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LuxEco Lifestyle is an ongoing conversation about the convictions, philosophy, challenges, choices, attitudes and spirituality that create the framework through which we view the world and define our lifestyle.

Part 2: Every California Community College Campus and Student Gets a “Helping Hand”

By Merry Elkins, LuxEco Editorial Assistant Ken Kragen knows what it’s like to accomplish the impossible. He’s done it time and time, again. This time every California Community College Campus and Student is his beneficiary with his Hands Across California campaign on April 17th, 2011.

An Angel’s Skin

By Nancy Chuda founder and Editor-in-Chief of LuxEcoLiving and co-founder of Healthy Child Healthy World For most people the diagnosis of cancer is a daunting...

Sycamore Mineral Springs Resort is a Liquid Gold LuxEcoLiving4U Destination

By Nancy Chuda founder and Editor-in-Chief of LuxEcoLiving and co-founder of Healthy Child Healthy World Travels without Journey...well sort of... We traveled to this beautiful haven...

Star Bright, Star Bright…

...I Wish For Safe Toys Tonight! My last trip to Toys R' Us was disturbing on several levels.  Not having kids of my own, I...

Great Organic Food: From Sides Hardwear and Shoes to A-RU Sushi

By Nancy and James Chuda founders of LuxEcoLiving and Healthy Child Healthy World Heading Sideways in Santa Ynez Valley from Los Olivos to Buellton Two Great...

Peace: War Is Not Healthy For Children and Other Living Things

In a times of great tumult, we are reminded of the calls for peace echoed by 1960's activists: War Is Not Healthy For Children and Other Living Things AMP founders with two Congressional Representatives, from left: Gloria Vanderbilt, Lenore Breslauer, Felica Bernstein, Joanne Woodward and Barbara Avedon By Nancy Chuda, Co-founder of Healthy Child Healthy World and Co-Fouder and Editor in Chief LuxEco Living On March 19, 2011, my mother, Lenore Breslauer would have been 88 years of age. She passed on the eve President Bush declared war on Iraq, March 20, 2003. US military invasion of Iraq, "Operation Iraqi Freedom" was a coalition forces cooperative. Approximately forty other governments, participated by providing troops, equipment, services, security, and special forces, with 248,000 soldiers from the United States, 45,000 British soldiers, 2,000 Australian soldiers and 194 Polish soldiers. Additionally, 70,000 Kurdish military troops joined forces.

Honeybees Living Atop Denver Hotel

By: Molly Rovero, LuxEco Editorial Assistant Denver’s Brown Palace Hotel takes a step towards sustainability by housing a new species of guests. The plan called the...

A Match Made In Green Heaven

By Janine Johnson, Founder of Green Wave and LuxEco Advocate Where do you start in telling your tale? Typically it’s an introduction, and...

Luna Red offers Healthy Handcrafted Food: A Restaurant Review San Luis Obispo Style

By Nancy Chuda founder and editor-in-chief of LuxEcoLiving and co-founder of Healthy Child Healthy World. Do drop in when in San Luis Obispo. Visit the...

Seasonal Eating: The Best Nature Has to Offer

By Kerin Van Hoosear, LuxEco Editorial Assistant and author of Seasonal Cooking with Kerin Before the advent of refrigeration, seasonal living wasn’t an aspiration,...

Travels with Journey to San Francisco’s Fairmont Hotel: A Sweet Spot Stay In The...

Journey left his heart in San Francisco and was thrilled to be invited back to the one and only Fairmont Hotel. This time our boy wonder got to stay in the Tower Suite named after the Spreckels family. What a treat!

Retaking our Green Wedding Vows at the Hotel Bel-Air

By Nancy Chuda founder and Editor-in-Chief of LuxEcoLiving and co-founder of Healthy Child Healthy World In a historic setting which rekindles Hollywoods Golden but now...

Amy Dixon Bakes the Very Best at The Baker’s Table

By Nancy and James Chuda founders of LuxEcoLiving and Healthy Child Healthy World Santa Ynez California breakfast at The Baker's Table 3563 Numancia Street COME HUNGRY! You...

Apple Will Get The Job Done!

Introduction by Nancy Chuda Founder of LuxEcoLiving and Editor in Chief and co-founder of Healthy Child Healthy World I am proud to say that my charity, Healthy Child Healthy World, earned early recognition when I was a journalist and reporter for ABC news. Our first grant was an Apple computer. The irony in all this is that we lost Steve to cancer. He was a hero. A person with a rare intelligence. Steve Job's brain was wired for success. He had a synaptic response to create just about everything Apple. We lost a legend but we gained a universe that in its totality has created a new religion: Interconnectedness. Life goes on for Apple and I will be true to the core.

