Green Kiddos...Growing natural kids

always good to hear of good customer service

2009-07-11T07:39:00.003-04:00

I just read this article this morning. I am super impressed with how Cotton Babies stood behind their products. Cotton Babies was one of the sweet companies that donated a diaper for my cloth diaper workshop. I have had nothing but positive experience with them. After reading this article about them I would have to say that they went way above and beyond! Always love to brag on someone I hear good things about!

friday favorites: mini boden

2009-07-10T07:18:00.007-04:00

Mini Boden is by far my favorite place to get clothes for Bubbie. Full price the prices are a little higher then I would pay, but if you sign up for their e-newsletter you can get great deals. For example this past spring on April Fools Day, they offered 20% off your total plus free shipping! I ordered Bubbie two tops, two pairs of shorts and two bathing suits and got a great price on them! Bubbie has the blow fish shirt above and it is super cute and he has been able to wear it for two summers as they size their clothes to fit two sizes (ie 5/6).

They also carry adorable stuff for girls! Sass is just starting to really fit in their "big" girl clothes, although I had ordered her several things last summer from the baby department. These clothes wash and wear amazingly and if you are into ebay, they resell awesome! The end of season sale is going on right now. This is a great time to stock up for next summer!!

I love me some Mini Boden!! What's a favorite product of yours? You can write about anything, clothes, food, cleaning products. Share your favorites with us and join this blog carnival by using MckLinky below! I can't wait to hop to your blog and read about one of your favorite things!

bye bye pull ups! hello imse vimse trainers!

2009-07-09T07:10:00.006-04:00

UPDATE #1

Well, not a great update, but I have a feeling it's more my fault than the trainers. Sass was so good about telling me this morning when she had to go potty that I didn't make her try while we were at the dr's office and we had a flood accident. Her pants did get wet, but not the floor thankfully. The interesting thing is that I don't know that it was fault of the trainers. Remember I mentioned that these run really big.... well, when I pulled the trainers off of her, the middle was wet on the inside, but not the outside. My hunch is she leaked out the sides because little bitty's theighs are big enough to fill up the leg holes. We are going to continue testing them out the rest of the afternoon, but for now she is testing out a new goodmama fitted for nap time.... hopefully we will have more success!

Kelly's Closet had free shipping over the weekend and the Imse Vimse trainers on sale (they still are on sale), so I bit the bullet and bought a handful. I have to say first off that I am super impressed with the service from Kelly's Closet. I believe I ordered them on Sunday and they were on my doorstep yesterday! WOW! Talk about instant gratification! I will absolutely be ordering from them again!

So, these super cute trainers came yesterday. What's the difference between these and say, Gerber training pants? Well, these organic cotton undies have a layer of PUL in between the cotton which is suppose to help prevent accidents from getting the child's clothes wet, yet still feel the wetness of the undies. While we love our Gerber trainers, if Sass has an accident in them, it's flood city, so I'm too afraid to take her out for long periods in them. Because of this fear (which has been justified by puddles in public... so sorry Target, we didn't mean it..... either time it happened....), I have resorted to using Pull Ups for things like church, going out shopping, and play dates at other peoples homes.

I hate using Pull Ups, not only for the environmental reasons, or the cost, but I might as well put a diaper on the girl, because she totally knows the difference and will use the Pull Up just like a diaper. She is much more aware of her accidents when she is in panties. You know you are in trouble when she says "mama, I did something". Never a good sign! Beware if you order, these trainers run large. I ordered Sass the 15-24 month size which ranges from 24-31 lbs, she's only 23 but these are the smallest I could find!

This brings us to today.... test day! The new cloth trainers were washed last night and dried and are ready to be put to the test. We have swim lessons this morning and then Sass gets to go to the OB with me. Perfect place to try out the trainers! I will post an update later!

wordless wednesday

2009-07-08T07:03:00.001-04:00

this little light of mine

i'm gonna let it shine!

cloth diapering on a budget

2009-07-07T07:07:00.004-04:00

While cloth diapering can save you thousands over the long run versus the cost of disposables, the intial investment can be kind of steep. Depending on if you go the cheapest route of prefolds and covers or the more expensive route of pockets and AIO's or onesize diapers, you can easily layout several hundred dollars right up front, but then you are done! You're investment will have been made and if you can keep yourself from getting addicted to buying new diapers, you can save a lot of money.

