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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.

Just last month marks the fifth year anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, the catastrophic natural disaster that claimed more than 1,800 lives in the Gulf coast region with damages totaling $80 billion. After the devastation of the hurricane and consequent flooding, it seemed to its residents and many around the world that New Orleans, specifically, was making a painstakingly slow recovery. Frustrated by the sluggish progress, actor Brad Pitt founded the Make It Right Foundation in 2007 to help rebuild the hardest hit region of New Orleans, the Lower 9th ward.

By: Lewis Perkins, Founder of Women Are Saving The World Now and LuxEco Advocate Article via Women Are Saving The World Now Last week, I had...

Are you wondering what to eat this spring so you can be bikini ready by summer? Try these light quinoa recipes to stay healthy and trim down. By: Lauren O'Neill, LuxEco Editorial Assistant With summer quickly approaching, the thought of baring it all and playing beach volleyball in a bikini can quickly become daunting. However, by learning what to eat this spring to shed the pounds and get fit, there will be no reason to feel mortified in your bathing suit. Quinoa is my absolute favorite ingredient to cook with and a staple in my daily diet. It is versatile, delicious, and loaded with nutrients that will keep you healthy, happy, and slim. Not only is it a complete protein, containing all nine essential amino acids, but it is also gluten-free and easy to digest. From improving cardiovascular health to reducing migraines, quinoa has a number of health benefits. It's incredibly easy to incorporate into your diet. When cooked, its light and fluffy texture makes it the perfect healthy substitute for rice or couscous. Below, I have shared my top three personal quinoa recipes that will make you feel great.

Heats on. Temperatures are soaring. Dinner time is a challenge and so is the clean up. But what's easy, delicious and always a favorite? In our home it's a good old American burger with melted cheddar cheese.

... And let's lead the way  by action for a better tomorrow. As the world is spinning madly out of control getting grounded is sometimes...

By Nancy Chuda founder and Editor-in-Chief of LuxEcoLiving and co-founder of Healthy Child Healthy World What's a hat got to do with it? The Kentucky...

By: Molly Rovero, LuxEco Living Editorial Assistant Lotusland practices sustainable horticulture in the care of their gardens. This episode of the Lotusland series explores these practices in Madame's rose garden. Also learn how to make your own tea compost!

A book review by Nancy Chuda, Co-founder of LuxEcoLiving and Healthy Child Healthy World of Luka And The Fire of Life, Salman Rushdie, Random House Jim and I were treated to a magical evening: time spent listening to Salman Rushdie in person at the Japanese American Cultural and Community Center, in Little Tokyo in downtown Los Angeles. Sir Ahmed Salman Rushdie or Urdu sael main rvdi/ is a British Indian novelist and essayist. He achieved notability with his second novel, Midnight Children (1981), which won the Booker Prize in 1981. Most of his fiction is set on the Indian subcontinent and his style is classified as magical realism mixed with historical fiction. One theme that has captivated readers is the connections he weaves between Eastern and Western worlds.

By Alanna Brown, LuxEco Editorial Assistant For those who spend the extra dough to shop organically, it is fair to expect that a market touting the sale of only organic goods should supply consumers with fodder and non-fodder products on an even keel. One such market, the well-known and widely shopped Whole Foods, is making sure those expectations are met. As of June 1, 2011, the organic grocery chain will require that all personal care products and cosmetics making an “organic” claim can prove it.

By Nancy Chuda Founder and Editor in Chief of LuxEco Living and Healthy Child Healthy World Where do we go when we die? How can we find mercy, forgiveness and love? There is no turning back the clock. Time does not wait for those who are waiting to find answers in their lives. But time does stand still for hours in Malick's fifth feature, The Tree of Life starring Brad Pitt, Jessica Chastain and Sean Penn. It premiered at the 2011 Cannes Film Festival where it won the Palme d'Or before being released in the United States. "The Tree of Life"A superbly conceived but somewhat stilted family drama rich in Christianity's emotional tapestries and the upheavals and uncertainties of life, reveals Brad Pitt who plays father to three sons, one being Sean Penn, brilliantly portrayed in his youth by Hunter McCracken.

Green Lighting: Lightning in a Bottle Festival covers celebratory spectacles of art, music, fashion, and design. By Lush Huxley, Editorial Assistant LuxEco Living On a bright...

By Nancy Chuda, Founder of LuxEcoLiving.com Betty White makes 88 look like a new-aged hippie whose secret is more than just getting good dietary fiber....

By Bethany Colson, Managing Editor of LuxEcoLiving.com After months of rally efforts, raising donations and even conducting neighborhood bake sales, the Hollywood sign has finally...

By Nancy Chuda, Founder and Editor in Chief of LuxEco Living and Founder of Healthy Child Healthy World While amping up for this year's Natural Products Expo in Anaheim, CA and getting the LuxEco team ready for our "Green Light" Initiative in which we search out and highlight the best natural, organic and eco-friendly products that the Green Movement has to offer, I can't help but to reflect on the evolving nature of "GREEN." Jim and I attended the first Natural Products Expo in Anaheim, CA almost two decades ago... and it was far from gluten-free. We were young, energetic, and held an undying faith that our world was unnaturally occurring; wearing Birkenstock and eating jerky we found our tribe. Or did we? back then, fair-trade was a hearty handshake.

