New Blog

So I have made the jump over to wordpress. I like the features available for blogging better, especially if I decide to get my own domain or anything they make it particularly easy and will host it. I doubt this blog will ever become big enough to really warrant much monetary investment but it just a little hobby after all. My new address is http://chemistryofjoy.wordpress.com, and the blog has been renamed Chemistry of Joy. The title came from a quote that my yoga teacher, Linda, was reading from a book during Savasana, and it just sort of hit me. I don't just want to write about living green and reviews on products I use, although I think it is nice for others to be able to have that information out on the internet for them. I decided I wanted to write more about just every day life even and so I figured the title needed to be something more encompassing of that idea. It isn't just about my silly little car anymore and an attempt to live green. Who knows it could actually get interesting...my life that is. Afterall my husband and I have a bad habit of trying to do everything at once.

Honey, We Shrank His Penis.

Danger of phtalates, endocrine hormone disruptors, to development of male genitalia in utero, as well as advice on how to avoid phtalates.

read more | digg story

Homemade Baby Food

As I was preparing lunch for my daughter today I was considering the fact that since I have gone to making baby food at home, I have saved a considerable amount of money. At first I was hesitant about making baby food at home, I figured it would take a lot of time up, create a big mess (I am a good cook, or so my husband claims, but I have a tendency to leave the kitchen in quite a state of chaos).

But since I was curious and I had a gift certificate, I purchased the So Easy Baby Food Kit from Babies 'R Us for $37.99, it comes with a cookbook, two freezer trays with lids, DVD and nutritional information card. The kit claims you can make baby food easily in 30 minutes per week. I have not sat through the whole DVD so I cannot say much for it, I am sure it is helpful but unfortunately when I do sit down and pop in a DVD I would prefer it be a movie that I can enjoy with my husband.

Pros:

• The cookbook goes over everything from picking the produce, how to store them properly or even encourage them to ripen if they are not. It also includes various ways to cook the produce that you pick including microwave, baking, steaming, etc. The cookbook nicely divides foods into the month ranges that they should be first introduced and provides advice on combining foods, possible allergies, even spices. On the page of each item it includes a line to write the date introduced to your baby and notes.
  
• The trays are handy with their lids, instead of wrapping ice cube trays in cellophane.
• The nutrition cards are great, especially helpful to leave out for babysitters because they cover everything from sources of certain nutrients, age that food should be introduced, and first aid for choking. Big bonus is they are waterproof!

Cons:

• I was not aware when I purchased the kit that the 30 minutes a day was mainly dependent on microwaving all of the produce to cook it, as opposed to baking, steaming and other options. I am not a huge fan of microwaves and much prefer the control I have when I am baking or steaming so that the produce is not overcooked and could lose its valuable nutrients. While the cookbook gives the estimated time to prep each individual produce it is based on microwave times.
  
• The cookbook does not include meat recipes in it, but does include tofu which is a great source of protein.
• The ice trays included are the same pretty much as the conventional ice trays you can buy at a grocery or drug store, it would have been nice if they were slightly larger for serving size purposes. If at least one tray had larger cubes it would be wonderful for when your baby gets older and starts eating larger portions. Right now I end up feeding my daughter about 4-5 ice cubes per meal.

Overall I think it is a bit pricey for something that can be easily researched on the internet. I would like to include in this post a website that I think has some awesome recipes especially for toddlers. The website is Wholesomebabyfood.com, and I would highly recommend it, it also has some great articles on food allergies, sweeteners, and even recipe contests sometimes.

5 Ways to Keep Bisphenol A, or BPA, Out of Your Food

This will be it for me tonight, but I thought I would post this before retiring to go spend time with my husband. This relates to my post "BPA and Human Disease" as it mentions a couple basic ways to avoid BPA in your daily dietary habits other than just disposing of the plastic water bottles with the number 7 on the bottom. I think it is important to note as a mom who bottle feeds that the list includes using powder formula instead of the ready-to-serve kind. To find out more check out the article.

read more | digg story

Medicine Cabinet Au Naturale

I receive the Babycenter Bulletin in my inbox just for random updates and helpful hints on parenting. Yesterday I received their bulletin with a link titled "10 poisons found in every home", which led to an article "Poison-proofing your home". It started making my wheels turn about what could be done about some of the more obvious compounds you can find in your home that your children could possibly get their little hands on and ingest. I already have latches on all the cabinets, but there is always room for improvement. Since I already use all biodegradable natural cleaners, most of them either from Method or Shaklee, my medicine cabinet is the next area to tackle.