Here are some of my money saving tips:

1. Sign up for newsletters, join Facebook groups and follow the brands you like on Twitter

You will get great coupon codes and discounts by doing these things. This is the way I essentially find out about all my sales that I post. You can get free shipping and great discounts by doing this. You also may luck out and get to be a tester for new products by doing these things!

2. Shop the seconds sales!

Seconds usually have minor defects that prevent them from being sold as first quality. The defects can vary from crooked stitching, the wrong color snaps and discontinued colors. This is a great way to stock up on good diapers cheap. My two favorite seconds shops are the Thirsties Outlet and the Swaddlebees outlet (which sells SB's and Blueberrys). Their e newsletters will usually tell you when they are stocking the outlet! I know CottonBabies tends to sell Bumgenius seconds, but I never seem to get there in time!

3. Buy used.

Okay, I know that at first this sounds gross. But this is really a great way to try out new brands with out making a huge investment. And put it this way, if you used a diaper service (which so many of our mamas did), I can guarantee you that they didn't return you (or your mama) the exact same diapers week by week. I just do some extra sterilization to these dipes when I get them. You do have to be careful that you know what you are getting. Ask lots of questions and look very carefully at pictures and the persons feedback, but you can save a ton of money this way! The two site I tend to sell/buy off of are The Cloth Diaper Swap board on Babycenter.com ( You have to request to become a member of this one) and Diaperswappers.com (really watch who you buy from on this one, I sell here more than buy). I also try to sell/swap with friends and have even thought about listing diapers here for my readers.

4. Resell Diapers

If you buy good cloth diapers you will be amazed at the resell value on them. As Sass has outgrown diapers or I have purchased ones I don't love I have resold them and used the money to then buy new diapers. If you take good care of your diapers you should be able to resell them for at least 50% of what you paid for them, if not more depending on the brand and popularity of the diaper.

5. Look for good deals on green blogs.

I find a lot of good deals on mommy blogs I read, so be on the lookout! I recently posted a great deal on g diapers where you can get 6 covers with snap in liners for $40. One cover normally sells for $18.99 so this is a huge steal! These are the kinds of things you need to watch for to stock up and save when the sales are good! (By the way, that deal is good until the end of the month, use code: g1378swanson at check out. Only good on the everyday g's 6 pack!)

Leave me a comment if you have any other great tips!

not me monday

2009-07-05T21:36:00.007-04:00

Not Me Monday is brought to you by one of my favorite blogs, My Charming Kids. This is a place where blog mamas can unite together and confess all their imperfections as moms, you know... all the things we would NEVER really do! ;)

I will start off by saying I absolutely would never use my pregnancy as an excuse to eat the dessert picture below. No way, no how! And I totally wouldn't have eaten it for say, three days in a row. That would be just excessive. I never would have justified it by drinking milk and counting the raspberries as fruit serving either. Nope! Not me!

Being an attentive, always on the ball mother, I never would have been so distracted by blogging that my daughter would have had enough time to color all over herself while sitting within inches of me. Not me, I keep an eye on my children at all times.

And in preparations for the Fourth of July, I would never have gone as far as tying red ribbons in Sass' navy blue crocs. Absolutely not! I didn't dress her in red, white and blue as many days as I could this past week just so she could wear them either. That would be way too thematic and bring me back to my first grade teacher days. I'm so not that cheesy!

I absolutely did not condone my brother bribing my 4 year old with $10 to go down the water slide at his neighborhood pool. I didn't encourage it either by explaining to said 4 year old that $10 was enough to buy a new lego set later and I would never had gone as far as telling him I would take him to Target that afternoon to use his $10 towards said Legos. The above mentioned 4 year old didn't ride the slide a thousand times after that because he loved it so much either. Surely you can see the fear in his face.

