers and gardens for preschool children and other gardens with flowers

• Red Composting Worms
• Rubbermaid Bin
• Worm bedding such as old leaves, grass clippings or shredded newspapers

You can put it under your sink, feed it anything compostable, do your part to save the environment and get some excellent fertilizer for your lawn or garden (for free).

By promoting eco-friendly products such as organic cotton, organic wool, corn fibers, recycled fabrics, biopolymers, natural dyes to industry and consumers, we can prove that style and sustainability can coexist - creating market demand and improving our environment and health.

earthpledge.org

At January 31, FutureFashion show at Gotham Hall, the industry’s top designers, including Marc Jacobs, Narciso Rodriguez, Doo-Ri and Stella McCartney, created and exhibited one-of-a-kind looks using materials such as organic cotton and cashmere. Fashion’s most famous faces, including Jessica Stam, Irina Lazareanu and show organizer Shalom Harlow, walked a sustainably-harvested wooden catwalk that will eventually serve as dinner tabletop

View the full article, “Heard on the Runway” at the WSJ