Organic Produce: The Truth

Lately we are hearing more and more about organic food and its benefits both nutritionally and for the environment. Organic food sales are the fastest growing sector of the American Food Marketplace and since the mid-1990’s American families are more able to find organic foods in chain grocery stores rather then just at farmers markets or local farms.

However, when doing a cost comparison we know that organic foods are 10 – 40% more expensive than their non-organic counterparts. Is it really worth the extra cost to buy organic?

Environmental Implications:

Lets first take a look at the environmental implications. Some studies have shown that organic farming is less damaging to the environment because organic farms do not use pesticides and release these pesticides into the environment. Additionally, it has been shown that organic farms use less energy and produce less waste. However, there are critics of these studies. Critics state that organic farms take up more land to produce the same amount of food as a non organic farm and therefore could possibly destroy the rainforests and wipe out many ecosystems.

This information is conflicting so we cannot yet say with 100% certainty that organic produce is better for the environment.

Nutritional Implications - Pesticides:

There are many studies showing the negative side effects of pesticides on farm workers. Some of these side effects include cancer, birth defects, and miscarriage. You may wonder if you can remove the pesticides from fruits and vegetables by washing them thoroughly. Unfortunately, many pesticides can penetrate the skin of fruits and vegetables so washing them thoroughly will not remove all of the pesticides from fruits and vegetables.

There are also some studies that show that there is residual pesticide residue on organic produce, but that it is only 1/3 of the amount that is on traditionally grown produce. So, if you are buying organic produce do not think that you are eating produce that is pesticide free – the only way to have produce that contains no amount of pesticide is to grow it yourself.

However, we can safely say that by eating organic produce your family will likely intake less pesticides than if they were to eat traditionally grown produce.

Nutritional Implications – Nutritional Value:

Some studies claim that organic foods have a higher nutritional value, however there are also studies that show no proof that organic foods have higher antioxidants or a higher nutritional value. Again, the evidence is conflicting so we cannot yet say with 100% certainty that organic produce has a higher nutritional value than non organic produce.

The FACS of it:

If you can afford to spend more money on fruits and vegetables, and want to safe guard your family from the pesticides that can be found on non-organic produce, than it would be worth your money to buy organic. However, if you cannot afford organic produce take solace in the fact that it has not been proven with 100% certainty that organic produce has a higher nutritional value or is better for the environment.

My recommendation would be to buy organic when you can for the following produce (in order as listed) as these are the ones that contain the highest amount of pesticides:

Peaches
Apples
Bell Peppers
Celery
Nectarines
Strawberries
Cherries
Imported Grapes (by local if you can)
Carrots
Pears

Click on the link to learn more about Organic Certification from the USDA

The Best Way To Use The Library: The Reserve Section

The current economy is in a bad state. We have all seen the headlines and many of us are even suffering the loss of a job. All of us are suffering the loss of money in our savings if it was invested in the stock market. As a result, there are lists upon lists of how to cut family costs and save money on a daily basis. One suggestion that I have seen over and over again is to use the library. It is offered as a suggestion so often that I believe we often skip over this suggestion and say to ourselves “yeah, yeah, use the library. What else can I do?” I encourage you to not skip over this suggestion, but instead to use it to it’s fullest advantage: The Reserve Section

Why Use the Reserve Section:

Most public libraries are part of a county system that is branched out into various cities. For example, a county library system could have upwards of 20 to 30 “branches”. That means that all of the “branches” share the library materials that are in the county library system. Therefore, when you go to your city library, the resource that you are looking for could very well be at a different branch at the time that you need it.

Additionally, many of the popular resources are already checked out and in order to get them you need to get on the waitlist. Even if a county library system has 30 copies of a particular resource, all of them might be checked out and the waitlist could be over 200 people long.

I am here to say that the best way to use your public library is from the comfort of your own living room or office (wherever you store your computer). Although it is fun to go to the library and browse the shelves, the resources you are going to find by doing that are going to be the older ones. If you are looking to get a hot new resource the best way to do it is by use the reserve section of your library.

How to Use the Reserve Section:

To use the reserve section you will need to know how to use the catalog search section of your county library system web site. If you are unsure of how to use this you will need to make a visit to your city library and talk with the resource librarian. He/she will be more than happy to show you how to use this resource.

