This Clean & Fair from Traidcraft review comes to you after a two week trial period, and boy was it needed! We have had a busy spell here at Casa There and Back Again… I was away in London for three days, then we had a bout of family illness and then we had to get the place sorted out again, so the chance to put our elbow grease to good use with some new products was a welcome distraction from work and illness!

The lowdown

From left to right we have:

Lemon and lime multi-surface cleaner

Lavender breeze laundry liquid

Lavender and aloe handwash

Lemon citrus washing up liquid

Why Clean & Fair?

This review is part tried and tested and part awareness raising; we need to educate ourselves about the products we use in our homes, and palm oil is something I’ve been concerned about for some time, this graphic from Traidcraft shows how palm oil is used in our day to day lives, in short, it’s everywhere!

But it’s not fair trade, much of it isn’t sustainable and whole ecosystems are being destroyed to produce it.

Traidcraft are working to challenge the assumption that demand for this versatile product can only be met by mass-production. Instead Traidcraft’s Clean & Fair range sources palm oil from small-scale farmers in Ghana who are working with nature rather than destroying it. When we use Clean & Fair products we know the benefits will go to some of the poorest farmers in West Africa.

Clean & Fair is the UK’s first ever fair trade household cleaning range

Tried and Tested

We used Clean & Fair products for two weeks, actually we tested them for two weeks, we’ve been using them for longer owing to their generous size and muck-busting abilities!

The range is eco-friendly and made from natural and plant based ingredients which is a big green thumbs up with this blog!

First up the moisturising hand wash, made with fair trade coconut oil and palm oil with moisturising aloe and gentle lavender this was a treat for my hands and well as my senses after a few weeks of cleaning up after a family illness! Some lavender products can have a really synthetic floral smell, this was just like my freshly cut lavender instead and pepped me up! Joss is really into washing her hands at the moment and asks for ‘slippy dippy soap’ before meal times, she loved Clean & Fair – “smells ‘licious” – high praise indeed!

The lemon washing up liquid is a great grease-booster, easy to see how we will get 75 uses from this bottle as you need just a smidge to give great bubbles that cut through grime.

The lavender breeze laundry liquid was my favourite product, it scented my washing beautifully and cleaned really well at lower temperatures too, even on our cloth nappies! It left my towels really nice and soft and I found that I didn’t need to use as much as my usual liquid which was a pleasant surprise!

And finally the multi-surface cleaner, it gave a lemon and lime hit that cut through highchair grease and cleaned my sink a treat!

Clean and fair does what it says on the label and performs brilliantly in the home; some products like the laundry liquid way out-performed our current products, and the peace of mind from knowing we’re supporting producers and in our case supporting local too (Traidcraft is based just down the road from us in Gateshead!) makes this range a great choice for our family!

Check out the Traidcraftshop website to find out more. There’s currently 20% off the range until midnight Monday 14th July.

Disclaimer: Traidcraft sent me these items for review purposes, all views are my (and Joss’!) own

 

As I can be working on a wide range of research projects at any one time I like to use a different book for each one. I really rate Paperchase notebooks as they’re pretty good value and come in a wide range of colours and sizes, I add this washi tape notebook pocket to the front of each to store my notes and any interesting documents I pick up along the way.

This is one I made for our holidays last year; I added it to our travel journal to store our ticket stubs and leaflets which I use for scrapbooking. The nautical washi tape has had a LOT of interest, that’s Paperchase too!

You can do the same with any notebook you like if it has a sturdy cover, using just a piece of cardstock and some washi tape adjusting the measurements to suit your needs.

I simply cut a piece of card to the height of pocket that I’m happy with, fold the bottom of the card up at a height of about one inch and then fold the card in three, taping the fold lines with my washi tape and leaving the top of the pocket open then taping all the edges folding the washi tape down the middle to make a sturdy pocket. I then stick the pocket into my notebook with strong glue.

If you like you can cut a notch out of the middle section of your card to make opening the pocket easier, I also added another strip of card to make a second pocket for smaller ticket stubs, handy!

(NB I buy a lot of stuff at Paperchase but this post is not associated with them!)

 

I’m really busy with work right now, so I thought to myself, you know what? You could really use an hour to procrastinate missus!

I used the time wisely to upcycle my old poundland memo board with some washi tapes; after a bit of repositioning my poundland memo board hack was complete!

Still productive as it’s a) useful for helping me organise and b) helps make a dent in my washi collection

Work 0 Play 1

Thanks to the lovely Hannah at Mumsdays who nominated me for a Liebster Award!

