Limited choices, and you know something big is happening when it happens here

We have limited options at our in-town grocery and Wal*mart stores. You can find pretty much whatever you want, or at least what you need, but the selection isn't what it is at the larger (or smaller stores) in the town where we work.

It isn't so much the products that we can find (juice, soda, canned goods, frozen stuff, deli, produce, all of that), but rather the types of said products offered. Finding an organic brand of nearly anything at the local grocery is nearly impossible. But there are a few options for "natural" peanut butter. I think there is one barbeque sauce in the whole store that doesn't have high fructose corn syrup. And that says nothing of my poor uncle who has a recently diagnosed soy allergy: out of  wall of salad dressing, there were maybe 5 bottles he could eat. One was a spice packet where you add your own oil and vinegar. The others were locally produced brands.

Since I've just started making the leap to baking soda/vinegar for some cleaning needs (certainly not all - yet), this has presented a challenge for us.

What has been exciting as of late, is the emergence of more eco-friendly brands and variants on the shelves, and at prices that are at least comparable to the conventional ones. For example, dishwasher detergent. I picked up one of 2 bottles that declared itself eco-friendly with no phosphates and my husband rolled his eyes. "Are we really that rich that we can... oh, it isn't that expensive." True, a smaller bottle of the store brand was much cheaper, but every other option was within 50 cents of the bottle I picked. Some were even more expensive. Score!

Then, at Wal*Mart (groan if you must) Tom's of Maine is being stocked. I've read a few places (can't remember now, so apologies for no links) that some people are upset as a result of changes since they were bought by a larger company, but I'm still very happy to see 2 different toothpastes (one with and one without flouride), and at least 2 different Tom's deodorants (plus a Crystal liquid roll-on). As we needed toothpaste, we got some. Still using the deodorant I picked up at Trader Joe's in California while on a business trip. (Really, my checked bag on the way back from these trips is hilarious now - shampoo, deodorant, all sorts of organic and natural personal care products I can't find easily in my small town.)

Small victories, I know, but I get a small thrill buying these products at my local grocery and Wal*mart because I know that somewhere in the vastness of information and reporting, another ping is going towards the more eco-conscious shopper.

In an attempt at full disclosure, I initially wrote this in June 2011. I tweaked a few tenses here and there, and it is up-to-date.

China, the dishes, and stickers

On the way back home from our recent vacation, we did stop by my hometown to pick up my grandparent's dining set from my dad. We had rented a smallish moving truck for this, and ended up running out of room, so had to leave some furniture my mom was holding on to for us. Just another excuse to visit!

This is a full dining room set that my grandparents had purchased in the 1960s, as far as anyone can remember. So, it is a bit dated, but all the pieces are in good condition (thanks to my dad having them refinished after a water issue in his basement - they were in good condition before that, though), solidly built, and will last a good while. 

It is quite exciting because, I've got to tell you, that dining set has turned an empty space into a real dining room (as it would), and has made a huge difference, turning the house more into our home. Combine that with the face that I spent much of Sunday unboxing our wedding china (and peeling off labels and washing it all) to place in the china cabinet, it really is quite homey!

About our wedding china - since we were moving shortly after our wedding, and then in student housing, and, well, transient, for the first several years of our marriage, we didn't completely unpack the china. We opened it, and such, of course, but decided that it was already packed well, and we didn't want to have re-pack it for the many moves that would ensue. (Good call - not one piece was broken!) This is also the first time we've really had the space to store the china in something other than the original box. It has been stored in attics, storage units, and closets, suffering hot and cold temperatures, varying degrees of humidity - all things that are supposed to be bad for china... And all things that made the bar-code stickers harder to get off than dried gum on carpet. Ok, maybe not that bad, but close!

After scrapping a few off with my finger nails, my husband took the windex with vinegar I had used to clean the glass in the hutch and sprayed a label. He waited a bit, and the label came right off. I don't know if it was the windex, the vinegar, or just the wetness that helped, but it sure made the rest of the job a lot easier! So, there's a helpful household hint, should you have stubborn labels