An attempt to brighten your gray snowy day. An article on sunglasses! :)

Shwood calls itself “a simple experiment with nature.” Harnessing the inherent uniqueness of each piece of wood, Shwood handcrafts sunglasses in their Oregon workshop “to showcase the medium’s natural and unique splendor.”

Founder Eric Singer had always enjoyed making art with wood, especially from the trees surrounding his house. “One day he chopped a limb off a neighbor’s tree, and hand-carved a pair of glasses from a solid piece of wood. He attached the temples using cabinet hinges and super-glued a set of cheap lenses into the frame,” says Taylor Murray of Shwood. A year of blood, sweat, and sawdust later, the story goes, a company was born.

The music industry might be dying, but people are still shelling out big money to see their favorite artists on tour. They just aren’t the same artists who are topping the charts. These are the highest grossing concert tours in the United States in 2010. 

This holiday season, U.S. consumers plan to spend $689 dollars each on holiday-related shopping. Imagine if they spent even just a small fraction of that money helping others. Mercy Corps has a program where you can buy gifts that lend support to those in the world’s poorest places. Here is some idea of the bonanza of commercialism that is the holiday season, and some of the impact you could have by taking action through the purchase of an alternative gift that changes lives.

 

Let each generation tell its children of your mighty acts;  let them proclaim your power. Psalm 145:4 NLT