A Liebster Award is an award for bloggers, a way to say, hey, I like your blog! It’s a bit like a chain letter, I answer 11 questions from Hannah and then nominate more bloggers with less than 500 followers to answer my 11 questions, here goes!

What is in your handbag right now? (no taking that half a kitkat out)

My purse, phone and keys, a pair of Joss’ socks, some almonds, a diary and many, many sweet wrappers that need to go!

Why did you start blogging?

I started out blogging 18 months ago as a way of keeping a record for my little girl, I wanted to track our journey through parenthood and I’ve always enjoyed writing so it was a way of keeping my mind busy and engaged during maternity leave. I am one of these people who have many varied interests but I found taking time out of the world of work freed me up to be a more creative homemaker both in play, cooking and craft; being on a tighter income but valuing eco-friendly approaches meant I had to be even more creative with money, blogging about it all kept me sane!

What do you find most challenging about blogging?

Not being very good at self-promotion! I love what I do but I have to put on my big girl pants to get it out there!

Who is your blog idol? Present company accepted

It’s hard for me to choose just one, I have so many, but I drop into Lulastic… each week, I love her thrift posts but more than that it’s her commitment to honest to goodness writing and eco-living that I really admire!

What’s your favourite – Facebook, Twitter or Pinterest and why?

I get more enjoyment from Facebook but I get so much inspiration from Pinterest that I’d have to choose pinning! I’m here if you’d like to follow me!

If you could live anywhere, where would it be?

I’m a real home body and love Bill Quay, it’s my spiritual home the North, but I have family in Holland and it has such a great feel to it that I’d love to be with them more too, I’d live half and half here and there given the chance!

How many kids would you like to have?

I get asked this all the time at the moment – this and, are you planning another! I will sidestep this in the way folks do the sex question in the Guardian, I ain’t telling!

If your house was on fire (and everyone was safe, dog, cat, kids, etc), what would you grab?

Joss’ memory book and my jewellery box would probably be about it, I’m not terribly attached to things in the way I was pre-family life, hubby, dog and kid, the rest would be a nice to have but nothing I’d really be mindful about grabbing!

What’s the best film you’ve seen in 2014 (doesn’t have to be recent!)?

Intouchables, set in Paris the brilliant Francois Cluzet plays an aristocratic quadriplegic looking for a new care assistant, Driss, an out of work street-smart young guy turns up looking for someone to sign his Social Security papers to prove he’s seeking work. Phillipe offers him a trial as his carer and the rest, well you’ll have to see for yourself but it is phenomenally good, phenomenally!

What thing (quote, book, song, movie, idol, etc) get’s you motivated to be the best you can be?

Should I go with a dishonest answer or a cliche?! Before every public speaking engagement, big event/anything where I need a confidence boost (which you lovely lot know I really do not enjoy putting myself through) I put on some music and shake it out, favourites include Lee Moses’ Bad Girl (if you’ve seen the most recent series of Girls you’ll get this even more) Voodoo Child, something really funky! I also have a quote above my desk by Maya Angelou

This applies heavily to the work I do with charities and in supporting them to campaign, both sides have given me strength when I’ve needed it. I also draw a lot of strength from my latest tattoo, it’s no happy accident that I can see it when I’m writing, it spurs me on to stay grounded and says to me “I shall not sink”

What is your signature dish?

I really need to write up the recipe for this, my leek, fennel and potato gratin is my fave thing to eat ever, it’s the most comforting meal, so I love to cook it as I know it’s gonna hit the spot!

So my questions:

1 What do you enjoy most about blogging?

2 Do you have a favourite thrifty tip?

3 What do you like to do to relax?

4 What did you want to be or do when you were growing up?

5 Where do you take your inspiration from for blog ideas?

6 Do you have a favourite song or piece of music and why?

7 Which five people living or no longer with us would you invite to your dream dinner party?

8 What one thing would you tell your sixteen year old self?

9 What’s your biggest blog challenge?

10 What’s your fondest memory?

11 Will you share your favourite ever blog post with me please?

I’m tagging these lovely folks and I hope they’ll accept their award and blog their responses!

Jenny from wethreeplustea a new blog but very entertaining

A blog I came about through Love All Blogs, the very sweet Dorothy Whiskers who writes an online mag for 6-10 year olds which I think is a brilliant idea

and finally for services to recycling and some blooming great ideas Vicky Myers Creations

I noticed that we seem to have lots of pops of red in the yarden at the moment, from the pinecone garland to Joss’ little bug hotel, I quite like that it’s all coming together now!