By Alanna Brown, LuxEco Editorial Assistant "Isn't it wonderful that none of us need wait a moment before starting to change the world," Penelope Jagessar Chaffer quoted from the Diary of Anne Frank after Nancy Chuda (Healthy Child Healthy World and LuxEco co-founder) presented her with the HCHW Moms-on-a-Mission honor for inspiration Wednesday night. Penelope is an award-winning documentary filmmaker and the first black female director to receive a BAFTA award nomination. Above all, however, she is a mother, proven by her dedication to complete her most recent documentary, Toxic Baby, despite the adversity that arose in the process. In accord with Anne Frank’s legacy, she waited not a moment before embarking on her five-year journey to make this film and thus start to change the world, one mother at a time.

By Nancy and James Chuda founders of LuxEcoLiving and co-founders of Healthy Child Healthy World    The Point was spectacular in ever sense of the word....

By Bernadette Bowman, Comedienne and LuxEco Advocate who writes the LIFE GOES RETROGRADE series. A streak of sheer panic went through my body this morning when I realized that in a mere three weeks, I’ll be schlepping south to San Diego to attend my thirtieth high school reunion. Rock on, Helix High School Class of ’80!!

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...

By Nancy Chuda founder and Editor-in-Chief of LuxEcoLiving and  co-founder of Healthy Child Healthy World Artist Mary Nohr Courtesy of LuxEcoLiving "She's got your back...

We were treated to the culinary talents of a genius! We had literally just returned from the land of Alain Ducasse, Provence France, where we had been seated for an array of tasting menus, literally, for days and nights, by his top chefs... our taste buds had been spoiled fresh until we met chef Jeremy Tummel... my oh my!

The Advent of Lignocellulosic Ethanol is a Biomass Boon By Derin Richardson, LuxEco Living Editorial Assistant There are a myriad of alternative fuel breakthroughs that been discovered this century--hydrogen fuel cells, ethanol, biodiesel, etc.--but there is one, recently discovered energy source that you either may not have heard or know little of. Enter leaf biofuel. As it is scientifically labeled, lignocellulosic ethanol is the progeny of refining biomasses such as wood, grasses and/or any non-edible parts of a plant. It is a potentially sustainable and renewable biofuel, like using vegetable oil to produce biodiesel, however the insubordinate and resillient nature of this biomass make it problematic for industrial applications.

By Lush Huxley, LuxEco Editorial Assistant ...Or so implies a new technology by Kolelinia lab the brain child of Bulgarian designer Martin Angelov. The lab...

By Nancy Chuda Founder and Editor-in Chief of LuxEcoLiving and co-founder of Healthy Child Healthy World As 2011 comes to an end, I feel a...

By Lorri Laird, Editorial Assistant Every day in the United States, millions of store transactions take place, and cashiers and clerks hand over receipts to their customers. What these clerks and cashiers may not know is that they may be exposing themselves and their customers to the dangerous toxin BPA (Bisphenol A) which has been linked to reproductive and behavioral abnormalities as well as certain cancers. While many consumers have become enlightened to the dangers of BPA in certain types of plastics, many may not be aware that some cash register receipts are coated with the substance.

Imagine trekking on foot through the rhododendron forests of the Sherpa homeland of Nepal's Khumbu Valley that lies below the ice-capped Mount Everest where...

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.

By Laura Turner Seydel, Chairman of the Captain Planet Foundation, Co-founder of Mothers & Others for Clean Air and LuxEco Advocate Via Defenders of Wildlife Defenders wins lawsuit; future of wolf recovery still uncertain * U.S. district court overturns Interior Secretary Salazar’s action that removed wolves in the Northern Rockies from the endangered species list * Ruling makes it clear that subdividing a wild population based on political boundaries rather than science violates the Endangered Species Act * Defenders calls for update of science and regional stakeholder collaboration to ensure continued wolf recovery and proper removal of federal protections

by Elizabeth Grossman, Author of Chasing Molecules: Poisonous Products, Human Health, and the Promise of Green Chemistry, High Tech Trash: Digital Devices, Hidden Toxics, and Human Health via The Pump Handle "After three long months of oil geysering continuously from the depths of the Gulf, a temporary cap has stemmed the flow and it appears that the well is on its way to being killed. But we are by no means through this disaster," said Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) in his opening remarks at the August 4th Senate Environment and Public Works Committee hearing on the use of oil dispersants in the BP/Deepwater Horizon oil spill.

By Rachel Lincoln Sarnoff, Executive Director/CEO, Healthy Child Healthy World and a LuxEcoLiving Advocate   Is there a link between the environment and illnesses such as...

Women at work: Women as the new decision makers in a changing world By: Lewis Perkins, Founder of Women Are Saving The World Now and...

They were thought to have been extinct since the 1980's but the thumbnail sized Palos Verdes Blue Butterfly (also known as the El...

By Rachel Sarnoff, Writer and Founder of EcoStiletto.com and MommyGreenest.com and LuxEco Advocate via www.ecostiletto.com Want to keep chemicals out of your home? Start with your furniture. Carcinogenic formaldehyde is...

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.

By Alanna Brown, LuxEco Editorial Assistant According to the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette article entitled “Fragrance Chemicals and the Scent of Suspicion,” the fragrance industry has been keeping vital chemical information from the public. The article says two recent reports, one by the EWG and one by Women’s Voices for the Earth, have caused a stir amongst researchers, environmental groups, consumers, and industry legislation. These reports reveal that on the label of any given personal care product, bottle of perfume, or cleaning agent the word “fragrance” is loaded with unknown meaning. Manufacturers have used this one word, a nondescript listing among the other ingredients, as a catch-all to legally mask the dozen-or-more chemicals not actually listed.