Ann Marie's Blog

Tags:	csa, food, food labeling, nutrition, organic, pastured eggs, raw milk, rawesome, trader joes, whole foods
Subject:	Open Letter to Trader Joe's
Time:	08:13 am
Current Mood:	amused

This is a great post about egg packaging:

http://www.homegrownrevolution.org/2007/10/open-letter-to-trader-joes.html

I agree! That is very fraudulent packaging. I used to feel so good buying my "free range" eggs at TJ's. Felt like I was doing something good. Little did I know I was being had.

I think it would be cool to make a t-shirt with both of the packages. Maybe I'll do that via Cafe Press.

I used to spend all my grocery money at TJ's but no longer. They don't sell pastured eggs so now I go to Rawesome. While there, I end up buying all my wild-caught fish and grass-fed beef. MUCH better than the mystery fish, grain-, corn-, and soy-fed beef, and "cage free" eggs Trader Joe's offers. (This is a lot of money, BTW, that is now not going to TJ's).

Trader Joe's also don't sell raw milk, raw butter, or raw cheese so now I get my dairy at Whole Foods and the Organic Pastures hub store. Although I will occasionally pick up a stick of KerryGold (pasteurized but cultured) at Trader Joe's in a pinch.

They have a lot of organic produce, it's true, but most of it comes from far away. And they don't list the names of farms. I'm not interested in produce that is trucked for hundreds and thousands of miles. I want local produce because it is fresher. I want to support local farms. So of course, now we are getting most of our produce from JR Organics, a farm in Escondido that offers CSA subscriptions. Anything I don't get in my box I pick up at Whole Foods, Rawesome, or at the farmer's market.

There is just no need to go to Trader Joe's anymore. I used to love Trader Joe's. Now not so much. They need to beef up their labeling practices and find better sources of food.

How I'd love to have my own chickens! One day...

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Tags:	coconut oil, cradle cap, csa, diapers, food, kate, organic
Subject:	Cloth diapers and cradle cap
Time:	12:40 am
Current Mood:	awake

I'm not quite tired enough to go to sleep yet.

I spent the past couple of hours researching cloth diapers. I think I am going to switch.

I didn't know how much better cloth diapers are these days. I used to use cloth diapers in the late 80s when I was a nanny. There are so many more options now. So many options that I spent three hours trying to understand them all.

It's a lot cheaper to use cloth -- you can save up to 75 percent! For what it would cost me to buy 6 weeks worth of disposables, I can buy a complete set of cloth diapers and diaper covers that will last me 8 months or longer.

But the biggest reason for me is that they make disposables so good at wicking away moisture, that it has become hard to potty train children. They are staying in diapers until 2.5 to three years on average now. In the days of cloth only, kids were potty trained on average between 18 months and 2 years. It's easier to train them when they can feel how wet they are. Obviously!

And obviously, diaper companies want to keep those kids as dry as possible -- not only to make happy customers, but also so they can keep kids in diapers as long as possible.

I also don't like the idea of all those diapers going into landfills.

I did another good environmental thing today. Kate and I went to the local farmer's market and signed up for a one-month trial CSA subscription with an organic farm. Yay! We get our first box next Sunday.

In other news, I've been using organic coconut oil on Kate's cradle cap. It's the first thing that has worked (I tried everything I found suggested online -- baby oil, dandruff shampoo, and breast milk).

I have a lot more to say about coconut oil. I just read a book about it. But I am going to go read a little bit now and try to settle down so I can sleep.

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November 25th, 2007

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