The Joys of Home Cooking

It is important that our daughter see us create healthy, delicious meals every day in our home kitchen. To me, it is central to her childhood experience as it is the place where we share so much as a family. Gluten Free Girl and I have daughters that were born days apart and she wrote a fantastic post on this subject recently.

Aside from those benefits, is the confidence in knowing exactly what goes into our food. This is especially true for me when making special holiday meals. Sure, it's easier to run to the grocery store bakery for a cake, but there is something emotional missing from that for me. And I certainly don't know what kind of scary ingredients may have gone into it.  My general skepticism for genetically modified foods was reiterated in Food Inc. and deepened in a recently post by Dr. Mercola.

So we make choices. Mine is to show my daughter that we can express ourselves in many ways - one of them is providing food that shows our care for one another, celebrates an occasion and nourishes our bodies, all at the same time.

Money and Breastfeeding

There are so many reasons to know that breastfeeding makes sense. Today it is making news because it saves cents - that is, a tremendous amount of money and much more importantly babies' lives.

It can be challenging, it can be difficult and much more so when a woman is without sufficient educational resources and emotional support. I had all of that and still had moments of wondering whether or not I could keep going. There are a lot of myths about it out there. But the solid evidence showing the benefits of breastfeeding made it easier for me push through the hard times.

There are many people who recoil at encouragement to breastfeed siting 'militant' women who insist it is the only way, often making mothers feel guilty if they had trouble. What to feed our children is an intensely personal decision that effects their health, their future nutrition choices and our finances. My point is that, rarely does a mom experience absolutely no challenges during the nursing time (which can stretch well into toddler years.) So let's support those mothers through the challenges instead of immediately pointing to the "more convenient" alternatives. (I never thought bottle feeding was at all convenient - mixing, heating, carrying it with me; what a hassle.)

As a community, we ought to recognize our own stakes in the health and well being of our children. I hope those involved with pregnant women will do everything they can to encourage the natural, loving act of breastfeeding.

Candy, chocolate and colored eggs

It really is tough to resist filling my daughter's Easter basket with sweet goodies and spending the afternoon dipping eggs in food coloring and other chemical processes (that are admittedly fun and dramatic). However, the alternatives are worth a little extra time and for me, definitely worth putting in place now so there is less expectation when my toddler is more aware of more traditional ideas.

We colored eggs using cooked down red cabbage (blue), cooked down turmeric with cream of tarter (yellow), and beet juice with vinegar (brownish-red). All took overnight soaks for really saturated colors and be careful not to stain your clothes, countertops, etc. There are soy based crayons or beeswax candles you can use to draw on the egg before dipping to create another effect.

I filled her basket with tiny gifts instead of candy - socks, a book, mini rolling pin for play-baking. But I loved this post on Red Pill Parents on alternatives to conventional Easter treats. I would love to hear your ideas, too for next year. Drop me a line.

If you are celebrating this week, I wish you a meaningful holiday.

Pests and our Preschoolers

As the weather becomes warmer, I have been itching to get out into our yard to do some planting. You see, this is the first spring I have had a yard to play in in over a decade. So you can imagine that my view on gardening, fertilizer, pest management and what not has changed dramatically since then.

A study done on preschoolers (from in utero to age 3) in upper Manhattan and the South Bronx was recently released showing a connection between exposure to an insecticide, chlorpyrifos and neuro-developmental delays. Chlorpyrifos, very common up until it was banned from residential use in 2001, was used in commercial and personal roach control products among other things. It suggests that this chemical easily crosses the placenta into the fetus and is connected with increased delays in cognitive and motor development.

Having lived in NYC, there isn't an apartment there that doesn't deal with roaches at some point or another. Once I became aware of the potential dangers of these products, we switched to a carefully controlled use of boric acid. While we refused extermination service each month, our neighbors did not, so I was undoubtedly exposed to at least some of it while I was pregnant.

To me, there isn't a lot of surprise in this latest study or the response. It reinvigorates my efforts to keep chemicals away from my family and me. The problem is that I can't control the farmers, the municipal workers and others who may still be using this chemical (however unaware of its effects) on nearby areas. Has it seeped into our well water? Is it in our food crops? Who knows? And again, it causes me pause that we as a society don't demand the testing of all chemicals before they are used. Period.

Roaches are gross and carry disease. But if the cure for them is at the damage of our children, there must be a better way.

Why are our children sick before they are even born? It is devastating to all of us.