aresenic and lace... well, not quite... part 1 of ?

DISCLAIMER:  prepare yourselves... this is a LONG one, but super informative... so please read!!!
 part 1


I have a confession, which is definitely NOT going to come as a shock to many.... i am an HGTV junky.  Since we moved into our house almost 4 years ago, we have redone the following: (feel free to skip this section  if you want)

-new carpet throughout, retiled, gutted and redesigned our gorgeous bathroom with custom tile tub after we had already redone it partially, new backdoor after we had already put new molding up around the old one, gutted den, retiled, new insulation, recessed lighting, fan, surround sound wired, drywalled walls and ceiling, repainted the entire house, some rooms twice, took out the wall at the bottom of the stairs and made a custom bench with lifting top and storage and storage drawers underneath, redone and reorganized laundry room with all new shelving (but we do need to tile it), redone downstairs bathroom, repainted cabinets twice, new hardware, new counters/sink/range/hood/dishwasher, getting ready to scrape the ceiling and put in new lighting in the kitchen, new fans in 3 bedrooms, new railings for the staircase, stained deck, 2 new patios and a pathway between them, with a fence around the beautiful organic garden we put in too, new trellis, reorganized hall closets upstairs and downstairs, painted, tiled and new shelving

-there might be more, but i don't remember, and really i'm impressed if you made it this far down the list...

all of this to say, I remember when my dad was putting in the trellis and we were using "salt treated" wood, he said something about chemicals that were being used to treat the wood... as it is often my husband doing the wood working (my circular saw skills are only about par on a good day) i hadn't even thought about wood being treated with chemicals.

so then this morning, i, of course have HGTV on and they are demo-ing a deck. i'm thinking to myself, i sure hope they are going to re-purpose that wood, but as they are throwing it all away, the host of the show says basically under his breath "we have to get rid of all this wood because it's pre 2003 and was treated with arsenic"...YEP, YOU JUST READ THAT CORRECTLY... ARSENIC!!...WHAT!?! 

i was dumbfounded...so i did what any normal person would do and googled it.  what i found out shocked me, so i'll try to summarize:

Arsenic exposure can also lead to nerve damage, dizziness, numbness, immune diseases, cardiovascular disease, diabetes, and changes in hormone function. Lung and bladder cancer are the two health effects most often related to exposure to CCA (chromated copper arsenate)-treated wood.
The worst part of this whole thing is that there were/are no regulations about labeling such wood, so we really don't know what was and wasn't treated as CCA wood was used from 1970 until 2003.... this means picnic benches, decks, railings, playset and more us and our kids are around, play on, have food sitting on, eat off of, etc... and when it rains and this stuff gets wet, the arsenic leaches off and onto the ground and then kids, pets, etc play on the ground and can get arsenic poisoning in this manner as well...

Yet another problem... there is still plenty of wood out there being sold that has arsenic in it, the manufacturers had tons of it and were not made to properly dispose of it, but rather just sell it until it's gone... this is crazy to me!

Here's a great passage from an amazing website that really explains why kids are at such risk for housing/building related hazards:

Although housing-related health hazards are a concern for people of every age group, young children are at special risk from health hazards in their homes. Young children spend the vast majority of their time in the home and they are most vulnerable biologically. Children’s bodies take in proportionately greater amounts of environmental toxins than adults, and their rapidly developing organs are especially vulnerable to pollutants. Since children naturally crawl and play on the floor, they are in direct contact with areas where contaminants accumulate, and they are likely to ingest those contaminants through their normal hand-to-mouth behavior and play.

http://www.afhh.org/ahh/ahh_main.htm

i will continue this rant topic in my next blog, but wanted to get this info out ASAP as you may want to be extra careful ...

on another note... today is my daughter's first birthday :)  Happy first birthday, joey!!!
ps, sorry but no pictures :( iphoto is not being cooperative :(

electro-what?

sorry, let me finish the new kitchen counters, etc, and i'll get to the green remodel....

okay, so anyone who knows me knows that i truly deeply love three things (well, really i love more than that, but for the purposes of this post, i'll just focus on three) 1-running, 2-the beach, 3-snowboarding.  so, of course this means that my poor little kiddo gets drug around to all of these places (from 100 plus this summer to -10 degrees and 10,000 feet up in keystone colorado).  i am a good motivated mom and have some guilt that my habits may be somewhat annoying my daughter, so i try my best to make sure she's as happy as she can be while we're out in the heat ( or at altitude). 