Once you know how to look resources up in the library catalog you simply search for the resource you are looking for and reserve it for yourself. If it is a popular resource you will get on the wait list and will have to wait your turn. But if it is a resource that isn’t as highly in demand you will put in your request and it will be shipped to your city library within a week.

Once you reserve the resource you can sign up for e-mail/telephone notification to let you know when your resource is waiting for you at your city library. Usually, once you receive the e-mail/telephone notification you will have 5 days to go and pick up the resource. Ta-da, the resource you want is ready and waiting for you to stop by and pick it up!

Tips and Tricks:

A good way to find out what resources you might want is by using Amazon.com. For example, if you are looking for a children’s book, do a children’s book search on Amazon.com. That way you can see the top sellers and get reviews. Although the library catalog will give descriptions of resources, I find that often times the descriptions and reviews on Amazon are much better.

Sign up for e-mail notification from your library that tells you when your materials are due in 5 days. That way you can either renew your resource on-line or plan a trip to the library to return your resource on time.

Another good way to decide which books you might want to put on reserve is to make a trip to your local book store with a pad of paper and a pen. Go through the aisles and write down the titles and authors of the books you would like to read. When you get home put these materials on reserve and when they are available they will be waiting for you at the library.

The Showdown Between Reusable and Disposable Nursing Pads

After carrying our precious little bundles of joy for10 months (yes, it really is 10 months instead of 9 months) each woman must make a personal decision of whether or not she will be providing breast milk for her child. If a woman does decide to provide breast milk for her child she is then faced with the decision of which nursing pad she will use. The easy thing to do is to buy disposable nursing pads and go on your merry way. However, if you are like me and you want to make sure you are making the right decision for not only yourself but also for your wallet as well as the environment you may be looking at getting yourself some reusable nursing pads. If you are at all considering using reusable nursing pads I have done the leg work for you so that you can make an informed decision about whether or not this is the direction you would like to go. From what I can tell there are six criteria that we need to consider when making a decision about what kind of nursing pad to wear:

• Cost
• Comfort
• Leakage
• Aesthetics
• Environment
• Maintenance

Cost:

In order to do a cost comparison I went to my local Target store to see at what prices the various nursing pads were listed. I chose Target because I feel this is a retail chain that can be found reasonably easy throughout the country and offers prices that are comparable to other big box stores. After browsing the shelves I found only one brand of reusable nursing pads: Gerber. I found only two brands of disposable nursing pads: Lansinoh and Medela. The Lansinoh brand was marginally cheaper than the Medela brand so for the purposes of this comparison I decided to use the Lansinoh brand. Here is a picture of the two brands I decided to compare:

The Lansinoh disposable nursing pads were selling for $8.19 for a box of 60. The Gerber reusable nursing pads were selling for $3.59 for a box of 6. Let’s break this down. Even though the Lansinoh box had 60 pads we must remember that we need to wear 2 pads at a time….therefore, we find ourselves with 30 wears for $8.19. When we divide $8.19 by 30 we get the cost of $.27 cents per wear. The Gerber reusable nursing pads cost $3.59 for a box of 6. In order to determine how many wears we need to get out of the Gerber reusable nursing pads we divide $3.59 by $.27 and get 13.3….lets round this up. At first glance we see that we must get at least 14 wears from the Gerber reusable nursing pads to make them the same cost per wear as the Lansinoh.

However, one additional item to consider is that we need to wash the reusable nursing pads after each wear. Let’s say we use a teaspoon of detergent with every wear of the Gerber reusable nursing pad. A bottle of Woolite at Target costs $3.82 for 16 oz. (or 96 teaspoons). $3.82 divided by 96 is an additional $.04 cents that must be added onto each wear of the disposable nursing pads. Working in this additional element changes the total wear count of the reusable nursing pads to 16 wears. (For those that want to know the math I used: 16 wears times $.04 cents is $.64 cents. $.64 cents plus $3.59 is $4.23. $4.23 divided by 16 is $.26 cents per wear).

The bottom line: If you think you will wear reusable nursing pads more than 16 times it would worth your money to invest in a box.