And lastly, (be grateful I have no pictures of this one), I most definitely didn't try to tiny a URL of directions to our community center this past week and email the link to my friends to only find out that I didn't send them a link to the community center after all.... the link surely wouldn't have directed my friends to an exotic site instead. I absolutely did not laugh so hard that I cried when they called to tell me what I did, sending dirty links on accident is not funny! They would never now refer to music time at the community center as "dirty music time" and I'm sure they will stop teasing me about sending out dirty emails sometime soon!
(PSA: tiny.cc does NOT create 100% unique URLs, learn from my mistake and use tinyurl.com instead and always check your tiny link before sending it or publishing it anywhere!).

Well, that's it! My dirty laundry is aired! Are you brave enough to share yours this week.... come on, you can do it!

supper planning sunday

2009-07-05T15:32:00.004-04:00

I have been super slack about meal planning the last few weeks due to summer time laziness and a couple of road trips. The picture of Sass above shows what we have eaten a lot of these last few weeks... good ol' peanut butter and honey! My goal is to grocery shop tonight, so here is our tentative meal plan that I need to shop for! As always, life happens and this is totally subject to change!

Sunday- Frozen pizza and fruit salad
Monday- Crockpot BBQ chicken to make sandwiches, baked sweet potato fries and watermelon slices, maybe some cole slaw (totally craving this which is weird because I NEVER eat cole slaw!)
Tuesday- Angel hair pasta with sauteed zucchini tossed in EVO and Parmesan cheese
Wednesday- Burgers on the grill, corn on the cob, oven baked onion potatoes
Thursday- Macaroni and chick peas (click here if you want to know what this is! so yummy!)
Friday- Leftovers
Saturday- Out to dinner!

What are you eatin' this week? Leave me a comment to your meal plan so I can check it out for some ideas! Also, let me know... would you like supper planning sunday to turn into a blog carnival where everyone could link their meal plans? does that sound fun, or is it too much? Give me your feedback!

blog hop - hi! nice to meet you!

2009-07-03T08:03:00.006-04:00

Hi! Welcome to my blog! And my first blog hop! I hope you will click on the MckLinky below and join the blog hop too! Today's theme is "introduce yourself".

This is me, Steph and my kids, Bubbie 4, Sass 2 and new baby (can't see him or her yet!)

And this is Super Dad holding Sass. Can't tell you how hard it is to get a picture of all four of us these days!

If you have never been here before my blog tends to be a little bit of a schomorgesborg (no idea how to spell that word! ) of information. At one point I had two blogs, one private one where I wrote about my kids and one public one where I wrote about "green" things. It was too much work to keep up with two blogs, so now I write everything on one! I love writing about cloth diapers and organic foods but I also love to write about my kids and often the two overlap. We aren't the crunchiest family you will ever meet, but I am trying take little steps every day to help transform our family to a healthy and more natural state! Usually I write up a menu plan on Sundays to share with you and on have Friday Favorites on Fridays, which I will resume next week! Then there is just a mixture of fun stuff inbetween! Hope you will hang around! You can follow me on twitter (see upper left hand sidebar) or become a subscriber (see right sidebar). I would love to have you join our family on this adventure called life! Now, click MckLinky below and join our blog hop!

lego storage.... I think I came up with a solution!

2009-07-02T07:52:00.004-04:00

My wonderfully, intricate 4 year old will play with those teeny tiny legos for hours on end. I love this about him, but all those pieces drive me crazy! A few months ago we moved his "train table" to his room so he could have a place to build where a little master of disaster couldn't destroy his creations. This was the first step of my lego solution, but it still drove me crazy that he constantly had ALL his legos dumped all over his table! I was bound and determined to come up with some sort of storage for these little building bricks that would be easy for him to manage.

With a quick run down the tub aisle at Target, I assessed all my options and found some plastic drawer organizers for $4.99 a piece that totally are working. I came home and cut out a piece of construction paper in each of the lego colors to fit each section of the container. It looked like this when I was done:

Then I headed upstairs with my new creations and he and I sorted. This is a great learning activity and he helped decide what we should do with some of the miscellaneous pieces. It took us a while to sort them all but I am hoping that will make an impression on him that if he dumps them we have to start all over again. I emphasized emphatically how much work it would be to have to do it all over again, so maybe he got the idea!

