Go Green NZ Expo | Review & Haul

Hey! This Sunday we decided to attend the Go Green Expo that was at Wellington's TSB Arena. The Go Green Expo is an expo dedicated to supporting green businesses across NZ, and has a wide variety of sustainable and eco-friendly businesses running stalls. The Go Green Expo was created to make it easy for everyday people to get their hands on affordable, environmentally friendly products, and to gain knowledge into a healthier, cleaner life. They cover everything in a 'one stop shop' from local beers, organic skin care and makeup, to ethical investments, cars and electric bikes.

Let me start with saying that I was not expecting much, I was still bitter about the horror which was the Pet Expo held in Upper Hutt. I can now say I was pleasantly surprised, and enjoyed the Expo immensely. One of my favourite things in other people is passion, it what attracts me to people and makes me want to build a friendship. However, these days, not many people show off their passion, and it's a real shame. I loved the atmosphere at the expo because everyone was so passionate about what they were doing, and what they were offering. I loved discussing all these different products and services with people whose eyes lit up with fire as they explained why and how they do what they do.

I think the passion behind peoples stalls really helped with us whipping out our cards and purchasing a lot of things. We made some awesome new purchases, and learnt about a lot of smaller businesses, so I have decided to do a quick haul to showcase some of these! There were a lot more stalls that we did enjoy but didn't purchase from at the time so if we do in the future I will make sure to mention them somewhere. Also, if you would like any reviews on the products, please let me know and I will give each product an in depth review.

 This is a whole laundry kit from Simply Laundry. This is a hypoallergenic, eco friendly and cost effective alternative to basic laundry powder. We got everything in their range and purchased it as a package which includes two of their Laundry Balls, plus replacement pellets, whiter bleach powder, stain stick and two of their lint balls. All you have to do is throw one or two of the Laundry Balls into your wash, depending on the size of the load. No other washing powders needed. There is no chemicals in any of their products, or soap agents so no residue is left behind. Each pack of pellets can last anywhere between 3 months to 12 months depending on how often you wash. For an average household doing one wash a day, they will last roughly 6 months. I am excited to see how these work, they also offer a 100% money back guarantee on all their products if you don't believe it worked for your family. If you want any more information, check out their website www.livesimply.co.nz

This is a lunch box from Meals in Steel. I have never thought about it too much, but I always reuse plastic containers for my lunches and it most definitely would not be good for my health. This is a great alternative to having a plastic lunchbox, it lasts longer, doesn't crack or leak, is lightweight and is dishwasher and freezer safe. We got the two layer circle container, and my partner will be using it for his lunches. The thing we love about this one is if you are having a salad, or something with a separate sauce, it means you can keep that in one layer and the rest in the other layer to keep it fresh til you want to eat. If you want to get one for yourself visit www.mealsinsteel.nz

 Next up we got the full pack of products from OurEco Home which is a range of home cleaning products. None of their products contain harsh chemicals, and to be honest, they smell 100% nicer than any other cleaning product that I have smelt on the market. These smell incredible! The man at the stall gave us an amazing run through on how each of these products work, and the best places to use each one. It was awesome how informative and passionate he was about his products. These products will replace every other cleaning product in our home, for the whole home including kitchen and bathroom. We also got four of their microfibre cloths which work fantastically with all their products. I am so excited to clean my home now, and will definitely be doing an update on these once I have got a feel for how they work. This brand is large in Australia and is in a lot of their stores, however it is new to New Zealand and can only be purchased online currently. You will be able to buy your own at http://ourecohome.co.nz/

 When I saw this stall, I wondered when I last tried blackcurrants, and I couldn't think of it. However, I am now hooked on them! These are absolutely delicious. We got a pack of their freeze dried berries, and a smaller pack of the dark chocolate covered berries. Both are vegan. The chocolate covered ones are my new guilty pleasure, and I will be purchasing more packs once I have finished this one. The freeze dried berries are great to use in smoothies, as well as mueslis, salads, ice creams, and any other meal you can think of. Viberi is 100% organic, New Zealand grown blackcurrants. To purchase your own berries, go to www.viberi.co.nz and you can order online!

This product is obviously not for me, well I hope I don't need beard oil! This is for my partner, who loves his beard, sometimes I think he may love it more than me. The beard oil contains ingredients to help condition your beard, ease any beard itch and to smell all woodsy and fabulous. This one does smell amazing! A common theme through the products we picked up. A portion of all proceeds from Archeus goes towards their plant conservation activity, so every purchase you know you are giving back! This company also made a tattoo oil that my partner tried out, and loved. The woman that we were talking with at the stall was so lovely, and spoke about how she is working with breast cancer survivors with their tattoo oil to help make them feel beautiful again. I just love the morals behind this company. I didn't manage to find the beard oil on their site, but you can check out the rest of their range on www.archeus.co.nz