I found a little article on Gaiam Life as I was using StumbleUpon, it is titled "9 Holistic Remedies You need in Your Medicine Cabinet" and it includes some nice affordable holistic remedies. It contains holistic remedies that naturopathic doctors use at home and suggest that their patients use as well for everything from insomnia to athlete's foot. Some suggested additions to your medicine cabinet include simple things like Vitamin C for cold and flu, white vinegar for athlete's foot, arnica for bruises swelling and pain relief, and honey for cuts and dry skin. It is important to remember that not all natural products are safe for children, especially out of that list Vitamin C and especially arnica can be hazardous if ingested in large quantities. But overall the list appears to have far less toxic substances than the normal medicines I have in my first aid kit. To read the article which contains all 9 remedies, their uses, directions, and why they work click on the read more below link. Note I have just started using digg, as I figured it would be easier to link to articles that I find and want to post about here.

read more | digg story

Fountain of Youth?

Telomerase is an enzyme (indicated by the "-ase" ending) that adds DNA sequences to the three prime end of a DNA strand in the telomere region. Telomeres are condensed DNA material at the end of a DNA strand that provide structure to the DNA strand.

So what is the big deal about telomeres and telomerase you may ask? Why am I geeking out over scientific nonsense on an blog focusing mainly on an eco-friendly lifestyle? Well I am glad you ask (or you clicked on a link or typed in a url to lead yourself away from my blog already).

As we live our lives our cells are continuously replacing themselves and during this replication process, mitosis, DNA sequences usually within the telomere region are lost. Telomerase allows for the replacement of these regions of DNA. As we ag our level of telomerase declines as well as the length of our telomeres, which is part of what causes us to age.

In a study done by scientists and doctors at UCSF and the Preventive Medicine Research Institute in Saulsalito, 30 prostate cancer patients were instructed to follow a low-fat diet, exercise moderately, and reduce their stress. Within a mere 3 months levels of telomerase, which was being concentrated on in the prostrate tissues of these patients, rose significantly. While the researchers can only speculate that the increased levels of telomerase are due to the change in lifestyle and are calling for a larger and more strictly controlled research project on this subject, their findings are encouraging for a couple reasons. Low levels of telomerase is often indicative of disease risk and premature death rates in cancer patients, and it is related to the natural aging process.

Dr. Dean Ornish, the director of the Preventive Medicine Research Institute and one of the leading researchers, has long been a proponent of a healthier lifestyle to prevent and even reverse certain diseases including heart disease. The findings of these researchers has been published in the British Lancet Oncology, and the article that I gleamed the information on this research project is titled "Changing diet, exercise found to extend lives" in the San Francisco Chronicle.

I can only hope that these types of research trials will encourage people to adopt a healthier lifestyle, even if it is for the vain goal of preventing themselves from aging. This in turn would help the earth since people wouldn't be consuming tons of unnecessary calories and wasting food that ends up in landfills along with the packaging for all of those food products and maybe even go outside and exercise instead of sitting in front of a screen of some sort or behind a steering wheel for most of their day. I would hope that it would be common sense to people that eating a well balanced diet, exercising, and reducing stress (the one thing I often fail at) is the best way to stay healthy, then again we are in an obesity epidemic in the United States.

BPA and Human Disease

Since BPA is technically an environmental concern if you consider anything that is around you as part of your environment, I figured it fitting to write about an article I was reading this morning that I found on http://news.google.com in the Science and Health section. The FDA is currently reviewing the possible health risks of BPA, or bisphenol-A, a chemical compound used to produce polycarbonate plastic a clear shatter-resistant plastic. BPA can be found in everything from the majority of baby bottles on the market to food utensils and even dental fillings.

