Top ten things to protect your family and the planet

I came across a series of articles by Doug Abrams on Dr. Greene’s website  including:

• An unprecendented experiment on our children
• Will my child get sick?
• Top ten things to protect your family and the planet

(Update:  I recently checked the links to the articles and they are no longer available).

He discusses how “since World War Two, approximately 80,000 chemicals have been invented, and thousands of these have been produced in excess of millions of pounds per year.”

A recent study of fetal chord blood (the blood a child is born with before they take their first breath) found 413 chemicals and on average more than 200 different chemicals per child.

Many of these chemicals are endocrine disruptors.

He mentions how ”one out of every three U.S. kids currently suffers from allergies, asthma, ADHD, or autism.” (And, as you know, my son has allergies and asthma).

Doug Abrams also provided a list of the top ten things you can do to protect your family and the planet, such as buying organic food and avoiding meats, cheese, etc; avoiding the use of pesticides; using cast iron pans; etc.

It’s a good reminder. We are doing some of these things, but not all of them.

We try to buy as much organic food as possible (esp. for Moses), but it’s not always available. I was actually a vegetarian when I was pregnant with Moses, but had huge cravings for red meat after I gave birth.  Moses loves chicken and lamb. We try to feed him as much local, free range and hormone-free chicken as possible and local, hormone-free lamb. (Just this week, we picked up a whole lamb from a local farmer and brought it to our local butcher).

We don’t feed Moses dairy, so he isn’t ingesting milk and cheeses, but dairy is a personal love of mine, which I’ve been trying to minimize. This is just another good reminder for me.

We have a cast iron pan, but don’t always use it. This is a good reminder for me.

Anyway, I thought I’d pass this on because these issues are often on my mind (i.e., our children’s sensitivities, how we are treating  our planet, our selves and our children, what we can do to minimize the effect on our children and planet).

Using apple cider vinegar to wash fruits and veggies

I read this advice in Doreen Virtue’s book, The Care and Feeding of Indigo Children (p. 137)  and I’ve been following it.

We try to buy organic as much as possible, but living in a relatively small community, our selection of organic produce is limited (esp. during off-season months).  Doreen suggests washing non-organic produce with apple cider vinegar because it’s a natural pesticide remover.

According to the Vinegar Institute website, “Add 2 tablespoons white distilled vinegar to 1 pint water and use to wash fresh fruits and vegetables, then rinse thoroughly.  Research has shown that vinegar helps kill bacteria on fruits and vegetables.”

Quite often, whenever I wash our fruits in apple cider vinegar, I get the message “share this on your blog”.  And, so I am…