Becoming a ‘Slightly Crunchy Mom’

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Hello! Welcome to my crunchy mom blog and thank you so much for taking the time to read my first post! This blog has been months in the making. I’m excited to share a little bit about what non-toxic and sustainable living means for me and how I got here. It has been a long road for me to make some of these changes, but they have been great changes for my family. I hope sharing some of this with the world will inspire others to make similar changes.

We have a daughter, Taylen who is almost 3 and I have to say raising a toddler in the midst of a global pandemic has not been a cake walk! I know the pandemic has been difficult for everyone, but I feel parents are having an especially hard time. In April we lost my grandpa to COVID and that is when things started to go down hill for me. Being stuck at home with a toddler who doesn’t understand why we can’t see her best friend or why her Dad is working from home all of the sudden has presented new challenges that I never could’ve expected. Things got really tough in those first few months and I lost my cool too many times to count.

The real eye opening moment was when my husband came in from playing in his truck with Taylen one evening. We used anything to keep her busy and she loves listening to music and playing in our cars. My husband asked if I could explain the video he just took of her. It was a video of Taylen saying, “I’m not f*cking frustrated, Dad”. My heart sank, I didn’t remember saying that in front of her. I must have though, I had been having a really rough time. That was a low for me. It made me realize I couldn’t let my daughter see me talk or act they way I had been. That video embarrassed me and made me feel so guilty. I knew I had to take better care of my mental health. Luckily, the weather was getting nicer and the playgrounds opened back up. We were able to start getting out more, but I had to do something for myself too. I had been casually working on my blog, but I decided I needed to get my butt in gear and do something to help myself. So, here we are, after many months of working on this, I am finally ready to share myself and my life with you all!

A little back story, in August of 2014 I started working at a coffee stand that focused on organic and sustainable living. At the time I had no interest in the ‘green lifestyle’. After working there for a couple years though and becoming manager, I learned so much. Working there opened my eyes to the toxic chemicals that we are bombarded with constantly. How could anyone say all these chemicals were safe? I started researching and when I got pregnant, I started researching even more. I can’t tell you how many hours I’ve spent researching and learning about everything we eat and use in our household. It made me realize that I can’t control every toxic thing that my family is exposed to. However, I can control some of it. It’s my belief that limiting those exposures could save us from a lot of health problems now and down the road.

I like to call myself a ‘slightly crunchy mom’. I try really hard to find a healthy balance between worrying too much and not worrying at all about the chemicals and products we bring into our house. So, if you see something in my blog and think to yourself, “that’s not very sustainable or non-toxic”, it’s because I am trying to find that balance and not go crazy! I spend hours researching the majority of products and things that we use in our household. There are some things that I just choose not to stress about for one reason or another.

I have a love-hate relationship with plastic. It’s great in that is has advanced our society and technology in so many ways. The problem is that it’s toxic to us and terrible for our environment. So, I try to do my part to reduce the amount of plastic we buy, especially single-use plastics. We really try not to store food in plastic, I never cook or heat anything in plastic and we rarely drink out of plastic. The main reason for this is that plastic leaches into our food, especially when heated. I’d prefer to minimize the amount of plastic we ingest as much as possible. I wish my daughter didn’t have any plastic toys, but I let it slide sometimes. She does have several recycled plastic toys and I am fine with that. I know some people don’t allow their kids to play with anything plastic, but I feel that is unrealistic in our household. Check back for a list of toys and other kids stuff I like.

We eat a lot of organic, but I don’t stress if everything isn’t organic. I try to stick to the EWG’s (Environmental Working Group) dirty dozen and clean fifteen list if I am worried about budget. The dirty dozen list is the produce that has been tested and found to have the highest concentration of pesticides. The clean fifteen is the produce with the lowest concentration of pesticides. The EWG tests and puts out a new list every year, so it can change. We also get a share of local grass-fed beef (we prefer grain finished) every year, we love to support local.

When it comes to being sustainable, I know I have a lot of room for improvement. I am trying to make frequent small changes to be more eco-friendly though. We use a lot of compostable products, we compost and recycle and I try to reuse as many containers, bags, etc. as I can. Check out my list of 10 easy ways to reduce your waste.

Some people have really high standards when it comes to living a clean lifestyle. We I try to find a balance in it and not stress out or inconvenience people around me with our lifestyle. I am starting this blog to share my favorite clean eating recipes, my advice for living a clean and green lifestyle and my recipes and tips for being your own barista (hence the caffeine in the blog title). I still have a lot to learn, but I am excited to share what I have learned with you all and I hope you will join me in learning more about being crunchy!

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