From Joyce's Laptop: Summer Road Trip 2012

We're going on summer holiday!...

This year, the husband has 7 weeks of sabbatical from work (who gets that anymore??) and we didn't want to put our little guy into summer camp. So... I decided to close up shop for a couple months, and our little family is taking a cross country road trip to see all that this land has to see. We stuffed the kid into the back of our rental Prius V with all our bags and gear and headed southeast... first destination, Bryce Canyon.

I'll be posting plenty of pictures on Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest and invite you to follow along as we take this amazing cross country journey. I'll post a blog here and there as time and wi-fi availability allow.

*NOTE: At the time of this post, we are already on Day 5 of our trip. Unfortunately blogging is not going to be so easy from the road. Takes too long to get photos uploaded. Please follow on Facebook, Twitter or Pinterest!

Stuff We Found Today - 06.17.12

Nature's Best Animal Dads

Food Stuff

• DVD Inspires 12 Year-Old's "Slavery in Chocolate Making" - (Fair Trade Judaica) Awesome!
• Pressure mounts on Hershey to source 100% sustainable cocoa - (ConfectioneryNews.com) "Hershey has come under pressure from human right groups to source all its cocoa from certified farms that avoid child labor."
• The 10 Most Impressive College Farmers Markets - (Mother Nature Network) Guess we're going to have to check out the one in San Mateo, CA.

Beauty & Fashion Stuff

• 10 Eco-Fashion Garments Inspired by Nature and Biomimicry - (Ecouterre) Some pretty neat design...maybe not wearable but definitely artistic and cool to look at.

Nature & Environment Stuff

• Nature's 10 best animal dads - (Mother Nature Network) Too cute for words...
• Watch This Polar Bear Use a Stone to Shatter Its Zoo Enclosure - (TreeHugger) Uhhhh...because wild animals do not like to be confined perhaps??

International Stuff

• Australia Creates the World's Largest Marine Reserve! - (Inhabitat) "The reserve consists of a series of marine parks that cover more than one third of the Commonwealth waters of Australia..."
• Singapore's Spectacular Solar Supertrees Open this Month at the Gardens by the Bay! - (Inhabitat)
• Italian Firefighter House is Carved Into a Cave Like a Superhero Base! - (Inhabitat) Very, very cool!

Other Random Cool Stuff

• The innovation Generation: 30 fresh thinkers helping humanity adapt to what's next - (Mother Nature Network) One word... inspriational!!

Quote of the Week - 06.17.12

Laughter is an instant vacation.

- Milton Berle

A piece of Fair Trade chocolate is an instant vacation.

- Coco-Zen

Stuff We Found Today - 06.07.12

Solar-Powered Floating Green Resort

Family, Kids & Health Stuff

• Top 10 Toxins Suspected of Causing Autism - (Care2 Healthy Living)
• Top 10 Baby Registries for Green Moms-to-Be - (Inhabitots)
• Traces of Veterinary Drugs Found in Baby Food and Infant Formula - (Inhabitots) Great... another reason to buy organic, especially for your kids. After all, we eat what our foods eat!

Food Stuff

• Eating Chocolate Will Protect You From Skin Cancer - (GirlieGirl Army) Well, life just got a little better!

Home Stuff

• Verdant PicNYC Table is topped with Living Growing Grass - (Inhabitat) Like having a picnic in your dining room!
• Ryosuke Fukusada's Glowing  LED Wooden Light Bulb - (Inhabitat) Pretty cool.
• Sweden's Treehotel Now Selling Mirrorcube Treehouses - (Inhabitat) Now you can order one for yourself and have it installed in your backyard... haha!

Beauty & Fashion Stuff

• 10 Infographics on the Fashion Industry - (EcoSalon) These are interesting...especially the one that illustrates how much textile waste America generates each year.
• Gross or Glorious? Kerry Howley Turns Human Hair into Intricate Necklaces - (Ecouterre) Definitely artistic, but a little creepy.
• 14 Eco-Friendly Sunglasses to Protect Your Peepers - (Ecouterre)

Tech & Science Stuff

• 3D-Printed LED Lamps - (Inhabitat) These are so cool looking.

Nature & Environment Stuff

• Canada's tar sands could mean "Game Over for the Climate" - (NYTimes.com) "If we were to fully exploit this new oil source, and continue to burn our conventional oil, gas and coal supplies, concentrations of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere eventually would reach levels higher than in the Pliocene era, more than 2.5 million years ago, when sea level was at least 50 feet higher than it is now."
• [Video] Watch the Whole World Connect the Dots - (350.org) Climate change and extreme weather around the world.
• Arctic Seawater Leaking Methane: Big Pic - (Discovery News) Oh, just lovely...
• World's First Vegetarian Shark Prefers Heads of Lettuce - (TreeHugger) Apparently the trauma of getting a fish hook lodged in it's stomach was enough to scare this shark into never going after meat again.
• Fukushima Radiation Found in Bluefin Tuna in Calif. - (Time.com)
• Mo'ynoq's Desert Ships Are a Testament of Man's Impact on the Environment - (Inhabitat)

Arts, Entertainment & Travel Stuff

• Solar-Powered Floating Island is an Off-Shore Green Retreat - (Inhabitat) Now this is houseboating in style!

Political, Social & Economy Stuff

• International Cocoa Initiative partners with ILO to tackle child labour on cocoa farms - (ConfectioneryNews.com) Well, it's something.

Other Random Cool Stuff

• L.A. makes history with ban on plastic bags at stores - (LA Times) "Los Angeles became the largest city in the nation to approve a ban on plastic bags at supermarket checkout lines..." Cool!
• Survival Condo's Apocalypse-Proof Bunder Are Now Sold Out - (Inhabitat) Seriously????!!!