Dear Green Mama: We are in the process of renovating a room for our baby.  We want everything to be beautiful, safe, and of course, healthy. Of course we don’t have an unlimited budget so where do we begin?

Dear Green Nursery on a Budget:

Hooray for the fun part: planning the nursery. And Hooray for you because you can save A LOT of money by buying green the first time. While there are many reasons to go green, health is the reason given by most of the moms we work with at The Green Mama so that is the focus in my Top 6 Nursery Items To Buy Green tips below. As usual, you can learn more at www.thegreenmama.com.

Mattresses

Infants sleep 12 to 18 hours a day so it’s important to consider what they’re sleeping on. The average mattress is made with polyurethane foam (petroleum-based) and treated with a variety of chemicals such as brominated flame retardants (also known as polybrominated diphenyl ethers – PBDEs) and perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) for stain and water resistance. Both the materials used and the chemicals they are treated with can off-gas (release chemicals into the air) to create unhealthy indoor air quality. There is some research to suggest that this contributes to SIDS (sudden infant death syndrome). Either way, it is extremely unhealthy.

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Dear Green Mama: I want to compost, but I am a single woman, living alone in a tiny one bedroom apartment on the 15th floor. I want something super easy that won’t smell up my beautiful new abode.

Dear High on Compost: I love composting. I know, organic decays isn’t a turn-on for everyone, but it does have the potential; and for good reason. Organic items — things you could compost and turn into soil — make up 40% of the garbage in most homes, the largest single item. (Unless you are a parent, where disposable diapers make up about half of a home’s waste stream.) If done right, a good deal or ALL of your kitchen waste can be turned into soil.

Composting Made Simple

What is composting? The basic process is simple: organic waste (think kitchen scraps, plant material, manure, etc) biodegrades into fertilizer. It is an aerobic process (requires oxygen) and is assisted by various microorganisms, including bacteria, fungi and in some cases worms. The process varies a bit from system to system, from leaves slowly turning into soil on the forest floor to my compostable diapers being turned into fertilizer in 24 hours in my Electric Assist Composter, The Red Dragon.

I’ve tried every kind of composting: from traditional piles to flashy worm bins (vermicompost). I love compost. You can read in-depth about all the options available for urban composting here. From your question, however, I assume you have NO yard so my advice is you pursue an indoor system. The two easiest options for you would be either vermicompost or a composting appliance. Read on!

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Dear Green Mama: My family and I live in North Florida. My son has asthma and allergies and he is attending public school in the fourth grade. His teacher refuses to remove her plug in air fresheners. I sent a note to this teacher and a note from his doctor explaining my son’s asthma and offered to buy something less offending to his health. She responded saying she has been a teacher for 28 years and never had a problem, she will not teach in a musty room and did not feel complete without perfume.

Dear P.U. in FL: What a tough, but not unique situation. Many children are experiencing asthma and allergy flare-ups due to indoor air pollution in schools. I can read in your question that this is now impacting you and your son directly. It sounds like you are working to have open communication with your school administration and teacher, but without much change.

At The Green Mama, our best successes have been through education; often times people are unaware of the negative health impacts of synthetic fragrances and the risks to children from indoor air pollution. It sounds like the air fresheners might not be the only issue and that mold or other issues may be an underlying cause of the musty smell.

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