Highlights from this year's Planet Earth Celebration

I love Earth Day. Not because of my hippy nature but because it's the first outdoor holiday of the year. I've always thought of Earth Day more as a celebration of the earth than as a day to remind people to go green. Earth Day to me is all about spring. Hurray, leaves and flowers and birds and bugs and everything green! In fact, Earth Day is my favorite non-religious holiday after the Fourth of July. And if Earth Day had fireworks, it would probably be my favorite holiday.

The past two Earth Days, we've been living here in the Triangle, the home of Burt's Bees, which makes for a very good Earth Day location. Every year, Burt's Bees puts on a big celebration downtown with bands and booths and a junk-band parade. I enjoy finding out what green businesses and organizations there are in the area, and the kids like coloring pictures of native plants, admiring chickens and worms, and making "art" out of junk.

Last Saturday, I spent the morning at a summit to get community gardens started in Raleigh that I helped plan. Then I headed over in the afternoon to man a booth at Planet Earth for the same community gardens group. It was a long and busy day, and I'm really grateful to Michael for spending the day with the boys so I could be involved in something important to me.