our friend melissa at itsa-belly (
www.itsa-belly.com) is at it again...spreading the good green word for baby. this week alone, she was on local television showcasing the best local green and sustainable brands (we are proud to say the segment kicked off with a feature on baby star) and also in our metropolitan newspaper with this great and very educational article...
Baby colors? Add green to classic pink and blue
Friday, May 09, 2008
EMILY PURO
Special to The Oregonian
Eco-friendly baby care is a priority for today's new and expectant parents, according to local baby planner Melissa Moog, founder of Portland's Itsabelly Baby Concierge.
"All the parents I work with are interested in going green in at least a few areas," she says. "When people become parents, they become more conscious of what they're buying for their baby and family. It's just a matter of what shade of green they want to be."
After researching environmentally friendly baby-care options, with a focus on the health of both the babies and the planet, Moog collaborated with writer and fellow "green mom" Jennifer Lo Prete to publish "Itsabelly's Guide to Going Green With Baby," due out in August. Here, Moog offers a few tips for easing the environmental impact of baby care and reducing your little one's exposure to harmful chemicals:
Typically, what aspects of baby care do you think have the biggest environmental impacts?
I would say diapering, food and clothing. With diapering, the statistic is that parents will change about 5,000 to 8,000 diapers in a baby's diapering days. If parents are using disposable diapers, that means our landfills are getting clogged up with diapers, which stay there for 500 years.
Another area to consider is food. I realize not everyone can go completely organic because it can be expensive, but there are ways you can save money and try to eat healthier while also protecting our planet.
The third area is clothing and bedding. Conventionally grown cotton, for example, is one of the worst crops in terms of pesticides. It's heavily sprayed 30 to 40 times a season in extreme cases with pesticides so poisonous they gradually render fields barren. To create clothing or bedding, fabrics are usually colored with toxic dyes and finished with formaldehyde. Certified organic cotton is grown in fields where the use of pesticides has been discontinued for at least three years and where rigorous controls help rebuild the soil's natural fertility, so organic cotton is much better overall.
What are your top three simple changes new parents can make to reduce the environmental impact of baby care?
One thing parents can do is to choose a less-wasteful diaper system. Even if parents can't use cloth diapers or don't want to use cloth diapers, I think it's important to find a hybrid solution.
A lot of my parents do half gDiapers, which are flushable and compostable, and half disposable with Seventh Generation or Tushies diapers, which have less chemicals and are better than the regular disposables. I'm not a cloth diaper evangelist, but I am an advocate of being more friendly on the Earth and healthier on baby in whatever way you can.
Another thing is controlling the baby-gear buying frenzy. What I mean by that is, before you buy something for the baby, make sure you really need it.
The third area I would focus on is breast-feeding. I know not every mom can breast-feed and sometimes there are health issues, but even just a few days of breast-feeding (each week) is a good thing to try to do. If parents decide to use formula, we recommend using an organic formula like Earth's Best or Similac brands.
In your book you describe the various eco-friendly labels parents might encounter in the marketplace. Are there any that you think are especially meaningful or important to seek out?
Yes, and there are places parents can go to get more information, too. The Environmental Working Group (www.ewg.org) puts out a ton of information about plastics and skin-care products and what to look for that's nontoxic for your baby and your family. If you see something's endorsed by EWG, or if you go to their site and look for information about a certain product, you'll be more educated on what's out there before buying something.
For textiles, there's Oeko-Tex Standard 100. They certify that an item doesn't contain allergenic and carcinogenic dyes and pesticides and so forth. If you can find something that has the Oeko-Tex Standard on it, you know it's a tried-and-true product.
Another thing you see is "USDA Organic" and "QAI" (Quality Assurance International) on foods. Those certify the organic integrity of a food. Many companies are placing "organic" on their product labels now, but they're not necessarily certified. I think it's important to look for the USDA or QAI seal, especially because you're paying prime dollar for organic products.
How does a focus on reducing, reusing and recycling translate to baby care?
(Reducing) goes back to my point about encouraging parents to evaluate their wish list for their baby, to separate what they really need from what they want. Because baby gear is used for a very short time, there's a great secondhand market out there that they can get involved with once they're done with these items. Also, hand-me-downs: All my maternity clothes were hand-me-downs from my sister-in-law. Another thing is donating to organizations who give items to families in need. There's also a great stroller company called Baby Planet (www.baby-planet.com) that recycles stroller parts and can help you donate your stroller.
It's a cycle. You buy it, you use it, and let's recycle it.
and here's the link to the video on Fox12 BetterTV featuring baby star for your viewing pleasure...
www.kptv.com/video/16189921/index.html
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