Great article on Raw Milk

This is being reposted from PureZing.com.

Pasteurized vs. Raw Milk
Information from ‘The Raw Truth About Milk’ William Campbell Douglass II, MD (pgs. 13-28)

Pasteurized Milk:

• Pasteurization may be used to mask low-quality milk
• Heat destroys a great number of bacteria in milk and thus conceals the evidence of dirt, pus and dirty dairy practices. To combat the increase in pathogens milk goes through ‘clarification’, ‘filtering’, ‘bactofugation’ and two ‘deariation’ treatments. Each of these treatments uses heat ranging from 100-175 degrees Fahrenheit. Dairies count on many heat treatments to mask their inferior sanitary conditions: milk filled with pus, manure and debris.
• Homogenization of milk causes leucocytes (pus) to settle as sediment in the bottom of milk. The milk industry calls this pus sediment ‘slime’: a grayish-oily sludge. This slime is removed by ‘clarification’
• Pasteurization destroys vitamin C, and damages the water soluble B vitamins diminishing the nutrient value of milk
• Calcium and other minerals are made unavailable by pasteurization
• Milk enzymes, proteins, antibodies as well as beneficial hormones are destroyed by pasteurization resulting in devitalized ‘lifeless’ milk. Milk enzymes help digest lactose and both enzymes and milk proteins help to absorb vitamins
• Pasteurized milk is more likely to lead to decay in teeth and interferes with the proper development of the teeth
• Infants do not develop well on pasteurized milk
• Pasteurization removes the stimulus to remove diseased animals from milking herds
• Pasteurization has contributed to an increase in allergies
• Pasteurized milk can be held for as many as four to five days in holding silos. The date on the carton is calculated from the time of bottling, not the date of milking
• It’s cheaper to produce dirty milk and kill the bacteria by heat, that to maintain a clean dairy and keep cows healthy
• Consumer Reports found 44% of 125 pasteurized milk samples contained as many as 2200 organisms per cubic centimeter (fecal bacteria, coliforms)

Raw Milk

• Raw milk may contain no more than 10 coliforms per cubic centimeter
• Raw milk is usually bottled and sold within 24 hours, and yet can be held safely for four to five days because of the strict standards required of the raw milk dairies. The milk is also clean because the natural enzymes in raw milk eat and destroy any pathogens.
• Raw milk is not homogenized. Homogenization destroys milk fat which releases lipase which turns milk rancid.
• Raw milk is filled with fat digesting enzymes (removal of these enzymes by pasteurization causes lactose intolerance)
• Raw milk is filled with absorbable calcium, vitamin C and minerals
• Raw milk does not have the cream ‘skimmed’ from it. Cream contains CLA (cancer fighting and immune boosting organisms). Absence of cream (non-fat milk) is called ‘blue milk’ in the dairy industry and is poured into the ground as it makes animals sick
• Pasteurization was originally used to clean up milk from filthy diaries at the turn of the century. Rather than cleaning up the diaries, pasteurization has enabled dairies to continue to produce dirty milk: cheaply. Raw milk does not need to be boiled, clarified, filtered, aerated and bactofugated. It is clean and healthy. It is the mainstream dairies that are dirty. Contact your state representatives concerning the legalization of raw milk. Demand that they not be swayed by the high paying lobbyists of the dairy industry who would rather produce dirty, cheap milk than spend the money on clean dairies and healthy cows.

Finally a raised garden!!!

After living in this house for four years, we're finally putting in raised garden beds!!! Yay! In the past, I've just had a small area for gardening in the landscape beds that produced "eh" results. Lots of strawberries, some zucchini, etc. Usually I supplemented with a weekly CSA delivery (love love love Community Supported Agriculture). CSA's force me to be creative with what's in the box...  but I've always wanted to experiment with lots of other veggies myself.  :)

So off to Home Depot I went to buy enough cedar for three large beds. NOT....... Holy cow! Sticker shock! So after talking with the HD guy for a bit, he explained that fir would be fine for about 4-5 years. Cedar (at triple the cost) would last more like 8-9 years as a garden bed. Decision made! So I bought enough lumber for three raised beds. All were built with 1x12's and 4x4 posts in each corner. The largest bed is 10'x4', then 8'x4', then 6'x4'. It actually looks really pretty staggered in size like that for the sunny area we chose.

