More Natural

Over the last year, Jer and I have worked at making things around our home more natural.  I guess you could say we're "going green".  However, most of the things we're doing started with the intent of saving money.  Adopting an infant is not a cheap endeavor.  Insurance covers none of it and (with the exception of friends and family) there is no one really to "help you out."  Since adoption became as priority for us, so did our budget, and with that came an effort to cut costs in many ways.  While saving money was a reason for most of these things, there are other reasons too, like sensitive skin and allergies.  However, I certainly like the fact that we're worked to make our family more natural.  Here's a list of a few things we've been doing to save some money and make our family more natural.

1) Cloth diapers! 

This is at the top of the list because it was probably the biggest investment, but also the biggest return.  I absolutely love our cloth diapers.  We started buying a few a month after we were licensed to adopt in order to make less of a dramatic impact on our wallet.  We stocked up during some sales as well.  We have just now reached a point where where (as opposed to disposables) we've saved money.  For the first few months of Anna's life, we technically didn't save anything with the investment we put into it.  However, with the cost of diapers where it is, we would be saving money right about now.  We have enough diapers to last a few days and will not have to buy a single diaper for baby #2 when the time comes.

Not to mention, the fact that I know the materials sitting against Anna's bum and she has yet to get any diaper rash.  They're easy to clean and I throw them in with her regular baby laundry.  So I don't do any extra laundry because of them!  I could go on and on about how much I love them, but I'll spare you and just say I'm so happy we made that decision.  Oh yeah, and my favorite part... no stinky poopy smells sitting around in my trash can for a week!

2) Composting

This was more of a way for us to simply reduce stinky trash.  For so long there was just the two of us.  It took a whole week to fill a trash can in our kitchen which is nice because trash pick-up is once a week.  However, that also meant banana peels and apple cores and onion outsides?? were sitting aroudn in my trash can making it stink.  Talk about a bad smell!  So we decided to do something constructive with them, bought a cheap compost bin and started putting all of our scraps in it.  We also have a lot of yard waste due to some beautiful landscaping that came with the house and excessive amounts of trees and leaves.  So it works wonderfully and now it's been baout 8 months and we're just starting to see some wonderful compost that will really be great for our flowers, especially since I'm really good at killing plants!

3) Norwex

A friend of ours recently became a Norwex consultant, selling environmentally friendly cleaning products that are chemical free, but antibacterial, and just use water.  I LOVE my Norwex cloths.  I use them for pretty much everything and I love knowing that I am not using chemicals to clean around my house.  I have gotten rid of all cleaners and since I'm a compulsive cleaner, my house smells so much better and is just if not more clean!  They also have body cloths that pretty much eliminate my need for soap as well, they're better for your skin and clean as well, without the soap scum!  And they're still antibacterial!  And it's saved us a lot of money as I bought a lot of cleaners since I"m a little psycho about cleaning my home...

4) Shampoo/Soap

Speaking of soap...  I've stopped using the regular shampoos and conditioners.  I now use baking soda/water as shampoo and vinegar/water as conditioner.  This wasn't that much of a drastic idea to me as I've always had scalp issues.  As a kid, my mom would give me a good rinse with vinegar every few weeks to really get all of the chemical/other stuff out of my hair.  It essentially strips your hair and allows your natural oils to rebalance themselves.  This tremenously helped my scalp as a kid and contiues to do so now.  It makes it so that I don't have to wash my hair every day and can simply rinse it every other day (I'm one of those people that NEEDS to have a shower every day, simply to wake me up).  My hair is much softer and less frizzy and it just feels clean.  And not to mention, with hair as thick as mine, I go through shampoo quickly and franky vinegar and baking soda are way cheaper!

I also know that Anna has sensitive skin and so we use very little baby soap/shampoo on her, but the stuff we use is totally natural and while it's expensive, we've gone through a quarter of a bottle in like a month and a half.  It's worth it to me to hav eher hair nice and soft and not wiry and to have her skin stay soft.  We also use a really hard core lotion on her to keep her skin soft, when I don't do it well enough, you can definitely tell on her skin!

5) Laundry

Really the last way we've made a major change to a more natural way is with our laundry.  Much of this was spurred by a need to wash cloth diapers in a detergent free of lots of things.  At first it seemed more expensive, but I've quickly learned that's not true.  The one box of the natural detergent I use was purchased at the same time as the generic regular detergent bottle that cost 2x as much.  The generic bottle is just running out and the Planet detergent box hardly shows a dent.  I only have to use a teaspoon of it in our machine and it's going to last us for a LONG time!

We also no longer use any fabric softeners/dryer sheets at all.  I never realized how bad they are for your skin, until learning about cloth diapers.  My skin is so much better, it's always been sensitive to things and I've noticed a huge different.  And I don't have to worry about Anna's skin this way.  Saves us money on products and saves us money on skin issues!


So basically we've tried to elminate chemicals and use natural alternatives.  Fortunately in these cases, the natural alternatives are much cheaper and so much better for us!