Here is what our finished project looked like:

We had a few empty sections so we used one for all the little lego guys and their accessories, one of the big sections for things he has built and one of the little clear sections for "clear" pieces. Target did have some similar trays that were made up of just the three longer sections that would store more pieces. I have a feeling after his birthday this year we may have to invest in one or two of those since all the boy wants is legos! But so far this system is working well for us. I think he really likes it because it makes it much easier to find the perfect piece when he is busy building!

g diaper deal! 6 for $40!!

2009-07-01T14:38:00.004-04:00

Here is a code to get $30 off the everyday g's 6 pack. I just ordered mine and can't wait to use them with the new baby! Now you can use g cloth or flushable inserts! Use code : g1378swanson at check out to get your discount!

wordless wednesday

2009-07-01T06:36:00.001-04:00

this is the day

that the Lord has made

let us rejoice

and be glad in it!

mcklinky

2009-06-30T18:44:00.003-04:00

A good linky system is great asset to your blog if you want to run a contest or a blog carnival. Unfortunately, they can tend to be unreliable and sometimes slow your blog down. Well our "friend" Mckmama and her friend Brent came up with a great, new, simple, and reliable linky system called MckLinky!! You can check it out and implement it on your blog a www.mcklinky.com. I had a chance to actually use MckLinky yesterday at My Charming Kids, when I wrote my Not Me Monday post and linked to it on her site. Now I am so excited to try this out on my blog that I am thinking of turning this weeks Friday Favorites blog post into a carnival where you can all write your own Friday Favorite and link it with MckLinky.... what do you think about that?! You better start brainstorming a favorite product to write about on Friday, I want to know what you're lovin'!

do you play with your food?

2009-06-30T06:47:00.002-04:00

Bubbie has recently taken an interest in cooking. I had purchased the Kids in the Kitchen cookbook a few months ago and he loves to look at it and pick out things to make.. If you aren't familiar with Kids in the Kitchen, I highly recommend their site! It's a great program put on by the Junior League all over the country. Yesterday, when I was preparing lunch he wanted to make "spider" sandwiches. I wasn't sure exactly what he was talking about until he pulled out the Kids in the Kitchen cookbook. I was already making peanut butter and honey sandwiches so I thought, sure, this will be easy! And it was! He did most of it himself.

I quickly remembered my sandwich sealer that I had bought from Pampered Chef years ago. I hadn't ever really tried it out. Well I'm glad I did! We will be using this again! It works to make your sandwiches just like those uncrustables at the store. I let him spread the peanut butter and squirt the honey. Then he assisted me in cutting the sandwich with the sealer ( I did have to flip it over and cut from both sides). I then just gave him some pretzel sticks and Crasins on his plate and let him have at it! I think his sandwich came out soooo cute, don't you?!

not me monday

2009-06-29T07:52:00.004-04:00

Not Me Monday is brought to you by one of my favorite blogs, My Charming Kids. This is a place where blog mamas can unite together and confess all their imperfections as moms, you know... all the things we would NEVER really do! ;)

This past week we most definitely have not been swimming all around town in different friends pools. I most definitely have not arranged as many play dates as possible at pools just to submerge my pregnant, overheated self in a nice, cool body of water. And I absolutely have not counted swimming as baths for more than one day in a row this week. Bubbie totally had to have had more than one bath between Wednesday and Sunday morning when I didn't realized it had been awhile and threw him in the shower quickly before church. Not me, I would never let my children count swimming and sprinklers as bathing!

Sass had absolutely hit all four of her food groups on Saturday between the birthday party we attended and the baseball game we went to that night. Her meals definitely did not only consist of chips, juice and cupcakes for lunch and popcorn, dip n dots and frozen lemonade for dinner..... oh and she didn't drink a chocolate milkshake in between those meals either. Nope, not me!Not my child at all!

Now head over to My Charming Kids to see what everyone else has "not" been doing and if you are brave enough, maybe even you will confess!

scared to try cloth....

2009-06-27T07:43:00.004-04:00

A sweet friend of mine asked me a few months ago if I would be willing to do a cloth diaper workshop with her to tell our friends all about how cloth diapers work. There aren't really any cloth diaper shops in our town and very few people use them so I thought this would be a great way to get the word out!