I got the design idea from Anything Pretty. Fun website for doing various DIY type projects to make your house pretty! Once I saw how simple it was to build the beds, I knew I had to build some right away before we got too far into spring.

And then of course, right AFTER I built them and we spent all afternoon FILLING them with soil... my mom says, "Oh look at the latest Sunset Garden magazine I bought this morning! It has a whole section dedicated to raised garden beds!" OF COURSE! :) The website shows the same design I did, but the magazine itself has several extra ideas I definitely wish I had done. So for you readers, here are some additional tips if you decide to build raised beds.

• Add remesh (mesh rebar) to the bottom of each bed so moles don't dig UP into your garden. We have lots of moles around here, so I wish I had done this.
• Add 1" pipes and pipe clamps (before filling it with soil) so it can easily be covered during bad weather or problems with animals.  With the 1" pipes clamped all around, you can quickly attach 3/4" pipe to make a canopy frame and throw a tarp or netting over the top.  I might add this next year.  :)
• Add 4x4 posts to the OUTSIDE of your project rather than on the INSIDE.  I made mine like Jenny from Anything Pretty for structural reasons.  I wanted to make sure the garden beds were nice and square.  And Sunset Garden did that too... but they had several other photos where the 4x4 posts were put on the OUTSIDE so a 1x12 could be placed on top as a bench.  LOVE this idea!  I could do that on mine now, but then it would cover up a small portion of my soil for planting.  

So excited to start planting!  My first project is to move my ENORMOUSLY overgown strawberry patch into the largest planting bed...   See there to the right of the bamboo?  That USED to be my garden area, but the strawberries smothered everything out.  To the right of the strawberries are five blueberry plants that I'm trying to grow.........  :)

Swine Flu Vaccine Poster

I'm a big fan of Dr. Mercola's and he has a wonderful flyer available for download on his website. I figured rather than print it, I'll just post the flyer here on The Green Republican, of course, hyperlinked to his Swine Flu page on his website. :)

Healthy Meat Comes From Happy Animals

Anyone seen the front page of FoxNews today? Wow... I've watched videos like this on the internet, but never on a MAJOR news site. Kudos to FoxNews for being bold enough to run this story. Healthy meat comes from happy animals...

Undercover Video Shows Pig Farm Employees Allegedly Abusing Pigs

MSG - The Hidden Dangers

It's been over a year since I wrote here and I apologize for the delay. It's just amazing how busy life gets as your kids grow!!! :) A good friend of mine asked me a question on MSG the other day. I avoid it like the plague, but then it dawned on me that I'd never written about it much here. I've only mentioned avoiding it casually. MSG is an excitotoxin, which means it excites brain cells to the point it's toxic. It's basically fertilizer for cancer cells... And the things it does to a developing child's brain is just sickening.

Very scary stuff, but it's so hard to avoid since it's in EVERYTHING - chinese food, canned soups, powdered soups, microwavable meals, fast food restaurants, salad dressings, etc. And it's not just in everything, it's also DISGUISED behind many different names such as hydrolized protein, natural flavoring or smoke flavoring. It doesn't always just come out and say "monosodium glutamate" like it should.

I found a fabulous 4-part special on the dangers of MSG that I thought I'd post here. Part 2 is broken into 2a and 2b because it was the longest segment. Enjoy!

Dining Out: What are you really paying for?

I've asked myself this question many times over the past year when we we get the wonderful opportunity to have "date night" together. We've been finding ourselves more and more drawn to small, organic restaurants. There's something about going out and knowing you're being pampered and NOURISHED at the same time. We are so lucky here in the Northwest to have a nice selection of natural, sustainable, organic restaurants. We've been to several over the past year and really enjoyed the experience. We've also found ourselves being choosier where we take the whole family out for meals (we usually eat at home) when we go out - opting to eat deli or prepared foods at PCC or Whole Foods... or a quick dinner at Chipotle's Mexican Grill (LOVE that place!).

Last weekend for date night, we chose a fabulous restaurant called Bennett's Bistro on Mercer Island. They filter their own water (in a huge, 3-chamber filtration process), serve vegetables and fruits from local farms, RAW cheeses from local dairies, Sunshine Dairy (the brand I buy) products and sustainably farmed meats and seafoods. The meal was absolutely fantastic.




