LAWRENCE: Groups gather to celebrate sustainability

By Lea Kahn, Staff Writer
   Belinda Silver watched as her son and daughter, Jason and Jessica Romero-Silver, carefully looked over the goodies at the “Lucy’s Free Market” table Saturday afternoon at the Lawrence Nature Center.
   The 7-year-old twins picked up several items, trying to decide what to keep. The items — which booth-minder Anne Demarais described as “treasures that have not found their ‘forever’ home” — had been donated to the table in the spirit of reduce, reuse and recycle.
   That was fine with their mother, who accompanied her children to the Friends of the Lawrence Nature Center’s annual Mother Earth Day. She said the family has always recycled, but now the emphasis is shifting to include reducing what they own.
   ”We finally realized that reducing is really the key,” Ms. Silver said.
   The Lucy’s Free Market booth was one of many set up in the yard surrounding the Rinck House, which anchors the Lawrence Nature Center at the end of Drexel Avenue. The Lawrence Nature Center is adjacent to the 36-acre Drexel Woods, which include walking trails.
   Groups as diverse as the Arbor Day Foundation to the Sierra Club to Sustainable Lawrence and the Stony Brook Millstone Watershed Association had set up booths in the yard. There was a booth where children — and adults — could make Mother’s Day cards.
   Lawrence High School students who belong to Students Against Violating the Earth, or SAVE, which is the high school’s environmental group, painted children’s faces. That was a fairly popular booth among the younger set.
   At the booth set up by Girl Scout Troop 70122, visitors could see what an actual portion of food looks like. It’s smaller than most people imagine, leading one visitor to comment that “I’ll have to eat (from) a smaller cereal bowl.” The purpose of the booth was to shine a light on the epidemic of childhood obesity.
   The 4-H Rutgers Cooperative Extension Service of Mercer County offered pamphlets and a coloring book entitled “Composting Matters.” Inside, the coloring book explained that composting organic material is nature’s way of recycling.
   But one of the most popular attractions was the blanket — set down on the grass — that held bowls full of beads and strands of string or plastic rope that formed the basis for sun-catchers. They are ornaments put together by young and old, and hung from tree branches.
   In this case, however, the sun-catchers’ creators hung them from a bower that marked the entrance to the meadow behind the Rinck House.
   At least a few of the sun-catchers were recycled from art class projects at the Ben Franklin Elementary School, but new ones joined their ranks Saturday afternoon as a way to welcome visitors to the meadow.