Thoughts

A friend of mine posted on facebook, a link regarding food dyes (http://mothering.com/).  A few years ago, when we got verizon fios, I started watching a station called veria.  I love a lot of shows that they have, but one of the things I learned was there are certain ingredients to look for in beauty products and food products.  Certain dyes like red dye #4, for example (though I don't know if this is a real dye, but that's similar to what the label will say) are really really bad for you.  Now all of a sudden, main stream media seems to be finally talking about how bad these things are for you.  I just heard it the other day on the Early Show.  When I was reading some of the comments on http://mothering.com/, I was kind of frustrated.  People were blaming our parents for feeding these dyes to us.  Others were saying that it's not the parents' fault because they didn't know any better.  And even others were saying that the FDA should regulate these things.  I don't blame my parents for feeding me some of these things.  Back in the 70's, we didn't know all of this information, at least as part of every day life.  Now here we are in 2011, and we are just finally having main stream media inform us about different dangers.  What I think should happen is: the FDA, who I believe should be protecting us from ingredients that may potentially be harmful, should publicize that there may be dangers in ingesting certain items or putting certain ingredients in products that will go on our skin or lips, or other areas that would make it easy for that ingredient to get into our bodies.  Do I think that they should police that these certain ingredients not be part of these products, yes, but I know that in the real world that is not going to happen.  People want cheap, convenient foods and products and they don't care what is in them and never mind that corporations would never go for this much policing, they would lose big time profits.  I just think that as consumers we need to educate ourselves and not buy things that we believe will do us harm.  I try to be a label reader.  I try to be an educated consumer.  I try to only buy natural foods in their natural state.  But for all my soap box talk, I often feel like I fail at this.  Reading and becoming educated on what I need to do for my family helps me make better choices, but sometimes convenience gets in the way and I give in.  I need to get off my soap box and start to follow my own beliefs more than I do some times.  By making my own foods from ingredients vs say buying cookies, I will know what ingredients go in them and how safe it is for my children and me and my husband.  So enough of my ranting and more on to acting!

Lastly, I also read a post at http://mothering.com/ regarding hanging clothes on a clothes line.  If you've read my posts recently, you know that I am trying to conserve energy by hanging my clothes rather than using our dryer.  Also, by hanging my clothes to dry, I am hoping that they will last  longer and I won't need to buy thing as often, and since I tend to buy more classic items, they won't go out of style as if I bought more trendy clothing.  The funny part about the post is that the author wrote about some of my hang ups (no pun intended) regarding line drying clothes.  As a kid, we always line dried our clothes and I hated it.  I hated the work it took to hang the clothes vs just throwing them in the dryer.  I hated line drying because that's what poor people did, and it just reminded me that we didn't have the money like some of my friends did.  Line drying was also embarrassing.  Now as an adult, I look at line drying a little differently.  By line drying, I will save money, and yes as a family with one full time income and one very part time income, saving money is very important.  By line drying, I can save energy and do my part to reduce my carbon foot print.  By line drying, I can have great smelling clothes.  By line drying, I can get out in the fresh air and feel productive.  Yes I still have my hang ups about line drying, but I know that it will help me move more toward doing what I believe for our environment and screw what others think of me. By line drying, my diapers will get bleached by the sun and help with sterilizing them!  Unfortunately, here in New England, even though tomorrow is April 1st, we may be getting more snow.  That just pushes off when I can line dry outside, but I need to look into good/better  ways to line dry inside!  Any thoughts?

Sorry for the very lengthy post,
Amy

One More Way To Go Green

I recently started to try to focus myself and this blog and write more about not just my struggles with healthy eating, but my attempts to be a little more green in my life.  I had forgotten about my desire to start hanging up my clothes after washing them versus just throwing them in the washer.  I had started hanging up my laundry in the basement while the weather was still cold, but recently got away from that when my laundry got a little out of control.  I was reading Facebook today and noticed that one of the pages that I follow, I also follow their blog http://greenlifestyleconsulting.com/, posted something about the weather here in MA getting nice enough to start line drying outside again.  I remembered that last year, I had wanted my husband to put up a clothesline in our backyard.  Unfortunately, we never got around to doing it since we had so many other projects.

This year, my goal is to get that clothesline put up and line drive all of my clothes!  The ironic thing about this is that if you had asked my just a couple of years ago, I would never have said that I wanted a clothesline.  I would have talked about how happy I am to have a dryer after growing up without one.  As a kid and a teenager and even until my early thirties, I remember hating the thought of line drying.  A dryer was so much more convenient.  Now, I am starting to think about what kind of impact I am having on the environment and what some of my practices are doing to me and my family, never mind the cost savings.  I am even thinking about switching to washing my clothes in cold water.  I guess I just always assumed that my clothes got cleaner using hot water, but at what cost?  I am also going to start using vinegar in my risnse cycle as fabric softener, especially since I am going to line dry more often!

I know that I want to continue to also use environmentally safe cleaners.  I am trying to remember to use vinegar and baking soda not bleach.  There is a new mop on the market that I want to get.  It has a refillable sprayer and a reusable cloth pad.  I am thinking that this will be something useful to clean up after the kids eat and throw food on the floor.  I think it may also just be a nice quick easy way to do daily clean ups on the floor and also use my own cleaning solution.

I am very excited that the weather here in MA is starting to warm up.  I am so looking forward to getting out with the kids.  I want to start exercising and getting some fresh air for me and the kids.  I also can't wait to start our garden, one more way we are trying to be more green.  I have started saving scraps for the composter.  I want to start a few plants with the kids so that they can watch things grow.  I can't wait for the flowers to start coming up again and  I can't wait to walk out myu back door and get food for my meals.

What are you dong to be more green?
Amy