In the Journal of the American Medical Association, British researchers have published a finding that indicates that the highest levels of BPA in 25% of adults was associated with these individuals being twice as likely to have heart disease and/or diabetes when compared with 25% of the sampled adults with the lowest levels of BPA. BPA levels were measured in a population of 1,455 U.S. adults between the ages of 18 and 74 through blood and urine samples. The study has shown to correlate with previous studies found in animal laboratory tests, but there is still much research to be done to determine whether BPA is in fact the cause or the high levels found in urine and blood are a symptom of another problem. To read the full article click on the title, "Common Plastics Chemical Linked to Human Disease" by Michael Kahn.

While I am not trying to run around adding to the hysteria over BPA, I do think it is important to be hesistant about human made compounds that we consume and assimilate into our body.
All this does is to reaffirm the need for further study of BPA when it is related to human consumption especially when those consumers are young children who are still developing. While the government can say something is safe, I do not plan on gambling with the health of my children. Since I could not breastfeed due to medical reasons I made sure I went with BPA-free baby bottles. Companies including Born Free, Green to Grow, Dr. Brown's, and Nuby have BPA-free baby bottles and sippy cups available a local retailers and many online retailers. I just recently noticed Playtex has also jumped on the bandwagon and I anticipate that many other larger companies will too as this continues to be a concern for parents. And for all of us adults instead of using tons of disposable plastic bottles, which contain BPA, think about investing in a reusable bottle. Companies such as Sigg, Camelbak, and Nalgene all make bottles that are BPA-free and there are a variety of colors and sizes to match anyone's fashion and lifestyle.

Alma Mater

So while I planned mostly to write about our eco-efforts as a family, I thought I would write about something that I am currently trying to deal with. I graduated just over a year ago with my degree from Cal Poly and was supposed to receive my diploma about 2 months after I received a letter congratulating me on finally being done with school. Mind you I almost wasn't able to graduate because of an alteration I made to my elective course list. Of course I was busy with far more important things 2 months after I received that letter in October 2007 because well I had a baby and a house and a husband to take care of! Before I end up getting distracted again from receiving this wonderful piece of paper, that I will probably just stuff in a folder, I find myself playing email tag with the Office of Academic Records at my Alma Mater.

Here is the real mind boggling part to this situation, their hours at the Office of Academic Records are 10am to 12pm and then 1pm to 3pm. Why is it that the university bureaucracy allows these people to somehow magically work only a portion of the day in comparison to most people and still have a salary to live on?

Purchased a Stroller

I finally purchased a stroller after having trolled forums, read reviews, and done much measuring and remeasuring my Prius' trunk and then comparing those measurements to the folded dimensions of many strollers. Mind you I paid a pretty penny for this stroller, which pains me to say since I was hoping to not spend a ton on a double stroller.

I purchased a pink camouflage (only because it was one of two colors on sale) Phil & Ted's Four In One Sport Buggy Stroller from pishposhbaby.com, I still can't believe I purchased from a site with that url...
But it is a 2008 model and it came with a free attachment so I paid the base price of $419.95 instead of the full $509.95 price tag.

Here is the catch though! My husband asked me why there always has to be a back-up plan when we finally have found a stroller. That's because I am such a penny pincher. As long as we don't use the stroller before Thursday, which is when my husband and I will get to do some shopping at the SCV Kid's Consignment Sale then we may still find something cheaper in the near future before the Phil & Ted's stroller even arrives (it is currently estimated to arrive this Friday). At the very least I am hoping to find maybe a crib at the consignment sale since I just blew so much money on a stroller.

I guess I will just keep telling myself that I will be using it a lot. I guess I will be walking to my parent's house more once the 100 degree heat subsides. But in the hopes of helping other parents going through the dilemma of a double stroller and a Prius, while I cannot provide a review on these strollers, they have relatively compact folded dimensions and I will provide these and price ranges for them below.

Chicco Trevi Twin Stroller
Folded Dimensions: I received an email finally frm Chicco in regards to the dimensions when folded and they are 44.6 x 10 x 16.7 inches.
Price that I have found online is $219.99

Combi Twin Sport 2 Double Stroller
Folded Dimensions: 22 x 16.5 x 40 inches
Price Ranging from $159.99 to $200+
Note: I have reservations about the Combi strollers after my experience with the Combi Helio, which I wrote a review on.