The last thing I picked up was this awesome shirt from NZAVS, which is the Anti-Vivisection Society of New Zealand. I just thought the graphic was so cute, the rat cartoon is just adorable. Of course, it also spreads a great message. I am not well informed on this topic so I can't say too much about it at the moment, but they have invited us to a volunteer meeting in December where we will discuss the cause over vegan food. So I will definitely attend that and learn some more information around this topic. I know that they do a lot of work with HUHA which is one of our favourite charities so I can't wait to learn more. If you want any more information, or to purchase a T-Shirt of your own, head over to www.nzavs.org.nz

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Wordless Wednesday: Summer Morning Walks

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Tough Dog Toy Hunt: ZeeDog Eggplant

Hey! We are still on the hunt for decent, tough dog toys that last the distant. It is crazy how hard it is to find a toy that deals with Diego's chewing. I can't imagine how hard it would be to find toys for Pit Bulls and larger dogs. If you want to see some of our other reviews in this series we have a list here.

Today, we are reviewing the ZeeDog Eggplant which states that it is the toughest toy in their range of vegetable and fruit shaped toys. We purchased this from Wolves of Wellington which is a small online shop that is based in my area. The toy can be used in multiple different ways, as a treat challenge, and as a fetch toy.
We currently have a giveaway over on our Facebook page to win your very own eggplant! 

First off, the way that it is designed means that when you bounce it, it bounces in every different direction. Also, when I say it is bouncy, I mean bouncy! I was showing my younger sisters just how bouncy it is, and it bounced straight up into her face! This worked well for us, because Diego is a ball and toy fanatic, and was quick to change direction and height when playing fetch with the toy. For the first couple of times that we played with the toy, we didn't even bother putting treats in it, just threw it around and Diego loved it. He wouldn't leave it alone and even decided that it needed to come to bed with us.

Sadly, the toy didn't last as long as we liked. As I said above, the first couple of times we played together, and the first time I left him unsupervised with the toy (No treats inside) he ripped the top off. This probably took less than ten minutes for him to completely rip off, I was only just started on dinner in the kitchen. Although, that didn't stop his love for the toy and now just meant that he had two toys to play with. I kind of was happy that he did destroy the top, because the full eggplant did look a little rude, and without the top, it was definitely less rude.

Once he had destroyed the top of it, we finally got around to putting treats inside. The first day we squished our Halloween Pupcakes into, another day we put in chicken necks and treats and another day we put a full banana inside. With access from both sides, it did make the challenge easier, and the chicken necks with treats fell out with little effort from Diego. The banana was a challenge for Diego, and it took him on and off a full day to get the banana out. I think this was because I smooshed it to the sides of the Eggplant which his tongue couldn't reach. I think the treat challenge is decent enough for him, it kept him busy for anywhere from ten minutes to a full day.

Another thing I thought would be good to mention is that my partner drove over the Eggplant a few days ago in his van, and it is still intact. I was very surprised that it lived through that. I thought it was finally time to say good bye to the Eggplant. I do believe that Diego will end up chewing it apart, his teeth manage to pull bits off the top every time he plays with it so eventually it will wear down.

My final thoughts is that this is a great toy, and is fantastic to leave for your dog with treats inside, or even for play time together. I don't believe that it would be good as a 'Tough Dog Toy' as Diego wore through it super quickly. I can't imagine it lasting against a Pit Bull or even a Lab if there is treats inside. If you are tossing up between this and a Kong for a destructive dog, I would suggest to go for the original or Black Kong as our baby Kong is still around untouched (although previously Diego has destroyed a Kong). If you don't have a super destructive dog, then it will be perfect and I would definitely recommend it. I would also love to trial their other products in the range, they all look amazing and would be good to compare the treat challenge on all of them.

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Book Review: Ivory, Apes & Peacocks

Hey! We haven't done a book review in a while and to be honest, I just stopped reading for a while there. I just finished Ivory, Apes & Peacocks by Alan Root, and it has put me back into the mood of reading. I really appreciated this book so decided that this was the perfect read to get back into posting book reviews.

This book is a biography all about Alan and his life in Africa. Alan is a wildlife photographer and videographer that travelled through a lot of countries within Africa filming animals in their natural habitat. For those of you who didn't know, my dream travel location would be to Kenya, or Tanzania so it was so great to read an insight onto life within those countries. The book spans through most of his life, with Alan writing a bit of insight into his youth and then through early 20's onwards.

As always I don't want to give too much away from the book, however, there are some things I need to tell you about. Alan is a very inspiring man, and not only did he make amazing documentaries on tonnes of different animals, he also filmed animals that had never previously been filmed, or got on camera animal behaviour that hadn't been previously known. However, because he was not a qualified scientist, he was unable to document this and get the credit for it.

My favourite quote from the book is "I’ve always felt that gorillas - powerful but calm and gentle - are what most humans would like to be. Chimps - more inventive, but rowdy, combative and murderous - are, I’m afraid, more what we are." This quote came during the time that Alan was studying Gorillas in the wild, and this really stuck out to me. After reading Chimps of Fauna Sanctury and Through a Window I understand what he means by this. Chimpanzees are more aggressive creatures but also incredibly intelligent. Compared with Gorillas, who are more calm and placid but not as intelligent.