I hate Charlie and Lola; there I’ve said it.

Joss on the other hand loves it, especially the episode Lucky Lucky Me. Herein lies an example of the jarringly poor use of of language that I don’t like:

Lola: Maybe today I’m absolutely the most luckiest person in the whole world. (sings) Lucky, lucky, lucky, lucky me-eee-ee

 

All being said, we’ve seen this so many times that lucky lucky me popped into my head when we were out this week, how lucky is Joss to live 30 seconds walk from an amazing urban farm?

This week the sheep shearer came down to Bill Quay Farm and Joss got to have a good look at the action.

She said that the wool felt ‘soft and comfy’

After a brief run in with a goose that was giving the stink eye…

We ended the day with a few wooly pictures made from the fleece!

gNappies offer a great way to make the move into cloth nappies. I’ve posted frequently about the eco, thrifty and gentle to babies skin benefits of cloth bumming; these bright and soft cloth pants act as a reusable cover to house either cloth inserts, or biodegradable disposable inserts can be home composted (wet ones only) or binned. We reviewed this ‘sposie option.

Often one of the questions I get asked about cloth nappies is about managing out and about, on holiday, and with childcare. Now I use cloth full time, but I find it handy to have something disposable on hand for poorly tum times or holidays, having this option of a biodegradable insert would solve these issues, could smooth the transition to cloth and give new parents the confidence to take cloth nappies out and about knowing that they won’t have to carry a poo around with them (genuinely this is a concern I hear a lot!)

I love the range of colours this brand delivers, I’d also heard great things about fit so was looking forward to giving them a go!

Here’s my rundown of gNappies pants:

1) The whole package

I really liked the little card that comes with the pants, if you’re new to cloth this is a really handy guide to cloth bumming from newborn onwards, even covering off umbilical cord care and cloth nappies.

The design feature of gNappies that I really liked the sound of was a back fastening for tots that can take off applix nappies, this feature gives a great fit and stops cheeky antics in their tracks!

The outer shell of the pants is made in the softest of soft cotton, I wish I could capture it in a photo, trust me, it’s soft!

The inner shell is a waterproof pouch that snaps into the outer pant and holds your insert. This is very handy because you can use the outer again, changing the inner and reduce the number of pants you need too, thrifty!

2) The fit

The slim fit of the medium size pant works great for Joss, but there are five size ranges and two sizes of inserts going up from newborn to 15kg+ although not a birth to potty style nappy I benefit from something that best fits Joss for the size she is as she is a skinny minnie and doesn’t change her shape much so I do value a great fit and gNappies deliver.

3) The inserts

The inserts looked like a giant sanitary towel, so giant I couldn’t see how they could possibly fit in the natty little pouch, but they do, and they give the nappy its unique shape popping in easily. These inserts are really thin to give a great fit, but their biodegradable filler made from made of cellulose, fluff pulp and super absorber does what it says on the tin and absorbs really well. We have a heavy wetter and the nappies went 3-4 hours as I’d expected.

4) The eco-bit

The inserts can be home composted (wet ones only) or binned. When the nappy is soiled, simply remove the disposable insert, dispose, and tuck in a new insert for a fresh change. As we all know conventional disposable nappies do not break down, it’s estimated it takes 200-500 years per nappy! These compost down within 3 months which is a huge deal for the planet.

5) Washing and drying

The best thing about this nappy for me was the drying time, wow, I was not expecting them to need just an hour on the line in the sun, our other cloth nappies take 3-4 hours so this is a great improvement

As cloth nappies go these are at the pricier end of the spectrum, but I say that with a caveat as you need fewer outer pants with this option, especially at the toddler stage where they need less frequent changing, I think these are a great cloth-starter nappy and a great fitting nappy for older ones too.

(Disclaimer – we received four gNappies pants to get us started, all views are my own)

I love anything that can jazz up a plain outfit or pair of shoes and love shoeclips. I’ve been making my own for a while and have found that cheap clip-on earring backs picked up in craft stores make a great base for them!

Mollie Makes issue 41 came with a great set to make your own shoeclips, a la these:

(image from molliemakes.com)

My Own Take

True to type I decided to make up a variation on the original Mollie Makes shoeclips so I added some gorgeous Liberty Tana Lawn Betsy fabric and made bows instead of a pompom shape.