We ordered the salmon poki appetizer (raw salmon on top of avocado with a poki sauce), which was to die for! Then I ordered their "Tip of the Iceberg" salad with a blue cheese-lemon vinagrette, Oregonzola raw cheese, toasted hazelnuts and tomatoes - I substituted the iceberg lettuce for romaine. Horus ordered their turkey burger with Beecher's (local cheese company) mac-n-cheese and chipotle cilantro coleslaw. Mmmmmmmmmm!!!!!

I'm so proud of how natural and organic my own kitchen has become... It's already expensive to SHOP for organic and natural grocery items... I guess part of me just can't get over thinking - why pay extra money for food that I wouldn't serve my family at home? At least when we're home, I know (for about 95% of our food) WHERE it came from, EXACTLY what's in it and HOW it was raised/farmed.

How do you feel about this? What does a fancy dinner really mean to you? Does it mean just simply spending a lot of money? Does it mean getting the absolutely best, most expensive food available (like a mouth-watering, well-marbled, fifty-dollar, corn-fed steak or the most beautiful, bright-orange fillet of salmon), regardless of where it came from and how it was "farmed?" I ask myself this question constantly when we go out to eat - anywhere. ...and if it's not the greatest restaurant, I try to pick the most natural item on the menu.

Do you think about this when you eat out AT ALL or am I just a weird-o? :)

Crying Over Asparagus

Yes, you heard it right. CRYING over asparagus. :) My five and a half year old CRIED tonight because I ate the last stalk of asparagus. Horus roasted it in the toaster oven with butter and sea salt for dinner tonight. It was sooooooo yummy.

As I was shoving the LAST STALK into my mouth, my 5.5 year old FREAKED OUT. I sat there with an un-chewed piece of asparagus crammed in my mouth wondering what to do. I decided it was way too gross to regurgitate it, so I chewed and swallowed it.

SHE STARTED CRYING!!!!!!!!!!! I'm totally serious! I just about fell on the floor, I felt so bad! At the same time, I was just swelling with pride that she liked the asparagus that much. I had always thought she ate it because I told her it was yummy and healthy. I didn't realize she actually LIKED IT that much! :)

Anyway, lesson learned. BUY two bunches of asparagus next time. :) That was the only way I could stop her quivering lip was to promise I'd buy an extra bunch tomorrow.

I know I've been MIA lately, but things have just been crazy here. Thank you for the wonderful emails you've sent! I've greatly appreciated them. I'll be posting a new blog later this week - stay tuned because I WANT YOUR THOUGHTS! :)

You got to love this country

I'd like to post a true story written by a very close friend of mine. I don't even really need to comment on it as it speaks for itself. Just wanted to share. -Horus

"So in the midst of all these lies the liberals are forcing us to believe, I thought I’d share some truth about the inequity of our system.

As you know, my stepdaughter just had a baby last September, out of wedlock and totally unprepared. It’s not a proud moment for my family, especially with my values but unfortunately my stepdaughter always chose to rebel against me and my wife, and chose the path contrary to our advice and guidance. In my opinion her biological father is to blame for the resistance he had towards my positive influence on his daughter. It’s long story so I won’t bore you with details but suffice it to say her teen years were terrible and put a strain on my relationship with my wife. Having said all that I do care for her and always wished her the best. However, I feel it necessary for her to be accountable for her actions and learn from her mistakes. My wife and I do help her a bit financially but we limit it to helping her support the baby, but of course her and her boyfriend are learning what it takes to be grownups, or so I hope they are.

Their views towards politics and society are what you would expect from people in their situation and this is what really pisses me off. Of course, because they made this decision to have a baby without any preparation and follow the “traditional” path to starting a family, they can’t financially support the child. This isn’t a problem because our Government makes it way too easy for people not to worry about such things. All doctors bill for both the baby and my stepdaughter from the moment of conception are paid in full by our state. She doesn’t even have a co-pay. I'd also like to mention that she doesn’t have to wait at some dingy clinic to see a doctor, she sees the same family doctor we have had for years. All prescriptions for her and the baby are paid for as well. The baby’s formula, diapers and other essentials are paid in full by the state.