Anna Getty Gives Tips For Enjoying A Green Christmas

The Christmas season is upon us, and people everywhere are gearing up for the holiday. In her book, I’m Dreaming of a Green Christmas; Gifts, Decorations, and Recipes That Use Less and Mean More, author and LuxEco Advocate, Anna Getty shares with us her ideas on how to create memorable traditions while taking small steps to reduce our carbon footprints, minimize waste, and creatively use what we already have.

Slavery, Chocolate-Coated Slavery

Forrest Gump may have been on to something when he compared life to chocolates. You really never know what you’re gonna get in a box of chocolates, do you? The truth behind chocolate is more bitter than sweet. The Ivory Coast produces 40% of the world's chocolate, and it just so happens to also be notorious for this little thing called child slavery. Children, both local and from other third world countries, are sold to farms in this area where they are physically abused while working in risky and inhumane conditions. Some children are sold into the trade by parents who are tricked into believing their children will have better lives at the farm. Others are trafficked, stolen from their families, lured by the promise of…chocolate. In these farms they are forced to work 60 hour weeks with little or no food (depending on their performance on the field). These children lose their fundamental human rights when they enter these farms and “modern” society turns a blind eye to the atrocities. Every time we buy a box of chocolate that is not fair trade stamped, we (often unknowingly) endorse child slavery.

Healthy, Green Design: Improve Indoor Air Quality with Plants

By Stephanie Nickolson, Healthy Green Interior Designer and LuxEco Advocate Originally published at Natural Home & Garden Air pollution abounds in our homes and businesses, but many air purification systems are not safe to use. A Key to Healthy Green Design in your home starts with purifying indoor air quality with plants. Have you ever walked into a store, restaurant or other environment and couldn’t stand the heavily scented aroma that someone used to try and cover up another (worse) scent? Well, I have. It’s one of my favorite stores that I frequent and whenever I enter the washroom, I cannot wait to get out of there as the air is so heavily perfumed it makes me feel ill. This is not an effective remedy, nor is it healthy. Anything that exudes that much fragrance is certainly loaded with phthalates. Most commercial air fresheners mask odors but do nothing to remediate them.

Chemicals Are Stealing Our Children’s Future

By Nancy Chuda, Co-Founder of LuxEcoLiving.com and Healthy Child Healthy World. This Earth Day, April 22, 2010, marks the 19th anniversary of the passing of...

Buy, Buy American Pie

We thought this was a funny yet poignant video, written and sung by The Capitol Steps, about knowing and having confidence in the source...

Do Sunscreens Really Prevent Skin Cancer?

Sun exposure creates healthy cancer-fighting Vitamin D production yet too much sun leads to cancer.  How can we protect ourselves and still enjoy...

Are Your “Organic” Eggs All They’re Cracked Up To Be?

By Lorri Ballance Laird, LuxEco Advocate For many consumers, eggs are a staple in their diet. What’s better than a yummy omelet or frittata on a Sunday morning? While many food-conscious consumers make an attempt to buy products that are produced organically and/or sustainably, they may be getting duped when reaching for that carton of eggs labeled “organic” or “free-range.”

Part 1: Every California Community College Campus and Student Gets a “Helping Hand”

By Merry Elkins, LuxEco Editorial Assistant Best known for being a star-maker, Ken Kragen, who is also an author, teacher, and film and television producer, has charted the career course of some our most celebrated entertainers including Kenny Rogers, Lionel Richie, Tricia Yearwood, Olivia Newton John, The Bee Gees, The Smothers Brothers, Harry Chapin and more; but nothing he has accomplished in his illustrious career has ever achieved the significance or the scope of his philanthropic work. For breathing life into Hands Across America in the 1980s where young and old alike joined hands across the country to call attention to hunger and homelessness here in the US; for setting in motion and organizing the recording We Are the World, that brought together 45 prominent recording artists including Michael Jackson, Lionel Richie and Bruce Springsteen to raise $64 million to feed people in Africa and for founding USA for Africa to distribute the money, he received the United Nations Peace Medal, something few civilians receive and an honor for which he is most proud.

A Book Review: Petrine Day Mitchum’s New Book Hollywood Hoofbeats Breeds Horse Power

By Nancy Chuda founder and Editor- in-Chief of LuxEcoLiving and co-founder of Healthy Child Healthy World Petrine Day Mitchum grew up in what is...

