I don’t think I will ever actually use the term “crunchy” when referring to myself, but I imagine others will when they read all this stuff. 😉 The first time I heard someone say they were a “crunchy mom” I had NO idea what they were talking about. I figured it out eventually, but never thought that I’d reach the point of being ‘crunchy’ myself. Especially since attachment parenting didn’t really work out for me. I put my babies on a schedule as soon as they came home from the hospital, and they nearly always slept in their own bed. I can’t sleep if they are in my bed.
BUT, there’s more to being ‘crunchy’ than attachment parenting, I’ve discovered.
I’ve thought for quite some time that processed foods, chemical sweeteners, fake flavors and such are bad, Bad, BAD for us. I don’t believe that God created our bodies to deal with and process chemicals. And since the rise of issues like autism, type 2 diabetes, and a whole slew of cancers have convinced me that we’re not doing ourselves any favors.
While I’ve been making changes in the way that we eat over the last couple of years, I know there is still room for improvement there. Baby steps tend to be the best because making changes slowly makes it easier on everyone to adjust. However, I’ve been inspired by a couple of other blogs and a slew of info online to make other changes besides diet. I’m going to de-chemical-ize our home.
If you follow me on pinterest you may have noticed a few of these natural products that I’ve been pinning. Over the next few months or year, I’ll be trying out some recipes I’ve found for natural beauty products and cleaning products. We like to ‘stock up’ on certain supplies so we’re going to work our way through those before we completely banish them. 🙂 My frugal side won’t let me just chuck them all.
So I’m going to blog about this journey to chuck the junk that we don’t need in our bodies and on our skin. Some of the things that we’ll be testing (or at least me) will be, homemade and natural deodorant, tooth soap, dishwasher detergent, laundry detergent, all-purpose cleaner, bathroom cleaner, and shampoo. 🙂
A lot of these products will have coconut oil in them as I have fallen in love with the amazing things you can do with that stuff! WOW! I’ll also be adding it to my daily diet due to the amazingness of this food! Seriously, look up the stuff, it’s fantastic.
Besides it’s actually pretty frugal! A lot of the products include ingredients like white or apple cider vinegar, baking soda and of course coconut oil. Some of the other products represent a bigger upfront investment, like the natural castile soap and essential oils. But those kinds of ingredients will last a very long time, even when using them in several different products.
So stay tuned for these experiments. I don’t know if they will all “take” or not. Some changes are more difficult than others to adapt to. But if they work the way that people claim they do, then I think we’ll be good to go. I’m excited for the process, I think it’s going to be a lot of fun, and hopefully will help us eliminate even more of the icky, toxic stuff that we shouldn’t be around.
My first experiment will be natural laundry soap…. next week, wait and see!