Zooper Tango Stroller
Folded Dimensions: 15.5x30.5x41 inches
Price Ranging from $299.99 (at albeebaby.com, it is currently on sale, I do not know when the sale will end) all the way up to $429.99

Maclaren's Twin Techno Stroller
Folded Dimensions: 45x18x17.5 inches
Price Ranging from $330.00 without the Comfort Pack or with Comfort Pack $361.00 to just over $400.00 online.
Note: The catch with Maclaren is they do not honor the warranty unless you buy from an authorized dealer, which you can locate using their website. They do not have Babies 'R Us listed despite the fact that it is an authorized dealer (I contacted Maclaren in regards to this). The lowest price available for this stroller from an authorized dealer is $399.99 at Babies 'R Us but the only comfort pack available is forest green.

Most of the prices that I have located are all from online retailers some of them national chains, some online boutiques, I used www.froogle.com.

Review: Combi Helio 2008 Stoller

Previously we had been using a Graco Spree Stroller that had come in the travel system we bought with a Graco Snugride Infant Car Seat. But honestly while durable (it has survived our dog chewing on the wheels) the stroller is pretty cumbersome and takes up almost all of the bottom of the trunk in our Prius. So before our last road trip we decided to downsize and get something that would take up less trunk space and mean we could still find our daughter among all of the stuff that we previously were packing in the backseat with her. We went to a store that specifically specializes in baby and children supplies and found our new Combi Helio 2008 Stroller in Ember and Wasabi. I have held off writing a review because I honestly figured I wanted to give the stroller some time to break in and really see what problems could possibly arise. We have now had the stroller for a month and have taken it everywhere we can with us from walking around our neighbor, which was a challenge before even with the Graco because not all the roads around our house are paved, to going shopping at the mall, supermarket, walking all over town. The list of features advertised on this stroller include the following:

• Taller Handles
• Wider seating area
• Compatible with Shuttle Infant Seat
• Quick and simple tri-fold
• Lightweight and portable lifestyle stroller
• Opens easily with one hand
• Deep recline will accommodate an infant
• Adjustable European Style Canopy with Viewing Window
• Basket with easy access
• Convenient carrying strap for traveling
• Removable Guardrail with Washable Fabric Cover
• Front swivel wheels for easy maneuvering
• Convenient footrest for toddler comfort
• Removable, Washable Padded Seat Cushion
• Seat cushion has air mesh ventilation that allows baby to stay cool
• Independent wheel suspension system for a smooth and restful ride
• Includes Safety Boot
• 5-Point Harness w/ Logo
• Removable kids tray with a cup holder and snack tray
• Includes removable diaper bag

The stroller weighs 13.4lbs can accomodate up to a 55lb child, has open dimensions of 32.5X15.25X40.

The biggest pro for us was that it was lightweight and folded up compactly. Otherwise the other pros that have come in handy are as follows:

• Removable diaper bag, which fits a quite a few diapers, a small case of wipes, and some extra binkies or a toy quite easily.
• The recline is very simple to operate and it goes back to a nice recline for our daughter to sleep in.
• I like the hinges on the side of the canopy to open it and collapse it down, they are easily operated and do not get stuck like on our Graco stroller.
• The carrying strap has come in handy when we have had to just carry our daughter due to certain terrain.

Unfortunately the list ends there, as we have had some rather frustrating happenings with this stroller (note I plan on contacting the company about these and will be writing another review after I do that to comment on the company's response to my complaints).

Cons:

• When folded the lock, which consists of a latch type mechanism, has a tendency to pop open causing the stroller to unfold from the tri-fold.
  
• The basket has a bar blocking access from directly behind the seat and there is not much space to access it from the sides either. I expected the basket to be small but it is almost unsuable except for very small items.
• The front swivel wheels have a tendency to get stuck so after making a turn sometimes they will not return to a straight position resulting in sudden stops.
  
• The locks on the front stroller wheels are very stiff, I have to operate them with my hands, and according to the instructions must be on when you are folding up the stroller to prevent damage to the wheels, which means I have to repeatedly bend over when folding and opening this stroller to work the locks.
• The brakes on the rear wheels are very stiff as well, requiring that you wear shoes unless you possibly like scrapping your toes on the plastic to flip them up into the unlock position.
• The handles do not seem to be that tall, but that seems to be a continuing problem with most of the strollers that my husband and I have tried, I am 5'9" and he is 6'0" and we are constantly kicking the wheels when using this and our Graco stroller.
• It says that it opens easily with one hand, and while yes I can unlatch the lock with one hand to open it takes me personally two hands to make sure that it locks when unfolded.