Well tomorrow we are hosting our first ever Cloth Diaper Workshop. We will both have our stash there for you touch and feel and ask all the questions you may have! If you live in my area and you would like to attend you can email me at greenkiddos.com (at) gmail.com and I can forward you the evite. The workshop is from 2-4 tomorrow (Sunday) afternoon! I would love for you to come

Besides learning lots about cloth diapers, I have some very generous "friends" who have sent me a sample diaper to raffle off, so you just might be able to win some new fluff while you are there. I'm going to do a special post on each of these people at a later date, but wanted to go ahead and give them thanks now! If you are ever looking for a place to buy cloth diapers, these are my "friends" that I have personally used and recommend!

friday favorites - melissa and doug toys

2009-06-26T07:23:00.004-04:00

Wooden toys get a lot of play time at our house. It amazes me because grown ups automatically assume that kids will want the bright plastic stuff that lights up and sings and does stuff but that is so not the case. Those toys get played with right at first then shoved to the side, but our wooden toys get played with daily. Unfortunately wooden toys come with a higher price tag most of the time. The most affordable option I have found are Melissa and Doug toys and I know that their is a lot of conflict of opinion on them because they are made in China and are painted, but my children are past the stage of chewing on them so I feel confident allowing them to play with them. You can read their safety statements here.

Here are some favorites that get played with on a daily basis at our house:

the pizza party
Sass and Bubbie love to make me pizza. They love "cutting" the pizza with the roller. All the wooden toppings and slices stick together with Velcro. This pizza has gotten tons of love around here and is served up on a regular basis!

shape puzzles
Bubbie got these for his 2nd birthday if I remember correctly. They are still today a favorite and both kids love them. We have taught shapes and colors using these. Each puzzle board is two sided so there are tons of options of what they can put together. These puzzles are by far played with more than any others we own. I love that both Bubbie (4 1/2) and Sass (2) can both play with these and enjoy them!

pattern blocks and boards

These are one of the newest M&D products I have purchased. I bought this a few weeks ago to take on a trip for Bubbie to play with in the hotel room. It kind of seemed like a step up from the pattern block puzzles above. So far he is still in the exploration stage of these and enjoys making things out of the pieces more than trying to coping and cover the boards. We have made pattern trains with the pieces and he seemed to like that. Sass wants to do these and understands the concept but doesn't have the fine motor skills to not knock the pieces off as she puts on new ones! This seems like a toy that they will both grow into.

stacking blocks

Bubbie received a set of these his second Christmas from some cousins. These are played with a lot! Both kids love building tall towers and knocking them down. They stack and sort and love to hide things in the boxes. A great first birthday present!

I have found a great place to purchase Melissa and Doug toys is at stores like TJ Max or Homegoods. Our local Homegoods has a huge selection of them and they are a good 25% - 50% cheaper than the toy store. Also Toys R Us tends to run good sales on them, although I avoid that place like the plague!

*disclaimer: Friday favorites are not sponsored, payed for or in any other way endorsed by the company. These are products that we have purchased (or given to my kids as gifts like some of the products I mentioned today!) and really use. They have not been given to me to review and post about.*

briar.claire hairclip winner!

2009-06-25T15:21:00.002-04:00

congrats to

ASHLEE!!

Random.org picked your post number as the lucky winner of the briar.claire hairclip! Please email me your address to greenkiddos.com (at) gmail.com and I will get it sent out! Also, I officially am requiring a pic of cute "m" wearing the clip once you receive it! (nothing like strings attached!).

great deal!! 6 gdiaper covers and liners for $40!!

2009-06-25T07:23:00.005-04:00

Are you familiar with gdiapers?? These are great if you are curious about cloth but not sure you want to jump right in. Gdiapers are a cloth shell with a biodegradable insert. The insert can be flushed, composted, or tossed if needed because there is no plastic in them and they will break down quickly.

I have wanted to try gdiapers for years now. They are what first got me curious about cloth, but the cost of the refills always scared me away. Well, now the lovely friends at gdiapers have come out with gcloth, a cloth insert that can be washed and reused. I love the idea of using a cloth insert at home and a biodegradable one when out and about. That makes the whole concept much more affordable.

