When you use healthy products to clean your dishes and wash your clothes, your greywater will remain healthy.  ecoSTORE USA’s Laundry Liquid contains No Nasty Chemicals™ so you can have peace of mind knowing that your vegetable garden isn’t being overrun with toxins.  In fact, I don’t even feel the need to wash veggies if they are being eaten during harvest.  

My family just bought a new camper and it has a greywater holding tank that slides out for dumping {or using in my case}.  I ‘m looking into a Laundry Pod {portable table top ecofriendly washer} for use while camping.  I am excited to use my greywater in the tank as well as the Pod to water my plants!  Waste not, want not is a great and novel concept.  Try it sometime.

Guest Post Written by Maggie Smith of SuperSavvyMommy.com

February is Heart Health Month and we love keeping our hearts healthy.  Valentine’s Day is all about hearts and love so we thought this would be the best time to show case ways to help keep your heart healthy.  According to Prevention Magazine, “For a truly healthy body, magnesium is essential. The mineral, which is required for more than 300 enzymatic reactions in the body, is found naturally in myriad foods, including green leafy vegetables, legumes, nuts, seeds, and whole grains. But despite its ubiquity, 75% of Americans don’t consume adequate amounts—and this missing mineral is one common culprit behind declining heart health. Given that February is Heart Health Month, now’s the perfect time to up your magnesium smarts—and intake.  Read more…

In fact, we love being healthy so much that we made No Nasty Chemicals™ available to everyone in the US and Canada.  What better way to stay healthy than to give a couple people the opportunity to try some No Nasty Chemicals™ products to help keep their families safe from toxins?

Want to win a $25 Gift Certificate to ecoSTORE USA?  Two people will win!

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Could Seaweed be the Future for Holistic Green Living?

When walking along a beach, seaweed is often seen as a nuisance; All too often, a layer of green and brown sludge sits between glorious white sands and luscious blue sea, marring an otherwise inviting scene. However, seaweed is now not only being hailed as a solution to the world’s imminent food crisis, but it could also be a viable alternative fuel and hold the key to preventing many diseases.

Superfood

The possibilities for seaweed are endless. As a food, seaweed is brimming with valuable nutritional goodness. Many seaweed cookbooks are starting to appear, as chefs recognise the superfood’s versatility. One such book is Irish Seaweed Kitchen, by Prannie Rhatigan. It consists of 150 recipes that blend seaweed into a range of unexpected concoctions, such as salads, pasta dishes and desserts. There is even a recipe that incorporates seaweed into a Christmas pudding. The book is a testament to seaweed’s natural goodness; it is rich in essential fatty acids, dietary fibres, amino acids and vitamins A, B, C and E.

“Seaweeds are mysterious powerhouses of minerals, vitamins and trace elements,” said Rhatigan, “but each vegetable has very different properties and these can vary considerably depending on the type of seaweed and the time of year that it’s harvested.”

The book explains the best seaweeds to buy and the times of year to buy them, as well as instructions on how to store it. “It’s important that people have a small amount of a wide variety of the seaweeds – then they’re getting the full synergistic effect of the sea vegetables,” Rhatigan said.

Medical potential

Aside from its capabilities as a superior food source, seaweed is being hailed as a substance that has great medical potential and a natural ability to prevent a range of diseases. There has been much research in the USA and the UK into its anti-viral capabilities, and it has also been found to have anti-cancer traits. It could also be useful in everyday medications, having been found to reduce inflammation in the body. This is being hailed by scientists as a significant development as inflammation is at the heart of many illnesses and diseases.

Other areas of development in the medical field include research into seaweed’s capability to lower blood pressure and strengthen the immune system. Nutritionalists are working towards being able to produce a seaweed medication that can reduce the number of harmful lipids in the body, which is an essential part  of the prevention of heart disease and obesity.

Alternative fuel

The world’s ongoing energy and fuel dilemma continues to worsen, as scientists and engineers frantically compete to come up with suitable alternative energy sources. Seaweed farming was recently found to hold the key to a viable solution; earlier this year, it was discovered that a genetically modified microbe could turn seaweed into a low carbon biofuel. Previous biofuels, such as those made from sugar or corn, have been promising in the past, but have ended up leading to an increase in global food prices.

