Happy Birthday Mateo

30 is that age where for the first time in life people stop to truly think about where they've been and where they are going. Whichever one you're thinking about I'm glad to be here with you. You are an exceptional husband and father and at 30 young years of age your character in those regards is immeasureable. Insha Allah you will continue to grow and live to the full potential of the gifts you have been given. You definitely are gifted. I love you - Your Wife, Joronda

WE DID IT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Well how about a big round of applause for everyone. On Saturday March 8th we succeeded in having a very ecoficient birthday celebration for my best friend, the father of my sun, my husband, Mateo. Thank you to all of you for your cooperation, participation and patience. I was throughly impressed with everyone's willingness to try something new. We all ate vegan food and enjoyed it. For those who live on the west side make sure to keep "Green" in mind when you're on your east side visits (it will save gas and time).

The gifts everyone brought were incredible. You all are REALLY creative. Mateo was smiling ear to ear and was thoroughly impressed. For his birhday he received an electric Thailand reminiscent fly swatter, a crotched blanket that had belonged to his grandfather, homemade cookies, shared cd's, original art, martial arts inspired birthday cards, a Bruce Lee dvd, jewelery, time off from work, a photo album, a gift card, text messages, e-mails, time with people he cares about and none of which were based on a price tag. You all are incredible!!!

Well keep up the good work. It's good good for the environment, society and your wallet. Mateo and I are working on consuming less, wasting less and living less frivolously and I thank you for giving him the gift of a group effort in this vein for his birthday.

See you all there!

Well the day has come. It's already the 8th and it's a good thing this celebration is focused on ecoficiency. That means no stress for anyone. It has been difficult trying to find time to post when Mateo is not around and remembering to cover my tracks when he is around. If you're checking the blog just now to make sure it's still on the answer is yes. Bring the family and have a cool family dinner experience.

Please be there by 5pm because that is when the guest of honor will arrive. Remember the location? The place is called "Green" it's on Scottsdale Rd. in Tempe just south of McDowell on the west side of the street. Look for the Salvation Army, but don't pass it. The actual address is in a post below. If you can't remember the name, just think of the theme of the occasion.

There WILL be food to try because I ecoficiently saved enough dollars to spend for people to taste test. Still managing to do this for "free", according to the rules (see previous post). Now I couldn't invite you out and not feed you anything. For those of you who have not tried vegan food before don't be afraid to try more than what's in front of you. The restaurant style is counter service so after the starters you can order at your leisure but remember you can't break the bank because you too are participating in this "green birthday".

If you bring a gift be prepared to share with Mateo how ecoficiently you came to that gift. If you can't make it but still want to be a part of the celebration give him a call during the event or send a text. For more information on the event look over the previous posts. See you there!

Please RSVP, the surprise depends on it

For several reasons I need a good estimate of how many of you will be there. I have already heard there's at least one out of towner coming. Also a couple of other out of towners who can't make are sending an ecoficient gift (I guess a few slurpee's will have to be sacrificied to pay for the postage on that gift). So if you are planning on coming please post a comment at the end of this message. We only have one week left to pull this off and here's where I really need your help.

If you are coming or not I would like you to help me decide.

Should everyone already be at the restaurant and seated when I arrive with him, traditional surprise style.

Or

Should he be inside seated already then everyone comes in all at once (this will take some parking lot coordination, but could be very cool).

Where's the Party?

So here are the details. The celebration will be held at the following location:



Green (this is the restaurants name)
2240 N Scottsdale RdTempe, AZ 85281
telephone: (480)941-9003

it is located between McKellips and McDowell on the West side of Scottsdale Rd.

to view the menu go to www.greenvegetarian.com The restaurant style is counter service so people can order at there leisure. There will however be food to sample because I am using the regifting option as my economic source to buy food for free (I'll explain later).

*if you can not find it a landmark is the Salvation Army

We have reservations for 5pm, Saturday March 8th. I told them we're expecting 20 people so I hope twenty of you are planning on coming. Time to RSVP

Gifts

Gifts are an optional one but if you want to give a gift here are a few suggestions

1. Make something

2. Send an e-card

3. Offer him some assisstance with something

4. Call him on March 10th and say "Happy Birthday"

5. Send him a text

6. Re-gift - so let me explain this one a bit.

Back in the 90's the term regifting was coined on an episode of Jerry Seinfeld. It's becoming more popular now but by no means is it a new concept. Basically it is the act of giving away a gift that you've been given. There are rules though. You shouldn't regift half a box of candy, bubble bath that you have used once or a pre-worn shirt, washed or not. A few standard rules include:

- rewrap the gift
- you might not want to give the gift back to the original giver
- you probably shouldn't regift hand made items.
- If you have $1.23 left on a gift card use it towards a purchase instead of regifting the card.

For more details go to http://www.regiftable.com/

Does anyone else have ideas on ecoficient ways to give a gift.

Food

So several people have e-mailed me and suggested a pot luck. It looks like that's the number one idea for an ecoficient way to eat. Well I thought I would share with you all a cool way to cut down on stress, time and dollars. I guess you can call it the new "pot luck". Have you heard of co-op cooking?

There's two ways you can do this. For both styles you need a group of people. For idea #1 let's say there are 5 different families. Each family takes one night out of the week to cook and on that night the other four families pick up dinner from that families house. Basically it's homemade take out. For idea #2 those five families would get together on one day of the week, maybe Saturday, and each family/person would be responsible for cooking one main dish. When all the food is done, it's divided into refrigerator or freezer safe containers and everyone takes their portions for the week. In both examples what your left with is a work week worth of food in only one days work. If you want to read more about it here's a helpful website http://oamc.factspot.com/

My initial idea was to have each of you bring something to the celebration that could be traded with other people, sort of a third variation of co-op cooking. I thought, well that will take care of the party favors but that could also turn into a logistical nightmare so I'm scraping that plan. I do however find this to be a great idea so if you're so inclined find a few people to try it out with and see what you think. Idea #1 might be best with people who live close to you.

So what do we do about food? My thoughts are...let's eat out. Is anyone up for trying something new? I'll pick a place Mateo likes where people can order if they want or just come and hang out. Let's make it for March 8th. That means we have exactly one month from now. Have you ever had vegan food? Remember though, you can't spend anymore money than you normally would for that day. Check back in a day or so for more birthday challenge details. We still need to talk about GIFTS!!!