You know what else makes it more affordable.... this great code for $30 off! I am now a "gmum" and have the code g1378swanson which gets you the everday g's six pack for $40!!! This is a great savings because the 6 pack normally retails for $70!! I just ordered it to try g diapers out with new baby. The pack comes with 3 vanilla bean covers and 3 great orange covers, 6 liners, a swish stick and a guide explaining how to use them. Each cover normally retails fro $16.99 so this is an incredible deal! And apparently you can use your prefolds in a trifold inside the diapers too!

I am so excited to give gdiapers a try. They have some great resources on their site, so if you are curious but want more info on their diapers, click here. Oh and I've been told that you can best deals on refills at amazon.com or diapers.com with their $10 off coupons.

ETA: I misread the deal a little.... it comes with 6 covers and 6 snap in liners (not inserts, I wasn't aware that those were different!), you still have to purchase your inserts, either cloth or flushable. I think I'm going to order some cloth ones to try at first!

wordless wednesday - thankful

2009-06-24T07:23:00.002-04:00

In light of my friends losing their two year old son yesterday very unexpectedly, today I just feel thankful to have these two little bitties to wake up to and care for.

The words to Casting Crowns song I Will Praise You in this Storm are ringing so true to how I feel and can only imagine my friends feel this morning as they wake and have to bear the reality of their life now.

And I'll praise You in this storm
And I will lift my hands
For You are who You are
No matter where I am
And every tear I've cried
You hold in Your hand
You never left my side
And though my heart is torn
I will praise You in this storm....

.....I lift my eyes unto the hills
Where does my help come from?
My help comes from the Lord
The Maker of Heaven and Earth

please pray....

2009-06-23T20:21:00.003-04:00

Some old friends of ours lost their toddler son today. I don't have a lot of details, so I won't go into any yet, but please lift Jason and Angela up in your prayers. This family has been attacked by Satan before when it came to one of their children and we all rejoiced in the miracles we saw God perform. Please help us still praise God through this storm.

Psalm 34:18
The Lord is close to the brokenhearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit

back to reality....

2009-06-23T09:32:00.003-04:00

I'm on my way, rested and ready to see my babes!

Until then... use these last few minutes to enter the briar.claire contes t!! I will update with a winner later and a new post about where I have been hiding the last few days!

hurry.... this cute clip could be on it's way to you later this week!! leave a comment here!

briar.claire contest is extended!!!

2009-06-20T22:07:00.001-04:00

I'm too tired tonight to even go through it all, so I will draw my winner after my anniversary with super dad on Tuesday afternoon! So scroll down, leave a comment and enter to win! And tell your friends to enter to win too! Oh and don't forget, for each thing you do, leave a separate comment, so each will count as an individual entry..... ready. set. go!!!

we love you super dad!

2009-06-20T07:31:00.001-04:00

This weekend we aren't only celebrating Father's Day for Super Dad, but also it will be 7 years ago that I married this super guy! So what makes Super Dad so super??? Lots of things actually!!

This sweet guy swept me off my feet just 8 years ago... yup that's right... we were only dating about 6 months before we were engaged!! We were then engaged for 10 months and then had the wedding of my dreams! It was so fun! I always say that if I could redo a day just to experience it again, my wedding would be at the top of the list. We had a blast!

Just over 2 years later Bubbie was born and my sweet hubby became a dad. I can't tell you what a great husband and dad he is. I have never met a guy more concerned or in love with his kids. His first thought is always for them and I love that about him. He works so hard so I can stay home and raise our children. He loves the Lord and is instilling his love for Jesus in our children. He changes diapers (even cloth ones!), fixes meals, gives baths and reads bedtime stories! He's quick to tell me "you go rest, I'll take care of them". He's super fun and adventurous and loves to play with his kids!

We are different in our ways, that's for sure. I'm social and always on the go. He would rather stay home and just play with the kids. He loves sports, tennis and mountain biking to be specific. He is super strong. He loves running and working out. He sets such a good example to our kids of what healthy living should look like. He is anything but sedentary!