It is thought that seaweed, on the other hand, could be suitable for large-scale use that would supply the world’s energy needs several times over. The discovery that resulted from this new microbe research was hailed this year as a “major breakthrough” in the global energy crisis, and that the next step was to find out if mass production was commercially viable. It would appear that governments may be able to provide the investment needed to make this possible; the UK Government, for example, was one of the first to add seaweed to its energy planning strategy, envisaging a usage of between 560 and 4,700 square kilometres of seaweed farms. Huge interest is being expressed in seaweed investment; both public and private organisations are said to be falling over themselves to put their money in the farming business. Investing fairly will be more of a challenge than that of finding funds; seaweed farming is already a big business, so there will be huge competition to grab a financial slice of this phenomenon.

The microbe essentially turns seaweed into ethanol, which can be used as an alternative to petrol. Daniel Trunfio, chief executive of Bio Architecture Lab (BAL) in Berkeley, California (the company that made the discovery) said that the benefits of seaweed as a biofuel could be exponential for the environment. He stated that if we used 3% of the world’s coastal waters to farm seaweed, we could produce around 60 billion gallons of ethanol. This is more than 40% of the fuel that the USA burns through car and truck fuel. BAL has already secured investment from the US Department of Energy, oil company Statoil and the government of Chile.

In conclusion, seaweed is one to watch for the functional foods industry, as well as the medicine and biofuels markets. With consumer demand for healthy food and drink, along with the growing urgency of the global energy crisis, the potential for seaweed is off-the-scale.

It has been over 4 years since my last round of IUI. And I’m now ready to have another baby. But instead of visiting my doctor and jumping right into IUI I’m choosing to try some natural infertility methods. I’m a big believer in not only keeping your body healthy, but keeping all the bad stuff out. Don’t get me wrong, that doesn’t mean I don’t eat junk food or drink caffeine. It just means I want the best for me. And when it involves a baby (which I’m hoping it will soon) then my instinct is kicked into overdrive. So what am I doing to try to kick infertility’s butt naturally? Here are my top natural infertility remedies.

Getting healthy! This is a BIG one for me. That isn’t to say I’m super unhealthy. But I do eat things I shouldn’t and could easily stand to lose 10-15 pounds. So I’m working on losing weight, eating better, and exercising. I have always known that losing weight can boost your fertility, but it has never really been a problem for me in the past. So now I need to get my booty in gear and shed some pounds.

Reduce my stress level. This is easier said than done, but I am trying. Mostly, for me this just means learning when to say no to things I can’t handle and asking for help when I need it. I tend to say yes to everyone and take on way more than I should. And I find it REALLY hard to ask for help. But I know that reducing my level of stress can also increase my chances of conceiving.

Thinking positive. It’s so easy to let the negative thoughts get in my head. So I’ve made it a priority to get them out. I believe in the power of positive thinking and hope that this is going to influence my fertility. This one is probably the hardest. I am a very positive person in general, but when it comes to certain things I am extremely negative. And my fertility is one of them. I’ve been through so much concerning my fertility that I have a hard time letting the past go and focusing on the present. But I have found that even if my positive thoughts don’t help my fertility they do help my day to day life. And those positive thoughts definitely help those around me, including my children.

I’m sure there are many more natural infertility options out there. But these are what I’m focusing on for now. If these don’t work then I will continue to look into more (acupuncture, natural herbs, etc.). In the meantime, I firmly believe that there is another baby for me. I know in my heart that I will get pregnant. I just don’t know when it’s going to happen. Hopefully the sooner the better. And hopefully pursuing these natural infertility options will increase my chances and get that baby here sooner.

Jacki

www.MamasonaDime.com

Club MomMe is a social events company for moms, moms-to-be and families in Los Angeles, Chicago and Houston.  Their events are social, educational and wellness-themed in order to help transition “me” into MomMe in a fun, communal setting.  Plus each event features lots of goodies in gift bags and giveaways, and of course food!

Each month, they host 4 – 8 events per month in a variety of event series like: Lunch and Learns for MomMes, Bump to Baby Series, Entrepreneurship for Moms, Daddy Bootcamps, Playdates, MomMe & Me Workouts and more!  Club MomMe was recently awarded the Circle of Moms Top 25 Mompreneurs Award!  I was lucky enough to “sit down” with founders Lane and Rachel and hear a little bit more about what they are and where they see themselves in the near future.