While I really wanted to love this stroller as it does have a child cup holder and some nice features the problem with the front wheels in particular has become near unbearable, I can barely manuever through the bookshelves at Barnes & Noble without getting stuck every two minutes.

Triclosan - An Unnecessary Antibacterial Now Shown to be Toxic | Blog | Healthy Child Healthy World

Triclosan - An Unnecessary Antibacterial Now Shown to be Toxic | Blog | Healthy Child Healthy World

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Review: Baby Shampoo & Body Washes

I figured since I was planning on giving my daughter a bath tonight, I would review the couple baby washing products that I have used. We live on a septic system, so I try to avoid putting tons of chemicals that are not biodegradable or contain possibly harmful chemicals in them that will eventually end up in the soil of our front yard. The majority of personal care products that I use that can be washed off the body are usually natural, and that includes what I use on my daughter.


The first that I will review is for Method Baby Squeaky Green Baby Hair + Body Wash (8oz bottle). It can be purchased directly from Method for $7, at Diapers.com for $6.99, in Target store for $6.49, and many other retailers, if you want to find a store near you Method has a search on their website for what stores sell their products.

Pros:

• Biodegradable formula that is hypoallergenic and tear-free.
• Light scent from rice milk and mallow extract, unlike some baby products that have too strong a smell for me.
• Paraben and Phthalate free!
• Does what it should, cleans.
• Does not dry out my daughter's skin, or appear to irritate her eczema.
  

Cons:

• Does not get as sudsy as I would like.

Overall though for a natural baby shampoo and body wash Method is affordable, and I definitely will continue using it.

Nature's Baby Organics Shampoo & Body Wash - Lavendar & Chamomile scent (8oz bottle) is another product I have used on my daughter, my mom gave it to me as a gift with a bunch of other stuff before I had her. It can be found at the Nature's Baby Organics site and Diapers.com for $9.95, and at health food stores and some beauty product stores.

Pros:

• 100% Vegan, Paraben, SLS (Sodium Laurel Sulfate), and Propylene Glycol Free, and Hypoallergenic.
• Has a nice lavender scent that is not too strong.
• I like that all ingredients on the bottle are explained in some form, so you know where they are coming from.
• Does get nice and sudsy.
  

Cons:

• Not tear free.
• Does not leave my daughters skin as hydrated as I would like.
  

I will probably not go out of my way to buy this again, but it seems to do a nice job, personally for the price I would rather go with the Method baby wash. But as a gift it was nice, and the smell is quite delightful, and I can only hope helps when I give my daughter a bath in the evening before her bedtime.

Review: Buns Up Wipe Solution Cubes

Even now I still occasionally will use cloth wipes to take care of our daughter during diaper changes, and as a result a wipe solution is a necessity to help clean up. I found the Buns Up Wipe solution cubes while surfing the internet for cloth diapering accessories, at Granola Babies. I figured I would try it out instead of always having to make home wipe solution, just due to time constraint at times. And surprisingly I really have no complaints about this product, I tried to think of some, I guess the only one I could come up with is that you have to wait for the cube to dissolve in the water. But the pluses to this product completely outweigh that small inconvenience, I actually will even use it when I use moist wipes because I like the smell and it seems to help prevent diaper rash.
Pros:

• Truly all natural they are a mild glycerin base with chamomile, witch hazel, tea tree and lavender (beat that Huggies!).
• Very affordable, a 3 oz bag of cubes is $10 dollars on Granola Babies, you can find them on other websites as well, and that 3 oz bag will make up to 5 gallons of wipe solution.
• Smells great!

Cons:

• Procrastinators like me will have to wait for that little cube to dissolve in the water if you don't pre-make solution ahead of time.

By far this is one of my favorite products that I have found on the internet, and yes I realize it is just wipes solution but it is a really nice and simple wipes solution that really does the job.

