Decide what to buy

This must be one of the simplest green gadgets we’ve ever featured on Decide What to Buy. The Paper Potter is a simple wooden tool that helps you to make pots out of your old newspapers.

Simply cut your old newspapers into strips, roll a strip around the Paper Potter and fold the excess paper over the end of the tool. Press the end into the base of the Paper Potter and hey presto! A mini pot for your plants that can be planted in the garden. Totally biodegradable and the growing roots will be able to push through the paper as it rots away in the soil.

The Paper Potter is made from wood from sustainable forests and comes in a recycled cardboard box. Not only that but you’ll save loads of money on pots! Great fun for kids too.

They are £9.95 in the UK but they ship globally.

Today’s Green Piece looks at three products that will keep your house warm, save you energy and provide you with some veggies.

First up - Using your own waste to heat your house? Sound wrong? Well the Logmaker, despite the dodgy name, can be used to compress waste such as wood chippings, tea bags, olive stones and shredded junk mail and turn it all into a log for your fire. The logs will burn for between 10 minutes and an hour, depending on what you put in them. You can also add the remains of scented candles, cinnamon sticks, lavender or a few drops of scented oils to make your logs smell lovely too.

Not a bad use for all the things that normally end up in landfill sites. They’re currently £24.99 +p&p.

Talking of logs, this next product is a grow-your-own-mushroom log. It comes with spores inside it already. All you need to do is keep it moist in a shady spot to magically grow 2-3 harvests a year. Not only do you save money on mushrooms from the supermarket, you’ll also be saving the environment from the extra packaging and possible air miles. At £25, I think it’s a great investment.

Finally, there’s the Leaf Lamp. It’s made from 95% recyclable and 37% recycled materials and has a 100,000 hour life-span – that’s 100 times longer than normal lights. It also claims to use only 40% of the energy used with energy saving bulbs.

But this light doesn’t just save energy. It’s touch sensitive so you can touch it on and off and set and memorise your own intensity and warmth of light settings. Although this lamp is cool in more ways than one – the LEDs stay cool to allow further adjustment – it is £349. Bit steep for a lamp but when you way up life-span and energy-saving, it might just make it worth it.

Boys, we’ve found you the ultimate tool for summer. Now that barbeques are in full swing, chances are you’re getting frustrated at having too many tools to carry and nowhere to keep them? Do you wish someone would just get on with it and create a barbeque tool belt? Well, all your wishes have come true.

The Grillslinger Barbeque Tool System has come to aid men across the land with its fire retardant coating, its stainless steel tools and its fully adjustable waist band. Women will marvel at men equipped with its Grill Knife, Speed Tongs and Pro Flipper as they effortlessly create mouth-watering dishes in front of crowds from far and wide.

Well…if it all goes wrong, at least you’ll look hunky in the belt. All girls love a man with a good set of tools.

The waistband adjusts from 30 to 60 inches so if you’re pushing more than 60, you might have to lay off the bangers for a while.

So how much is this piece of barbequing heaven? A mere £49.99 from the Gadget Shop. Worth it just for the compliments.

If you’re looking for a barbeque, take a look at the barbeque reviews to help you decide what to buy.

I think we can now officially say it’s summer, so to celebrate, I’ve picked out a few summer essentials to help you make the most of the weather before it’s too late.

You can’t enjoy summer without a lovely fruit juice at your side so I’ve checked out which juicer shoppers consider the best. At the moment, the Philips HR1861 is top with 8.6/10. It’s a 2 litre stainless steel super machine that pulverises whole fruit into juice in seconds. Shoppers hardly have a bad word to say about it. Check out the juicer reviews to see for yourselves.

As gadgets are always on my mind, I feel the need to insert a gadget I saw the other week that would be a perfect accompaniment to this juicer. Unfortunately, I can’t find the exact equivalent in the UK but for all of our US readers, you shouldn’t have a problem finding one. It’s a radio controlled drinks and snack holder for the pool. Summer can be a hot and sweaty business so don’t exert yourself, deliver snacks to friends in the pool without even having to move from your chair, or get snacks delivered to you on your lilo without having to get wet. For those of us in the UK, here’s an equivalent snack and drinks float that’s unfortunately not radio-controlled but it’s still pretty cool. All for £19.95.

If you don’t have a pool, how about one of these. It’s a 15 foot pool that can be put anywhere and it comes complete with a cover, ladder, pump and ground cloth. It’s £170 but surely it’s worth it for 3 days of sunshine a year?

And you’re going to need something to chill those drinks in. One of the best rated mini fridges is the Woolworths Micro Chiller. It’s a bargain at £14.

You’ll also be needing somewhere to sit, so how about this eight piece garden furniture set? It’s £199.99 and at the moment, it comes with a free sun lounger, worth £29.99.

And finally, no self-respecting sun worshipper can do so without some tunes. We featured the wireless outdoor iPod speaker a few weeks ago and I think it would be the perfect addition here. The speaker comes with a small transmitter that you plug your iPod
into. You can then apparently wander up to 240 feet away from the
speaker and still enjoy your favourite tunes. Perfect for the garden and wire free.

Some summer selections there. Here’s hoping we get some summer to enjoy them…

In this week’s Green Piece, we’re looking at the Green Cone Food Waste Digester System - sounds tasty, doesn’t it? It’s quite a handy little addition to your kitchen and your garden that claims to make your organic waste disappear – almost.

The 4 litre Green Cone Caddy sits in your kitchen, which you fill up with all of your organic kitchen waste such as tea bags, bones, stale bread, vegetable scraps or even raw and cooked meat. Whenever you need to, you can then go and empty the caddy into the Green Cone, which sits in your garden.

The Green Cone needs to be placed in a sunny spot in your garden to work properly. It is solar powered and has a double wall which makes things nice and toasty for the micro-organisms that break down the food. The cone actually sits in the soil so that worms and other creatures can move in and out of it freely to promote further break down. But don’t worry, this part of the Green Cone always stays in the garden so you won’t be taking a zoo back into the kitchen with you.

If you’re worried about smells and those pesky flies and rodents, the fact that the cone sits in the soil allows it to filter out the smells and keep the flies and rodents at bay.

When it gets to winter time, decomposition naturally slows down so they’ve got some natural Green Cone accelerator powder to sort that out.

Household food waste is converted into water, carbon dioxide and small amount residue that will apparently only need to be removed every few years. It’s been designed to take three-quarters to one kilogram of food waste each day, which is apparently the typical amount for a family of four - a great way to save on plastic used in bin bags and space in your bin. If you fancy making your organic waste virtually disappear, you can find a Green Cone at Green and Easy.