1. How did each of you meet?

Rachel and I met while volunteering through Junior League of Chicago. We were both on the same committee and, along with lots of other young women, were pregnant at the same time. We formed a natural bond with a small group of other women who were due around the same time of us over those fabulous things no one wants to talk about during pregnancy, baby gear and lots of late night emails and support for each other after our sons were born just a week apart.

2. Why Club MomMe?
We consider ourselves extremely lucky to have formed a bond during pregnancy and live in a city where women can find resources, services and products to support them through pregnancy and beyond (Google is not a resource).  There are so many choices out there now, for instance so many types of strollers, car seats and carriers, that choosing what you want for your upcoming arrival can be stressful and overwhelming.  We want pregnancy to be fun and exciting.  We decided to start Club MomMe when the boys were 6 months old and we wanted to share the resources that we found with other Moms throughout the nation. Having a small support group was invaluable to us and we want other women to feel that bond that we have. No one should go through pregnancy, child birth and the lifestyle changes that occur post-baby without a support person and MomMe friends!  That’s how Club MomMe was born!

3. Parenting clearly changed the way you look at the world.  You are now compelled to make a difference, why?

Rachel and I both feel the need to help everyone! We are compelled to make a difference in the world and we see it as Club MomMe is making a difference to someone during the most important part of their life: parenting. We want to share all of the knowledge that we’ve amassed through our support networks with other Moms. EcoSTORE USA is just one of the resources that we’ve found over the past year and the love to share with our MomMes!

We especially feel the need to protect the world that our children will one day inherit. Club MomMe allows us to create a place that one day our children can turn to when they become expectant parents and need advice. We want our little ones to know that parenting is not a competition, we don’t have all of the answers, and there isn’t a magic recipe for raising a perfect child, but that with love and support we all make it through even the worst times. Lane and I want to share the things that we want for ourselves and our children with the broader MomMe community.  We welcome conversation, but there is no place for judgement and attacks.  We believe that most parents can make the best decisions for themselves, their bodies, their children and their families, and these decisions may change over time and with different children based on where they are in life, their experiences, etc.  Who is to say that one way is better to do something than another?  With that being said, we do have certain opinions, and we like to share them in an educational environment that is not preaching, but more sharing.  For instance, we will only introduce eco-friendly and non-toxic products for mom, baby and home to our MomMes and MomMes-to-Be.  While we understand that they may not be the choice of all of our moms, we can and do choose which companies we choose to partner with and share with our community.

4. What are your goals for MomMe?

Our main purpose for starting Club MomMe was to be a support network for parents and expectant parents. A place where moms and moms-to-be (and Dads too!) can turn to for guidance and support during the transition into motherhood and navigating the ups and downs of parenthood. We want to make the process of turning “me” into “MomMe” fun, social, educational and communal.  We like for our communities to grow organically so that bonds last over a lifetime and not just a short period of a person’s life.

5. What makes Club MomMe different from other Mom ‘clubs’?

Our mission is not just to be a social club, but to really create a community of moms and expectant moms with all of the resources, services and products they need at their fingertips.  We address the full range of motherhood, from dealing with infertility, topics like Entrepreneurship for Moms who may not want to return to their former career or want to start a side business while staying at home, finding a work-life-baby balance, changes to expect after delivery, positive discipline for your toddler and topics that continue on through pre-school and beyond. Lots of other groups focus on support for a short-period of time. We want Club MomMe to expand a life-time. You never stop becoming a Mom, so you shouldn’t stop receiving support, making friends and connecting!

6. What have been your biggest challenges in the last year since you started MomMe?

Finding a balance! Everyday becomes more difficult and challenging to balance a toddler and a new business. Rachel works until late in the night PST, often when I’m waking up CST and I tend to work early in the morning. We are lucky that we are friends foremost and that has helped us overcome a lot of the hurdles that we face everyday in running a business.

7. What do you attribute your quick growth to?

We believe in Club MomMe with everything in our heart. Club MomMe is both of our second babies.   If we truly didn’t think what we were doing was important for parents than we wouldn’t have had such success the past nine-months! Our quick growth justifies the need for parental support networks in all ages and stages of life and in every city.