Comfort:

Comfort is an important factor in this decision due to the fact that when providing breast milk to a child, a woman’s breasts can become quite sore and irritated. After wearing both of these brands I found the Gerber reusable nursing pads to be far more comfortable than the Lansinoh disposable brand. The Gerber reusable pads were made of cotton and were very soft against my skin. I found the disposable nursing pads to be scratchy and itchy.

The bottom line: In my opinion there isn’t even a comparison in this area. The reusable pads are far superior in the area of comfort.

Leakage:

It is important to maintain some sort of modesty when providing breast milk for a child. When going out in public it is important that your shirt stays dry in order to not draw attention to yourself. It was my experience that the disposable Lansinoh nursing pads held much more liquid than the reusable Gerber brand. A few times, when I was especially engorged, the reusable Gerber brand leaked when the disposable Lansinoh brand did not. However, it is important to note that I felt that the Gerber brand did the job just fine when I was not engorged.

The bottom line: If you feel that you may become engorged at a time where it is important to not leak you may want to wear the disposable brand. However, for regular day to day usage the reusable pad worked just fine and did not leak.

Aesthetics:

As you can see from the below picture the disposable pad (on the left) is much larger than the reusable pad (on the right).

Due to the varying sizes of these two pads I found a big difference in the aesthetics of each of the pads under a shirt. When wearing a shirt that was somewhat form fitting the outline of the reusable Gerber brand could be seen through my bra whereas the outline of the disposable brand could not be seen.

The bottom line: If you are wearing a form fitting shirt out in public you may want to wear a disposable pad. If you are wearing a baggy shirt at any time or a form fitting shirt at home, where you don’t care if the outline of your pad can be seen, you would be just fine wearing a reusable pad.

Environment:

The reusable pads are clearly much better for the environment. There is much less waste even with the additional hand washing that is required with reusable nursing pads.

Maintenance:

The disposable pads are clearly much easier in terms of maintenance. After you wear them you simply throw them away and pull out a new pair. Whereas, you will need to wash the reusable pads after each use.

Conclusion:

In my opinion it is important for every lactating woman to have a box of disposable pads as well as a box of reusable pads available for her use. There is no doubt in my mind that a woman who is lactating will find 16 times to use her reusable pads. There are many times in a mother’s life when she finds herself lounging around the house in her baggy sweatshirt and sweatpants. This is an ideal time to wear the reusable pads. Even just wearing them 16 times will help a little bit for the environment, not to mention that the reusable pads are so much more comfortable. Especially for sleeping!

However, it is also important to have a box of disposable pads available for those times when a woman wants to look nice in a tighter fitting top as well as those times when there is a fear of engorgement and a little extra protection is needed.

I hope this helps you to determine which nursing pads would be most appropriate for your use! Here is a site to go to if you are interested in making your own reusable nursing pads.

Produce Washes: Are They Worth The Money

As I continue to see advertisements for produce washes I realized it was important for people to know the FACS about these washes and the best way to wash our produce before eating them.

All of us want our families to be healthy, and one of the best ways to improve health is to incorporate more fruits and vegetables into our diets. We know that most of the time the fruits and vegetables that have the best nutritional content are the fresh ones (rather than canned or frozen) but with our busy family lives it is easy to skip the produce washing step with our fresh produce.

According to the Food and Drug Administration, even if you plan to peel the produce before eating, it is important to thoroughly wash all fruits and vegetables. Fruits and vegetables that are not grown organically have pesticides and herbicides lurking on their skins. And even if they are grown organically you don’t know who or what has touched your produce before you decide to eat it.

The good news is that the commercial produce washes are not recommended and washing fruits under running water should work just fine. Firm produce such as apples and cucumbers should be washed with a produce brush. It is not necessary to wash “pre-washed” fruits and vegetables before eating. Berries and grapes can be rinsed thoroughly and left to dry in a colander.

There isn’t a definitive answer in regards to how long you should wash your produce before eating them, but I would use the same rule of thumb that you use when washing your hands. Sing the ABC’s and when you are done with the song, you are done washing the piece of produce!