Review: gDiapers

These were our first choice when we had the big dilemma of having to give up on cloth diapering. We thought great these are just as wonderful, if not a better option because it doesn't require a ton of washing, so we save water, and the liners are compostable or can be flushed. We picked a starter pack up from Whole Foods Market, the starter kit includes a little manual, two "little g" pants, 10 flushable inserts, and a swish stick for toilet disposal. You can also purchase them directly from gDiapers.com or from Diapers.com. But unfortunately gDiapers were not a big success in our house, I was willing to keep giving them a try, but my husband actually put his foot down when he ended up with #2 on his shirt after it leaked out of our daughter's diaper.
Pros:

• Wonderful cloth outer shell that has a a snap-in liner into which you place the biodegradable liner. The snap-in liner allows for the cloth outer shell to be reused numerous times before having to wash. The fact that you can reuse the cloth outer shell repeatedly until dirty is wonderful, it actually is more eco-friendly than cloth diapering if you consider the fact that potable water is not exactly abundant, especially in California right now.
• The liner is made of sustainable farmed wood pulp, sodium polyacrylate, cellulose rayon, which means no plastic!
• The liners can be composted, flushed, or thrown away and they will break down in 50-150 days.
• The cloth outer shell is 92% cotton and 8% spandex, no perfumes, no latex, no elemental chlorine.

Cons:

• Nowhere near as absorbant as a conventional disposable, although I have heard that you could squish two of the liners in for added absorbancy.
• I found that with #2 it had a tendency to leak past the liners and either into the cloth outer shell or out of the diaper completely, I don't know if this was a problem of fit, but I could not seem to remedy it by getting a different size.
• Significantly more expensive even when compared to Nature Babycare, as a refill package is $14.49 for 40 flushables for the small size, or $14.49 for 32 medium/large size.

So unfortunately our foray into the world of gDiapers was an unsuccessful one, for those who have had success with them, wonderful I am very glad people are using them. And if you haven't tried them and have the money please do as they are a wonderful alternative and you may have more success than I did with them. I have considered giving them another try as my daughter is now on solid foods and her stool is much more firm now so that may have solved the explosion problems. Overall gDiapers is a wonderful concept that I wish was more popular.

Review: Huggies Natural Care Fragrance Free Wipes

I am obviously already partial to using the Nature Babycare line of products and so no this is not going to be a very positive review for these wipes, they aren't necessarily bad, there are definite pluses to these wipes, but I do not see the pros outweighing the cons.
Pros:

• Very moist
• Very thick
• You can first purchase a hard case and then purchase bulk packages of refills which is nice.
• Alcohol-free.
  
• Cheaper than Nature Babycare per wipe.
  

Cons:

• While they are moist, they have a tendency to almost be soapy, they actually left what looked like soap bubbles on our daughter's bottom after wiping.
• They are not fragrance free as stated, they have a chemical smell to them.
• They tear easily despite their thickness.
• The list of ingredients are not as natural as one would think, and just to make my point here is the list of ingredients on the back of the packaging: Water - Aqua, Potassium Laureth Phosphate, Glycerin, Polysorbate-20, Tetrasodium EDTA, DMDM Hydantoin, Methylparaben, Malic Acid, Aloe Barbadensis Leaf Extract, Tocopheryl Acetate - Vitamin E (Note: The links lead to a website "Skin Deep: Cosmetic Safety Database - Ingredient Report" that lists possible dangers of the chemicals found in personal care products, it is a great website to look up ingredients both in your and your child's personal care products).

Personally for me they just didn't fit the bill since they seemed to increase the frequency of diaper rash. But I guess if you can't find anything else they will do the job, but I would rather just use some water and a cloth wipe if that is the case. For those still interested in purchasing you can find these at almost every drugstore, I purchased my package at Target, and you can find them at Diapers.com as well.

Review: Nature Babycare Fragrance Free Baby Wipes

In addition to the Nature Babycare Diapers, which I previously reviewed, we also use the Fragrance Free Baby Wipes from the Nature Babycare line of products. They can be purchased in Target stores or at Diapers.com for $3.79 individually or a case of 10 for $34.99 ($3.50/package). Again similar to the diapers from this company these pros to these wipes are as follows:

• 100% natural and chlorine free as well as alcohol-free
• 100% compostable consumer packaging
• While thin they are pretty durable, they do not have a tendency to tear like the Huggies wipes do when I am pulling them out of the package
  

The cons:

• They are thin and aren't that big, although most wipes don't seem to be that big, so inevitably I end up using at least 2 for each diaper change I do.
• They easily dry out when the packaging is not properly resealed, although I have found that if you get an empty wipes case that seals tightly you can put them in there and they stay nice and moist.