Prevent Cancer in Your Pet

By Lacey Szczepanik, LuxEco Living Editorial Assistant I have two beautiful pet babies; Diggs, my proud, empathetic and cautious boxer, and Mo, my silly, sleepy Staffordshire terrier. I take my role as their guardian very seriously. When my pet Diggs was two years old, he was diagnosed with mast cell tumors, a form of cancer prevalent among boxers. I was devastated. I went through all the stages of grief. Denial; “Excuse me Mrs. Veterinarian, my dog has a small ‘bump’ on his side. Bump. Not lump. Lumps are scary. This is simply a ‘bump’.” Anger... directed more at God than anyone in particular. I lost Diggs’ brother much too early in life and found it cruel to be faced with another premature goodbye. Bargaining. Depression; full on who-needs-food and why-would-I-get-out-of-my-pajamas-or-leave-the-house-when-I-could-sit here-and-stare-at-my-beautiful-dog kind of depression. And finally Acceptance, and by acceptance I mean he’s alive today and he’ll be alive tomorrow SO THERE. Maybe the anger and denial are still sprinkled on top of the acceptance. A shocking 20-25% of our furry four legged pets end up dying prematurely due to Cancer. (Perdue University Department of Veterinarian).

Restaurant Review: Get Your Locally Grown Kicks at Root 246

By Nancy Chuda founder and Editor in Chief of LuxEco Living and co-founder of Healthy Child Healthy World Having just returned from Burgundy, France as...

Last Thursday

By Bernadette Bowman, Comedienne and LuxEco Advocate who writes the LIFE GOES RETROGRADE series. I said “goodbye” to my best pal last Thursday. As you may recall from my...
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InhabitableSpaceFrames Create Affordable Cloud Center Communities

By Nancy Chuda founder and Editor in Chief of LuxEcoLiving and co-founder of Healthy Child Healthy World Two architectural visionaries, James Chuda and David Noble...

George Clooney Travels to Southern Sudan

Actor, director, producer, and social activist George Clooney has been journeying throughout Southern Sudan this past week in an attempt to bring attention to the war-torn area. The region is three months away from an independence vote which could possibly see the largest country in Africa split into two sovereign nations.

Find a Pediatrician Who Shares Your Environmental Health Concerns

By: Janelle Sorensen, courtesy of Healthy Child Healthy World Looking for a pediatrician is no easy task, especially if your concerns and parenting methods aren’t exactly the same as mainstream America. My husband and I scoured the city for a full year before finding the right one for our daughters. But, it totally paid off. We found an amazingly supportive and brilliant pediatrician whose philosophy was to tell us everything she knew and then let us choose what to do. She had only one provision; if she ever thought the results of a treatment were sub-par, then she would intervene with an alternate recommendation. That never happened and I was always overwhelmed with how much she knew. She could rattle off statistics about best practices in the EU, pertinent studies regarding alternative remedies, and recent outbreaks that could put my children at risk. She was a dream come true. But, alas, we moved. Now we are on the hunt again.

Up a Stream With A Broken Chinese Paddle

By Lacey Szczepanik, LuxEco Living Editorial Assistant I was born into a generation which, when it comes to consuming products, ‘Built to Last’ was long...

LuxEcoLiving4U: Roblar Winery’s Posh Private Affair

By Nancy Chuda founder and Editor-in-Chief  of LuxEcoLiving and co-founder of Healthy Child Healthy World "You step into the main greeting room and you know...

Healthy Recipes For The Fourth Of July

By Alanna Brown, LuxEco Editorial Assistant What says Fourth of July better than friends, fireworks, and good food? For a traditional celebration, not one of those three can be sacrificed. However, you can make healthier food choices without sacrificing flavor. Believe it or not, there are healthy alternatives to the yearly cheeseburgers and hotdogs dripping with grease, and that fattening potato salad. CBS News has shared with us some great recipes that will leave you and your friends satisfied and guilt-free to enjoy the fireworks.

The BP Oil Spill: What Happened And Who’s To Blame?

On April 21, 2010, the oil rig Deepwater Horizon had a dire malfunction. Both its manual and emergency blowout preventers failed to deploy when the worst-case scenario became a reality. An oil rig blowout has the potential to occur when some combination of mud, oil, natural gas, and water erupt from the well, surge up the drill pipe, and ignite at the surface, exploding into an inferno.

The Chesterfield Palm Beach: LuxEcoLiving’s # 1 Hotel in Florida

It's a jewel of a hideaway in the confines of one of the wealthiest locations in all the world...   Palm Beach Florida. What The...

Zhenya Gershman Reveals… 4-Ways Art Can Bring Our Ancestors Alive

By Zhenya Gershman, artist & art historian, co-Founder of Project AWE As a portrait painter I deal with an idea of capturing my model’s presence,...

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