That's Fit

I'm the odd female -- I don't like lots of shoes. I probably wear less than six pairs of dress-up shoes and my feet are never happy the next day. A granola girl, most of the time I'm in jogging shoes, Teva sandals or my Merrill hikers.

Okay, so my personal shoe carbon imprint is fairly small. Beyond my lack of interest in shoes, I rarely totally wear them out. My dad purchased my very first pair of jogging shoes when I was around 14. After retiring them from running, I wore them around casually for years, graduating them to 'around camp' shoes, with one sole finally cracking completely through in Idaho's Sawtooth Mtns when I was 28.

In honor of Earth Day today, I wanted to share a few environmentally-friendly tips from Brooks on how to extend the life cycle of your running shoes.

• On Your Feet: After your running shoes wear out, slip them on for casual street wear. Once they're past that stage, transition them to gardening, lawn, painting duties.
• Donate: If your shoe is in decent shape and you don't need another gardening shoe, donate them! Look to a local charity, a community drop-off box or even ship them to Soles4Souls, a national organization facilitating the distribution of new and gently used shoes to those in need around the world.

Running shoes are replaced fairly often. The goal here is to try and avoid a landfill whenever possible. It'll take a little extra effort, but our Mother Earth is worth it.

Finding shoes that are easy on the environment is getting easier -- whether you're looking for running shoes, dress shoes, or just some sandals for kicking around town, you've got options.

Well, if you're an adult, anyway. It's a little more difficult to find eco-friendly shoe options for kids, but it's not impossible (and it's getting easier). In fact, this article at Divine Caroline lists options for kids' shoes. Patagonian, Timberland, and other companies have joined the good fight and are offering kids' shoes made with environmentally friendly products and packaged in a responsible and sustainable way.

And what if you have an environmentally conscious little ballerina? You can even find a vegan alternative ballet slipper. It might take a little more hunting for you to find shoes for your little ones with all these qualities, but isn't it worth it to know that your child's footprint isn't leaving an environmental footprint, too?

Fitness fans are constantly told to replace their workout shoes in a timely manner. But after your pair of trusty friends are worn out, they often end up in a landfill -- for too many years. If your midsole is made from traditional Ethylene Vinyl Acetate (EVA), you're looking at possibly 1,000 years in a landfill before a pair breaks down. That's one large carbon footprint.

Good news arrives today on two fronts. Not only is it Earth Day -- claps and cheers for our Mother Earth -- I also just discovered Brooks running shoes is launching a revolutionary new midsole which biodegrades 50 times faster than EVA.

Named BioMoGo, Brooks has transformed their original long-lasting MoGo midsole to be more environmentally friendly. They added a non-toxic, natural additive to speed up the anaerobic microbe munch rate once the shoe finds its final resting space in a landfill. BioMoGo soles can biodegrade into reusable byproducts within 20 years, which Brooks alone estimates will save 29.9 millions pounds of landfill waste over 20 years. BioMoGo will initially be available July 2008 in their Trance 8 shoe, with all MoGo midsole performance shoes featuring the new technology by year-end 2009.

Today is Earth Day. And you should take the stairs. Not because it's saves a lot of energy. If you take two flights of stairs every day at work, you'll save 72 kilowatts of energy on each day, which saves 90 cents a year in energy costs. You should take the stairs for two other reasons.

One, it's a green thing to do, says Renee Mullen of The Nature Conservancy's Conservation Science Group. And any energy saved is good for the environment.

Two, it's a healthy thing to do. It's good for your body to move. It's good for your head too. So today, take the stairs. Do it every day if you can. But at minimum, do it today.

As fabulous as we at That's Fit think this blog is, the truth is there are hundreds of wonderful blogs on healthy living to be seen all over the blogosphere. So in this feature, Fit Links, we'll introduce you to some that have caught our eye.

Today is Earth Day, a day to celebrate our Earth and raise awareness about environmentalism. This is the 38th anniversary of the holiday, and the issue of sustainable living has never been more popular ... or more important. Here at That's Fit, we address green living through our Sustainable Community category, so feel free to check out some of our recent posts or to visit some of these popular green living blogs:

No Impact Man
Visualize Whirrled Peas
Little Blog in the Big Woods
Ethicurean
EcoGeek
Treehugger
The Daily Green
Grist
Sustainable Table
Lime

Last but not least, of course, is our very own Green Daily, a daily must-visit for the latest in environmental happenings. Take a minute to check them out!

Our earth gives us so much -- our food, the air we breath, our water and much more. So it's time we started giving back, don't you think? Or at least doing what we can to lessen our impact on the earth.

As most of you know, today is Earth Day, a day when we take a moment to realize the impact we have on the environment. To do this, our fabulous team of bloggers has put together some inspirational posts to help get you thinking about -- and more importantly, taking action towards -- saving our earth. Click here to see our fantastic Earth Day posts.

And while you're at it, pay a visit to our friends over at Green Daily -- they're celebrating Earth Day in a big way too.

Whether the 37th anniversary of Earth Day has you planting trees, working in your garden, enjoying (finally!) the arrival of spring, or just having a quiet Sunday morning, here are some tips for making this year your "greenest" yet.

If you pick just one thing off this list to change in your own life, you'll be going a long way toward improving the health of the Earth and it's citizens. For instance, did you know that if every person in America replaced just 5 conventional light bulbs in their home with compact fluorescent bulbs, it would be like taking 8 million cars off the road? (Plus, you'll save money!) Turning off the tap while you brush your teeth, combining errands into one trip, and recycling your newspapers (or switching to reading them online) are all changes you can make that won't impact your life in a big way. If you're interested in bigger changes, however, you can always look into energy alternatives or research green vehicles.

Finally, take some time today to measure your carbon footprint. This one was a shocker for me. I like to think I make a decent effort to reduce my own carbon footprint, but even so, if everyone lived like I did we'd need 4.3 planet Earth's to support us! There are some things I can't change easily (size of my house, my car's gas mileage), but there are many that I can (eat less meat, eat more local foods). Take the quiz and see how you do! Finally, here's a fun way to keep track of your progress as you make green changes to your life.

Happy Earth Day!