A big thing for me with books is how they are written. I believe that poor writing can ruin even the most amazing story. Alan has done an impressive job on the writing of this book, and it drew me in. A lot of biographies are hard to get into, and are not the type of book that you can't put down, however, Alan has done such a great job that I was hooked on reading this book. The story was set out perfectly, and went through each idea in chronological order. It also had amazing drawings in the book that one of his friends had especially drawn for him which gave some more character to the story.

My final thoughts on this book is that it is a definite read for animal lovers out there. It is such an inspiring story to do what you are passionate about, and not to give up when there is a bit of hardship in your life. It is also awesome to hear the stories about so many people that are passionate about animals and acting in their defence to protect them from us humans. I am now very keen to track down some of his documentaries and watch a few of them.
Have you read this book? What were your thoughts? Leave a comment down below telling us.

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October Favourites

Hey! We use a lot of different products, and go through many different treats and I know that a lot of those products never get mentioned. I have decided that a good way to wrap up the past month of trialling products is that we do a favourites list. Each month we will list our favourite thing under certain catergories so you can find out more about the things we are appreciating. This way, you can find out a lot more about what we have been loving. This will not replace current reviews that we often post.

Favourite Walk: Off-Leash Dog Park
This was not a hard choice, the number one place we go every weekend is the off leash dog park. We don't generally go during the week because it is a bit of a drive, but every weekend in October we packed up the dogs and took them to the park. This is a fenced in area that means we can let Asha off leash since his recall is seriously lacking. While we are there, we throw a ball for Diego while Asha runs around finding the best spots to wee. There is often a lot of dogs there as well which means both dogs get some great socialisation. I am yet to find a more efficient way to tire both dogs out without walking for hours. The one thing I will say about this park is that I don't recommend it for dogs that are likely to get aggressive in the presence of lots of other dogs. Because all dogs are off leash, it means there is a lot of dogs in each others faces and if your dog cannot cope with that, I would suggest visiting somewhere else. Otherwise, perfect for any dog, even the most 'glued-on ears' dogs will be great here.

Favourite Treat: Harringtons Training Treats
This brings back some memories from when we first started getting Bow Wow Boxes, and these treats were featured in the box. Diego absolutely loved these, so we went down to a local supermarket and purchased about ten packs. We done a giveaway for some of them, and the other packets were slowly used during the year. This one packet obviously got lost in the chaos which is our pet area, and I was trying to find good treats for training Diego to Play Dead and came across these again. They worked perfect, and meant that Diego learnt how to Play Dead in record time. They are soft enough to break into smaller pieces, or keep them large for the bigger dogs, and are perfect consistency that they don't halt training too much for chewing. We have a more in-depth review here.

Favourite Dog Toy: Zee.Dog Eggplant
We picked this toy up from Wolves of Wellington at the Tess the Dachshund charity event, and every time we gave it to Diego he went loco. When we first started giving it to him, we didn't put any food in it, he just loved the idea of fetch as it went bouncing multiple different directions. Unfortunately, Diego being Diego, he ripped the top off of it within about ten minutes of chewing it while I made dinner. This didn't affect his love for the toy though, and now he is even more happy because he loves playing with both pieces. We now put treats inside while we go out, and he has access from both ends to get to the centre goodness. I will have a full review of this within the month of November.

Favourite Extra: Mudwiggle Doggy Bandanas
Our favourite extra for this month had to be the Mudwiggle Doggy Bandanas. Diego wore his every day for the whole month, and Asha would have, if Diego hadn't decided that dragging him by the bandana was a good idea. We got plenty of compliments over the month on these, especially when we were at the HUHA Collection Day! So many people asked where it was from, or just complimented us on how awesome it looked on Diego. I am now upset because they have no general bandanas, and I feel that the Halloween ones will be too much for every month. Maybe that just means I have to purchase more.

Favourite Vegetable: Celery
The guinea pigs needed a mention in our favourites, however we don't change too much in their daily routine month to month so found it hard to come up with an idea on what we can put in. I finally decided that vegetable would be good because each time we got to the markets, a different vegetable is in season and therefore this is the major thing that changes in the pigs lives. This month they have been really enjoying celery, even eating that before carrots or lettuce! Celery doesn't offer much nutritional value but because they enjoy it so much we generally put a small bit in each day. One thing to make sure of, is that you chop the celery into smaller segments to avoid the string that celery has, getting caught in the pigs internal tracks.

Favourite Event: HUHA Collection Day
This month we only had two events, the HUHA Collection Day and the Pet Expo. Although at the time of writing this, we haven't yet been to the Pet Expo. If that one is good enough, you might hear about it in the November Favourites. Anyway, we spent a day collecting donations in Central Wellington for HUHA, and you we wrote a blog post all about it. We love HUHA and being able to help them out by spending a day on the streets is well worth it. HUHA do an amazing job for pets and animals in New Zealand.

What were your favourites for the month of October? Any new products that stand out for you? Leave a comment below.

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