Q: We are a yuppie couple; I guess that's what you'd call us. We have a nice center hall colonial, two children as well as plans to redecorate. Everyone is talking about "going green," using everything organic and sustainable, but I was overwhelmed when I went online to find information. Where do we start?

A: Many manufacturers are running to catch the "green" bandwagon — no wonder you're bewildered by the information overload. That's not such a bad thing when you consider how far our green awareness has come, even with a color-blind administration in Washington D.C.

Your home — and millions of others — is by far the most effective arena for battling indifference to earth's growing crises. Redecorating will afford new opportunities to clean house and your conscience, too.

The real beauty of eco-decorating is that green can be gorgeous. Gone are the days when "organic" meant oatmeal grays, boring beiges and bare natural materials that always looked, well, unfinished. No more sackcloth and ashes.

Today's organic products are as beautiful as they are sustainable; they can be replaced in time for the next generation. Plus, they have a low-impact on the environment when they are manufactured and transported to market.

For example, the swellegant silk runner on the pictured dining room table is inherently organic. Hand-woven in Southeast Asia by artisans who use generations-old techniques and natural dyes, the silks are from Lulan Artisans, a company founded by Charleston, S.C., designer Eve Blossom to promote sustainable design.

The silks and cottons in her "Organic Symmetry" collection (www.lulan.com) come natural — no pesticides or insecticides used in growing, no toxins or metallic compounds added in processing. They are woven into curtains, table runners and other eco-savvy products that look right at-home in Blossom's own early-l9th-century home with the other "green" products she and her husband mandated for its restoration: low VOC paint (Volatile Organic Compounds, awful on allergies), formaldehyde-free plywood and recycled furniture (what some folks call "antiques").

Don't forget that you can also purchase new eco-savvy furniture. Check out the offerings at www.sustainablefurnishingscouncil.org, headquartered in High Point, N.C.

Q: Mourning the seasonal wind-down of your garden?

A: Bring your outdoors inside to complement your dŽcor all year-round. It's easy, promises horticulturist Mike Sikes. Plant a container garden with small tropical plants that can develop in low or diffused light.

The green-thumbed expert and teacher spends the gardening season spreading the word about new developments for your garden, such as the trademarked "Mini Penny" hydrangea (www.GardenersConfidence.com). Sikes says container gardening can brighten your indoor rooms in the off-season, too.

Fill a lightweight clay planter look-alike with a prepared potting soil, such as Pro-Mix. Then plant what Sikes calls a thriller (tall and in the center), a filler (lower and bushier) and a spiller (trails over the side).

For indoors, he suggests a combination of small tropical plants like ferns, ivies and creeping figs in a variety of greens. For a sheltered outdoor porch, try dwarf Alberta spruce or English boxwood in a window box with pansies and ivy. In a location where no plants can grow, he recommends a winter garden of bare-tree branches and berry-filled holly branches "just pushed into the soil."

Rose Bennett Gilbert is the co-author of "Hampton Style" and associate editor of Country Decorating Ideas. To find out more about Rose Bennett Gilbert and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate website at www.creators.com.

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