Green Your Baby - My 5 steps to a healthier baby

Several parents have asked me what they can do to keep their babies as healthy and green as possible.

My number one answer is always, "breastfeed".
Not only are giving your baby the healthiest possible start in life but by breastfeeding but you are saving thousands of dollars on formula, bottles and the likes.

The manufacturing of baby formula is energy intensive. The industrial processes release harmful greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. Formula is packaged in tin cans - the majority of which are never recycled. Formula requires plastic bottles and nipples - which take anywhere between 200 to 450 years to breakdown.

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Additionally Since many cows in the U.S. are now routinely ingesting synthetic growth hormones to artificially increase their milk production, it stands to reason that these hormones are also getting into the U.S. formulas.

Click here for more information.



Make Organic Baby Food
This is actually quite simple. You don't need all the trays and fancy baby grinders unless you want them. All you need for little babies is a blender and for older babies - a fork.

To make organic brown rice cereal:
1. Cook your organic brown rice according to instructions.
2. Put it in a blender with a little breast milk.
3. When it's the right consistency - feed it to your baby. Easy Cheesy.

To make fruit and veggies
1. Boil the fruit and veggies
2. Blend or smash with a fork.
*Some fruits like bananas don't need to be boiled - just mash the heck out of them.

In my house we feed the babies whatever we are eating - just mashed up. No need to spend money on store bought brands that might have sneaky ingredients in them.

This is a good link for more information.



Use Healthy Sunscreen
Brands of sunscreen that you find in conventional stores typically are full of chemicals. There is no need to lather your baby in a chemical cocktail - here are several brands that are cleaner and safer:

*Badger All Natural Sunscreen

*Soleo Organics Sunscreen

*Kid Kare Biodegradable Sunscreen

And my personal favorite

*Alba Botanica Sunscreen - this is sunscreen made from green tea and my kids can wear it all day long in the pool without burning or needing re-application. Be forewarned - this is a THICK sunscreen.

Click here for a comprehensive guide to sunscreen.

Pay special attention to this "Hall of Shame" list of sunscreens.

I had to sneak a picture of my Doodle Bug in here :)

Cloth Diaper Your Baby
You knew I was going to say that, right? Since I talk about cloth diapers almost exclusively on this blog I'll be short and sweet. Protect your baby's tenderest parts, keep raw sewage out of our landfills and save literally thousands of dollars with cloth diapers. Of course I recommend LolliDoo Diapers :)



Last but not least - stay away from plastic toys, seats and the likes
You really don't need even a fraction of all the baby stuff in stores nowadays. Especially those plastic toys and bouncers. If you do buy them please pay attention to where they are made - things coming over from other countries are sometimes full of chemicals.

This is what I believe you need for a baby:
A sling and/or backpack (check out Sweet Pea Ring Slings)
Diapers
Clothes
Wooden toys
Organic blankets

That's it folks - all the other stuff is just gravy. Even cribs - how many babies do you know that actually sleep in a crib? I can count three - the rest sleep with their parents; where I believe they should be.

I am of the opinion that these five steps are easy, practical and safer for babies.

My Take on Octomom

I was up late last night and a special came on TV called Octomom; the unseen footage. Usually I stay clear of the news and subsequently didn't know much about her other then some woman who already had six kids had octuplets. *Interesting side note when I tried to run spell check on the word octuplets and I got sextuplets, quintuplets and couplets.

As I am watching the chaos of media I feel bad for the mom aka Nadya. She looks scared and shocked by how much attention she was getting. She said,

"I'm just a mom why are they so interested in me?"

I'm not going to pick apart this woman and her decisions, I don't know what I would do if I was in a position that I either had to implant my embryos or they would be destroyed. Especially if I believed as she does, that they were living children. I do want to point out two major things that she can do to save money, live conscientiously and keep her carbon footprint as low as possible.

1. Immediately switch to cloth diapers. The book Diapers: Environmental Impacts and Life cycle Analysis claims that over 300 pounds of wood, 50 pounds of petroleum feedstocks and 20 pounds of chlorine are used to produce disposable diapers for one baby EACH YEAR. Holy cow man, that woman has 10 children currently in diapers which means JUST THIS YEAR her family will have consumed 3000 pounds of wood, 500 pounds of petrolem and 200 pounds of chlorine. Not to mention that over one ton of *illegal* sold waste is dumped in our landfills by each child in cloth diapers.

I realize that she's probably too tired to eat let alone wash diapers but I noticed that she has a small army in her employ to help her. She even managed to sneak away and get a tattoo.

Cloth diapers, as well as being eco friendly will save her approximately $12445.20 if she uses prefolds and covers, $7261.20 if she uses fitted diapers with diaper covers, $9277.20 if she uses LolliDoo(TM) eco-pockets(TM) and $7261.20 if she uses a low cost pocket diaper. *calculations based on 96 total diapers or 12 per baby

At any rate, those are HUGE savings worth taking a look at.

2. Ditch the formula I know easier said then done. I realize that it's not possible for one woman to exclusively breastfeed 8 babies simultaneously however I have faith that the milk share community would happily provide her with breastmilk for a low cost. Mothers will reach out to those babies. I suggest asking yahoo milkshare and calling La Leche League.

The cost of formula feeding one baby for one year on average is $1643. Multiply that by 8 and you get $13,144. I am blown away how much it can cost to feed a baby formula.

The environmental impacts are also astounding. Peggy O'Mara explains,

"Manufacturing formula requires miles and miles of cows. Each grazing cow that produces milk for artificial baby milk needs about one hectare (10,000 square meters) of land. To create enough land for cows to graze on, forests are cut down, which leads to deforestation, which in turn contributes to soil erosion and water contamination; or land is used for cattle that was previously used to grow food for families. In addition, cow flatulence and excretion account for 20 percent of the world's total annual emissions of methane. While methane is second only to CO2 in contributing to greenhouse gases, it is much more destructive of ozone than is CO2. A similar equation could be used around soybeans, an alternative to milk, which use significant pesticides, water, and petroleum resources in their production and distribution.

O’Mara also asks us to consider the energy used in heating baby formula: “One study determined that producing one kilo of formula in Mexico costs 12.5 square meters of rain forest.” In the U.S., this cost is less noticeable, but there is still an energy cost to transporting and heating formula."

This is bad stuff folks, if you want to read more about the health risks of formula click here http://www.promom.org/101/


I don't believe in judging others and for that reason I don't want to trash the woman but I do wish she would be more responsible.