8. What can MomMes expect to see from you in the near future?

Club MomMe is expanding! We’ll be moving into at least two new cities on the west coast and moving south to Houston, TX. Lane will be managing the Houston expansion and Chicago and Rachel will be managing the West Coast expansion. You can expect to see events in new cities on the west coast by December and events in Houston in early 2013.

by Abby Vizelka

I am a mother of 3, two boys and one girl. My oldest son is 11 years and I took an 8 year break before having my daughter and then my second son was born 2 ½ years after her. I have always been environmentally conscious and wanted to cloth diaper my first born. I chickened out with him when I looked at doing a diaper service, thinking that was my only option, when I discovered it would cost me as much to do it and I’d have dirty diapers with pins and plastic pants hanging out for a whole week. With my daughter I thought about it again and again chickened out. With my last son, I decided I was going to go for it and bought a stash of cloth diapers. If I was going to do it, I was all in. Between my first two children I went to college studying environmental policy and planning, environmental science, and biology. While doing that, I learned so much about endocrine disruptors and the chemicals that we find in everything from the products we purchase to the water that we drink. It’s amazing to think about how many things we are exposed to and we don’t even think about it. I also did lab studies on the effects of estrogen on cancer cells, in which showed the rate of which they divide increased with the amount of estrogen present. Also we looked at reports from other studies in regards to behaviors of male rodents that were born surrounded by females compared to other males born by males. That was interesting to see the more feminine traits associated with those by the females, like being less aggressive. This makes me think about how that affects our males and the fertility issues that seem to be becoming more prevalent because of the estrogen and its mimics that we are all exposed to even through our drinking supply. Anyways, the more I’ve learned, the more I’ve become interested in changing the levels of exposure of many chemicals for my children. It has progressively gotten worse, or better depending on whom you ask, since I’ve started cloth diapering. I really want my kids to be the best they can be which includes putting as little into/onto their bodies as possible. My younger kids both have eczema so we try to look for as few ingredients in products as possible. I make my own toothpaste and cook lots of things from scratch. I have recently purchased my first half cow and half pig to know where our meat comes from and ensure no added hormones. I hope that my children grow up with an appreciation for everything around them and that they won’t have to look so hard for “clean” products to purchase from stores. There is lots our government can do to make that possible but they need to make companies prove the safety of their products rather than just prove their products aren’t toxic on a large scale.

Baby’s come with a small foot but they make a large impact on our earth.  As parents, it is our job to choose the safest products for our children and for Mother Earth.  We need to choose our products and food wisely.  This is why my family chooses eco- friendly products, cloth diapers and organic foods.

Natural products are a good idea for anyone big or small.    I used to use the strongest chemical cleaner in my home.  I always thought that the stronger the smell, the cleaner it got.  I recall so many times cleaning the bathroom and coughing from the inhalation of the chemicals.  Having asthma, I thought, this cannot be good.  Something has to change.  We then started buying natural products.  At first, it seemed like it took a little more elbow work to really clean, but it was very worth it.  The air was safe to breath and there was no fear of accidentally poising ourselves, pets or children.   Our home is naturally clean and fresh and our lungs are healthy enough to talk about it.

We didn’t stop with household cleaners.  Natural products extended to our laundry, our shampoo, soap, toothpaste, sunscreen, etc.  If there is a natural product that works, why use the chemicals?  They are not necessary and they are unsafe.  When our baby came along, our home was safe.  Our baby uses cloth diapers washed in chemical free laundry soap and she bathes in natural shampoo.  Best of all, most natural companies do not test on animals.  The products do not hurt you, the environment or helpless animals!  That’s a win-win!

Natural living includes what you put in your body as well.  Organic foods are raised without chemical pesticides.  I believe the body does not need those extra chemicals neither does the Earth.  Seeing our baby’s precious brand new body, I especially did not want to put any unwanted chemicals in her.  She eats homemade organic baby food.  Eating homemade allows her to try any and all vegetables, they are pesticide free and nutrient rich.  Shopping at the Farmer’s Market allows us to purchase fresh, organic, in season vegetables and fruits!  Yum!

Remember…The children we raise TODAY will be running this planet TOMORROW!

How do you lower your children’s footprint on the Earth?

Author Mary Holland practices Jivamukti Yoga and is a joyful vegan! She says “It is a liberating way to live! I am married to an incredibly awesome man, have an amazing baby girl and live at the beach! Life is great!  My blog, A Yogi with a Cause can be found at http://maryshealthyblog.blogspot.com ”