It's been so fun to watch him grow as a dad. Motherhood was a natural transition for me. I grew up playing with babies, baby sitting, then started teaching school. Having kids to me was like breathing, of course it was the next step after marriage. But he's a guy! I don't think he had ever changed a diaper until Bubbie was born. But you would never know that now! He knows all about car seats and cloth diapers, and pureeing baby food! He can even put hair bows in! He builds legos and plays dolls. He jumped right in and figured it out and is super involved in our kids lives.... this is such a blessing to me!

So this weekend I'm thankful. I'm thankful that the Lord blessed me with a loving and caring husband. I'm thank that the Lord has made him a father soon to be three times over. I'm thankful that we are a priority in his life and that he loves us so much!

Super Dad we love you!! Happy Father's Day and Happy Anniversary!!

friday favorite - the brita pitcher

2009-06-19T08:23:00.004-04:00

If your kids are anything like mine, they love juice! I do dilute juice a lot when I give it to my kids, but it is by far the beverage of choice. It's also so easy when we are going somewhere to just throw a few juice boxes in my bag and be on our way, but I know it's not the best thing for my kids and I need to get them to drink more water. I too could use more water intake but I never really cared for the taste of it. I grew up drinking Kool Aid and Hawaiian Punch, so drinking water with a meal was just not the norm for me.

In order to cut back on bottle water usage and the drinking of too many sugary drinks, we invested in a Brita Pitcher a few weeks ago. I have instantly fallen in love. The water tastes so much better! I think it tastes even better than bottle water which has a little bit of a plastic taste to it.

We have also invested in some good BPA free water bottles for the family. I bought both kiddos their own Nalgene bottle which they love, one in pink and one in blue of course! I love them because they are like a sippy with a spill proof valve inside!
Super dad is a fan of the Camelbak bottles, like this one:

But I really like the look of the new stainless steel Camelbaks..... because even drinking water can be cute right?!

Since switching to our Brita water system we are all drinking so much more water!! At first I got a little pull back from the kids, but they have quickly adapted and now are requesting water instead of juice! We fill our water bottles every morning and just take them with us.

The other huge benefit to using a system like Brita is the money savings. Water bottles were costing us a fortune every month and we wasted so much by throwing half bottles away. Plus all the plastic that was being used is such a waste. The Brita pitcher cost us about $25. Filters are about $25 for 4 but each one last you 3 months.... this comes to about $50 for this year and then $25 a year after that... we would spend that much in just a few months on bottled water. We did invest in BPA free water bottles, so that adds to our cost for this year, but you don't have to buy water bottles if you just drink water at home.

This is an easy and inexpensive little change that has big impact environmentally, financially and for your own personal health!

briar.claire hair clip giveaway

2009-06-18T07:52:00.005-04:00

See this cute hair clip.... it could be yours!! The sweet girls at briar.claire sent it to me with my last order to giveaway.

I have written about these cute clips before, as you may remember. While I love a good hair bow, these clips are my all time favorite in Sassie's hair. My poor follically challenged child doesn't have a ton of thick hair to do fabulous things with, but these clippies stay in great! I love that you can wear just one or add a bunch and they look so cute. I am officially addicted.

So here's how you can win this cute hair clip.... leave a comment. Any comment will do (as long as your nice!). Tell me about your blog, or what you want to see more of on my blog, or just hi. Whatever you want just make sure if you don't have a blog that you leave me an email address so I can email you if you win! On Saturday night I will close the contest and use a random number generator to pick a winner! It's that easy!

I know, the clip is really, really cute and you really ,really want to win, so here are some ways to get extra chances:

1. follow me on twitter or let me know that you already do with your twitter name. I'm @greenkiddo, there's a link up top to get you there! (I'm almost at 100 followers! Help me get there!)

2. Blog about this contest and send me a link to your post!

3. Become a reader of my blog or let me know that you already are (see right hand side bar to do this).

4. Facebook this contest in your status with a link to my site. Let me know in a comment

Remember each of these counts as a seperate entry so leave each thing you do as a seperate comment to get your extra entries!

Oh and make sure you go persue briar.claire's site.... they are giving away a free clip with every three your order right now.... but, I wouldn't know this though from personal experience
...ummm... because I would never have ordered three more clips last night..... no, not me.

Now I'm off to chug that nasty glucose drink.... YUCK!