Other than that they appear to be the only wipes that don't seem to irritate our daughters delicate skin, we have tried Huggies wipes as well as Seventh Generation and they both seem to cause mild irritation and seem to increase the frequency with which she would get diaper rash. Other than the cloth wipes, with home made solution, which I think work the best hands down out of any wipes I have tried, I think the Nature Babycare are my second favorite if I have to grab some wipes.

Review: Nature Babycare Diapers

I have been using these since my daughter was about 4 months old, so it has been 7 months. We chose them because we originally started out cloth diapering, but due to some problems with the septic system we can no longer put the stress of doing loads of laundry on our leeching field. So we shopped around for diapers (we tried gDiapers, Seventh Generation, Huggies, and Pampers), preferring that we hopefully would settle on a tmore eco-friendly alternative. We use these because of the following reasons:

• 100% Chlorine free
• Materials based on corn instead of plastic, unlike most disposables, which also means they are breathable. They have a 100% natural based back sheet and distribution layer.
  
• 100% compostable, both the diapers and the packaging they come in (although you of course should not compost poopy diapers), while conventional disposables can sit in landfills for up to 20 years after being disposed of and forgotten.
  
• Thin construction and very absorbant
• Seem to fit just like every other disposable diaper, and they do go up to size 6 (+35 lbs baby weight), which is nice since my daughter is already in size 5 in every brand of diaper I have tried.
  
• No latex, fragrance, or TBT (tributyl tin)
  

They are definitely more expensive than most disposable diapers, they can be purchased either at Target, in stores only for an average of 9.54 per package, or on Diapers.com for $11.99 per individual package or a case of 4 for $44.99 (11.25/package). (NOTE: If you plan on ordering for the first time from Diapers.com please enter my referral code: CABI6588 and you will get $10 off your first order and you'll help me earn $1 credit towards my account for each order you place over $49).

Back to the Nature Babycare diapers, the downsides that I have found are the following:

• They do have a tendency to get bulky when wet, I think because unlike a conventional disposable that traps the urine in a high absorbancy gel, there is no gel in these diapers so they get a little on the puffy side when wet.
• Unfortunately I would love to say we have had no leaks, but we have, which we seem to have a problem with every diaper we have tried with this, it is only when our daughter has pooped, but unfortunately we have eperienced some small leaks.
• Cost versus other disposable diapers
• When disposing them the fasteners to not fasten to just any part of the
  diaper, only the strip along the front side of the diaper meant for
  fastening so you have to roll them up starting from the back.
  

Overall though my husband and I are very happy with these diapers, they hold up just as well as the Pampers my mom picks up for when she is babysitting and personally they don't have the odd perfume smell that I have noticed some diapers have (I have severe allergies to perfumes). I will be posting up reviews soon for Nature Babycare unscented baby wipes and gDiapers later today.

Stroller Dilemma

I figured I would post on what has sparked me to start this blog. I don't know if anyone will actually read this or find it of use (I hope you do). We leased a Toyota Prius back in March of this year about a month after I found out I was pregnant with our second child. What we were not thinking about back then was the fact that we would soon require a double stroller. And while I have read reviews recently that say a double stroller will fit in the Prius, I do not think they had in mind that you would have to fit other things in the Prius in addition to yourself, your husband (or significant other), two children in car seats, the stroller, and possibly either groceries, the dog (mind you we have a 50lb pointer, not a lap dog despite what he or my husband thinks), or other necessities.
So we come to the difficulty with owning a Prius, previously we had the Days of Hunny 2007 Graco Spree Travel System and the stroller when in the trunk of the Prius barely left room for groceries next to it, although we still had that wonderful backseat. But soon there won't be much of a backseat left if you consider the fact that there will be two carseats and a diaper bag, and the necessity for a double stroller, that will inevitably be larger than Graco Spree Stroller folded. So the hunt begins for a double stroller that will not eat up all the cargo space in the Prius.