Remember that washing fruits and vegetables will make them spoil sooner, so only wash them if you plan on eating them fairly soon!

Group Weight Loss and Google Documents

All of the research on weight loss says that if you do it with a partner you are more likely to have success. Additionally, the research says that if you journal everything that you put in your mouth you are also more likely to have success. What I have done is combine the two using Google Documents and have found it to be extremely successful!

After having my second child I had about 40 pounds that I had to lose (yes, I was one of those mothers that put on 55 pounds during pregnancy). I had several friends who were also interested in losing weight. None of us had time to go to a weight loss center to weigh in so we decided we would be accountable to each other. This is where Google documents came in.

Google documents is a free application offered by Google that allows users to upload documents to a shared site so that more than one person can work on a document at the same time and all the changes will be saved. No more e-mailing documents back and forth! For a more formal definition of Google Docs here is the wikipedia definition

You do need a gmail account in order to access Google Documents but once you do that it is free to use!

What my friends and I have done is created an excel document where each of us has our own tab and in that tab we write down everything we eat for the day as well as any exercise that we did. Everybody can access everybody else’s tab and then can comment on their food choices for the day. We also have a tab of shared recipes. Additionally, we have chosen a common “weigh in” day where we all weigh in and track our weight loss on that specific day. We currently have 7 people all using the same document to track our weight loss journey! It is a great group!

The benefits of doing it this way are a plenty. Here are just a few:

Support:

It isn’t easy for anybody to lose weight. We all have families, events, responsibilities, and parties that are likely to derail our weight loss success. By having a document where we are all tracking this information in the same place we know that we are not going through it alone. Successes are celebrated together and setbacks are supported by every one. Just a few comments on “the spreadsheet” (as we call it) really helps me to keep my will power strong and keeps me from ripping into that bag of chips that my husband insists that we have in the cupboard for his lunches.

Accountability:

When you promise your friends that you are going to maintain this document with them, you instantly become accountable for doing so. I have found that sometimes I enter my information more because I know that my friends will be looking for this information than for myself. But in the end I am glad that the information is there.

Additionally, because I know that I will be entering my information onto the shared document I think twice about having that second helping of dinner. When other people see what you are eating it is a lot easier to say “no” to food items that won’t look so good on your tab of the document.

It is important to state that you all must commit that you are going to put down everything that you eat even if it does not shed you in the best light. The amount of detail that you want to include is up to you and your partners to decide upon, but it is important to make sure you are tracking in the same way. For example, are you going to be weighing and measuring everything or will you be entering in estimates of the amount. i.e. a glass of orange juice vs. 1 cup orange juice.

Historical Information:

As I go through my weight loss journey I am really enjoying going back to see what I have eaten in previous weeks. Therefore, I am able to determine what has proven successful or not successful for me. This information is invaluable when you hit a plateau or find that you are not losing as much weight as you would like to.

For example, I have found that when I eat less carbohydrates I lose a bit more quickly even if the amount of calories that I am taking in is the same. I would have never known this if I did not have the historical information to look back on.

Tips/Tricks/Ideas:

I have gotten many breakfast/lunch/dinner/snack ideas from my partners on my document. When I see that someone has made “baked oatmeal” for example, I ask them for the recipe and try it for myself to see if I like it. One of my partners is a vegetarian so I have gotten great non-meat ideas from her that I have incorporated into my eating habits.

Additionally, I will ask for advice from my friends on this document. I had to make a meal for my daughters baptism and I asked my friends what they thought I should serve that would please a crowd as well as my waistline. I got some great ideas!

Maintaining Friendships:

As we have all moved into the child rearing portion of our lives we have been able to find less and less time to spend together. “The spreadsheet” is used as a place to vent and celebrate not only our weight loss journey but also our lives. By being on “the spreadsheet” we always know what is going on in people’s lives because of the food that they enter. Because of our shared document I know that last weekend one of my friends had a date night with her husband, another friend went to a fundraising benefit for the breast cancer 3 day, another one of my friends babysat for her brothers children, and another one of my friends went camping with her family. This is information that I now know on a weekly basis about my friends that I probably would not have otherwise have known. It has kept our relationships strong and happy.

If you are looking to lose weight I hope you give this technique a try!