Granola

There are a lot of ways to parent a child. I honestly didn’t realize this before getting pregnant. I knew there were things I didn’t want to do, and other things that made sense.

I knew about certain choices like cloth diapering and breast-feeding. I knew that some families make their own baby food. I know that there are a lot of reasons why people make the choices they do. Some are basically environmental. Some flirt between the lines of anti-establishment and holistic methodology.

Our choices for the upcoming birth of our child fall somewhere in that realm, too. We’ve decided to seek the care and partnership of people who will support and encourage the most natural aspects of bringing a child into the world. On the other hand, I certainly don’t have anything against hospitals and doctors and surgeons who are trained to deal with the more complicated side of things.

Beyond that, though I don’t think I have it in me to really be a ‘crunchy’ earth mommy.

We don’t plan to cloth diaper. Not at first anyway. We decided that babies have enough of a learning curve that we didn’t want to make anything more complicated than it had to be.

Our initial postpartum adjusting period could be best labeled as disposable. Plates, cups, utensils, all the containers I’m freezing meals in… all suitable for tossing after use. We’re probably responsible for the destruction of an acre or two of rain forest. But Brandon & I had a talk about what kind of things we could let slide while we were growing accustomed to the ‘new routine’, and this seemed like the best plan. If we had a dishwasher, it’d be another story entirely. But we don’t. So there.

Also, I have really no clue what the big deal is with delayed or even skipping vaccinations altogether. I have to lump this one in with the cloth diapers: I’m not sure I have the time or energy to invest in good research and formulating my own opinion before our baby comes. (Not to say that I won’t be asking questions and finding out risks/benefits, but I’m probably not likely to veer too far away from mainstream until I see some evidence.)

Not going to get started on the organic/free range/ locally grown debate. It’s way bigger than this blog post. We do what we can, and sometimes we still eat french fries. I’d like to say my kids won’t know about french fries until they’re school aged, but real life is full of curve balls that I’m probably completely unprepared for.

I do plan to breastfeed. For one, it’s natural. A close second: it’s free. I know there are countless health and mental/emotional benefits for mothers and babies, too. Bonus.

Also, I’m going to babywear. Happy baby, hands free? Um, duh.

Co-sleeping: yes. This one Brandon was a little iffy about at first until I showed him the designs of the sleepers and how the frame would keep us from squishing nine months of hard work. It’s a little more controversial, but for us, the benefits out-weigh the risks. There are studies that show babies who sleep in the same room as the parents have fewer occurrences of SIDS, there’s all the middle of the night feedings that we can avoid getting out of bed twice for, and there’s your baby… right there. I dig.

I’ve already mentioned how I feel about gender normative clothing (and toys). So far I’ll admit that most of my family has thrown all that out the window. I was pretty annoyed at first, but honestly, the bulk of the clothes we have are under 6 month sized. This baby will probably never remember that she spent the bulk of her first days dressed like the Easter bunny. Breathing and moving on…

I’m sure there’s a plethora of parenting issues I’m not even starting to touch. I’m okay with that. Obviously our goal is not to fit into the “Greenest Super-parents of the Decade” mold. Honestly I’m a little wary even throwing around the term ‘holistic’. But we’ll try our damnedest, and that will have to be enough.

a little earth day magic

I read this morning about some musician wanting to create an “organic experience” and I just shook my head. ‘Organic’ is mostly hype, now more than ever. At least what we label as organic, anyway.
Besides, in a media blitzed, internet-addicted, instant gratification society, could there be such a thing as an organic experience?
I guess that what you consider organic depends on what you’d consider artificial. Quite frankly, I don’t even know anymore. I don’t garden by any means, but I’ll take my old fashioned oats any day over a box of sugary confection cereal. (Ok maybe not ANY day, but most days for sure.) If I put my non-USDA certified organic oats in with my USDA certified organic soymilk, what do you get? What about if I add dried cranberries? Or today, I added orange-flavored cranberries… it’s all so non-sensical.
So we can all accept that the idea of organic food is nice but in actuality it’s a bit of a joke. But now an experience… that seems to be a whole different mine-field. Two people can exist in the exact same circumstances and have totally different experiences. It’s all about perspective. For me, if I were to pursue an organic experience, I’d probably head to the park & find myself a swing. I’m not even sure what an organically bad experience would be like. Something terrible that happened purely by accident? But if chance is one of the defining factors in an organic experience, then the concept of creating something organic seems to be an utter failure.
Perhaps, though, all that’s required is to be utterly in the moment, to keep your eyes wide open, and try not to judge prematurely the meaning and the reason that these things are happening. For someone like me who is prone to speculation and contemplation, to have that kind of an organic experience would be a spectacular achievement.

Something new to strive for…