getting ready to go up the gondola

at the top of keystone

at the continental divide in loveland, colorado, like 11 or 12,000 feet

running at keystone

heading out for a run back at home

She's had coconut water to help combat altitude sickness when we went from 0-10,000+ feet in 1 day, on all of our hot runs, and at the beach.  I started her on it at around 5 1/2 months and she's Loved it ever since!

about 5 years ago on a yoga teacher training trip to costa rica, i learned all about the awesomeness of coconut water.  now, i do love coconut, so when my friend and i were laying out on the beach, and a nice man was walking up and down the beach dragging a cooler behind him and asked us if we wanted a coconut, i thought, "when in rome..." and said yes.  He pulled out chilled coconuts from the cooler and took a screw driver and put a hole through the rind and gave them to us.  heaven, i tell you!! 

(no, this is not the man in costa rica, this is my hot husband when we were in key west.  i was 26 weeks preggo, and he was being a good hubby and shimmied up a coconut tree for me )

okay, i know the following is a lot of information, but just take a glance through it.  i bet you'll learn a LOT you didn't know about coconut water:

Coconut water is a naturally isotonic fluid, meaning it has the same properties and electrolyte levels as your blood does.  (it has even been used in IV form !). This means it hydrates extremely well!!

"Coconut water is the very stuff of Nature, biologically Pure, full of Natural Sugars, Salts, and Vitamins to ward off fatigue and is the next wave of energy drinks BUT natural", according to Mortin Satin, Chief of the United Nation's Food & Agriculture Organization.

• Coconut water contains more potassium 294 mg sports drinks 117 mg
• Coconut water has less sodium 25mg, sports drinks have around 41mg
• Coconut water has 5mg of Natural Sugars where sports and energy drinks range from 10-25mg of Altered Sugars.
• Coconut water is very high in Chloride at 118mg, compared to sports drinks at about 39mg.

Data is based on a 100ml drink from http://www.knowledgebase-script.com/demo/article-320.html

All of this to say, i have been giving my daughter coconut water all summer long.  i know the people at the children's hospital thought i was def. a nut when i told them, no thanks, i brought my own drink to give her,  no pedialyte for this kiddo.  but why would i ever give her artificial colors/flavors when there is such a better option out there?!!  

for those of you out there who HATE coconut, don't worry, it doesn't taste very coconutty, it's the water from an unripe coconut, NOT the milk that is fatty once it starts to ripen and absorb with the coconut meat.

my daughter and me at the beach

My favorite brand here in the states, since it's hard to just get a fresh young coconut in Virginia, is Vita-Coco. http://www.vitacoco.com/  and you can recycle the container :) 

the best coconut water ever!!!

Getting started

so, here I am doing something i swore i would never do, blogging.  i'm not sure how well i will keep this up,  but my friend said to me today that i need to start a blog about being a green mom.  i'm sure there are quite a few of these out there, but here i am giving it a shot! i will try my best to post all the tips, products, etc that i have come across and use as a mom in order to provide the healthiest environment for my family for years and years to come.

my daughter is a little fish.  she LOVES the water and started swimming underwater, holding her breath at 7 months, which i thought was pretty impressive.  introducing your kids to the water at a really young age is SO good for them!  The beach, or salt water pools are definitely the best places, but I know not everyone has access to those.  my daughter has blonde hair, and every time we swim in anything with chlorine (yuck), we immediately take a bath with california baby lavender soap... not a single green hair and it's almost september!!

http://californiababy.com/calming-shampoo-bodywash-17-5-oz.html
 

i'm not sure how this link will come out yet, but i swear, this stuff is the best, and it's made from organic ingredients, with a recyclable bottle made from a large percentage post consumer recycled plastic.  I lived in San Diego for 5 1/2 years and totally took for granted co-ops like peoples in OB.  but now that I'm back on the East coast... i really really miss it!!  you could just go in there and pay to refill your bottle.  i def. used to think everyone that went there was a hippy... little did i know i would rank among them one day :)

anyway- helping your kiddo learn to hold his/her breath is super easy... count to 3 with them, then blow in her face, then dunk.  works like a charm!  introducing kids to nature early is key to them learning to appreciate it and protect it later in life.

Coming up next.... green home remodels... a lot more challenging then you'd think!!