This isn’t as a result of receiving a welfare check but rather is a program called WIC funded by the Washington taxpayers. I am sure other states have similar programs. What really gets my goat is that we just did her taxes last night (she isn’t even responsible enough to do them herself) and it appears that she will be getting a refund of about $3,700. She only worked part time last year and only paid a total of $900 in combined federal taxes. This is outrageous.

My main problem with this is that she will never appreciate this and understand the inequity of the system. Like many people who have made poor decisions in their lives, they see no problem with others having to pick up the bill for them. With Obama and Clinton running around filling their heads with ideas that Republicans are evil and out to get them, they of course become Democrats. There is a sense in these people that the Government is here to take care of everything and that no one should be held accountable for their actions. They fuel the fire of class envy by claiming such lies that only the rich get tax breaks and that the poor get nothing from their Government. How can I possibly make her see the truth and accept responsibility for her actions.

This is the true circumspection of Hope not the Audacity of Hope."

Honey Cilantro Salad Dressing

Honey Cilantro Dressing

• 1/2 cup extra virgin, organic olive oil
• 2 tablespoons balsamic vinegar
• 1 large tablespoon of raw honey
• 1 clove garlic
• dash of salt
• 1 teaspoon to 1 tablespoon pepper (your preference)
• 1 small handful organic cilantro

Blend all ingredients (I have the same blender she uses in the video - Magic Bullet) - LOVE IT.

This salad dressing was absolutely fantastic!!! I didn't have any persimmons or cheese so I only added chopped bosc pears with a spring salad mix. Absolutely fantastic and both of my little girls devoured theirs!

I use a local raw honey called Guilmette's Busy Bees from Bellingham, WA.

I just love Lucy Lock from Mercola.com. She is a patient of Dr. Mercola's and does all of his recipe videos. I thinks she's humorous to watch and I love her accent. :) Enjoy!

No More Organic Milk at Starbucks

So disappointed to hear that Starbucks is discontinuing their organic milk supply. I originally heard about this over at the United States of Motherhood. I thought for sure it wouldn't happen for another month or so, but no... As we ordered our drinks at a nearby Starbucks, I was promptly told they don't carry it at all anymore. To which I replied very politely, "Awh, I'm so sorry to hear that. This will probably be our last purchase here then." The barista totally understood as she buys organic milk for her kids. She was equally upset over the decision.

*sigh*

Not that we go to Starbucks THAT often, but it was nice to swing by on occasion and the girls love getting organic steamed milks that I sweeten with stevia. No more!

Starbucks chose to do this because they're proud to have switched all regular milk to rBGH-free milk, they phased out the organic milk..............

...... you know because rBGH is the ONLY REASON to drink organic milk.

*rolling eyes*

Nevermind the fact that conventional animals are confined to repulsive living quarters. Nevermind that rBGH is only ONE hormone! What about all the rest? Nevermind that those poor animals are fed pesticide-laden, GM corn and soy and then pumped full of antibiotics to prevent the infections their diet causes. This stuff MATTERS. This stuff is what makes organic milk worth the extra money. Conventional milk IS NOT HEALTHY. Healthy milks comes from healthy cows. It's as simple as that.

I can't expect Starbucks to go all-organic, I know that. :) rBGH-free milk is a great step for a big company like Starbucks to make, but they should have kept organic milk as a CHOICE.


Seattle Times Article

Monica Lewinsky's X-Boyfriend's Wife for President

ROTFLMAO

Ugh, I definitely needed a good laugh this morning. :) LOVE THIS! Thanks to my wonderful uncle for emailing it to me.

I'm not much of a bumper sticker person (except for my itty bitty republican elephant sticker), but boy do I want to display this somewhere! LOL

Zevia!

So as I was poking around at PCC the other day, I stumbled upon a new soda pop. I never buy soda pop, for many reasons. Most companies think pure cane sugar is a good sweetener in a natural soda, but it's still terrible for you. It still rots your teeth and the artificial carbonation (phosphoric acid) is horrible for your teeth, gums and digestion.

This wonderful new product I found is called Zevia and it's made by a small company here in Seattle, WA. They make three flavors and all three are absolutely fantastic. Their cola flavor tastes like REAL cola, not diet cola. The orange flavor and lemon/lime twist flavor are both caffeine-free and also just as delicious. I'm sipping the lemon/lime right now. :)

And here's why I like this product:

1. No artificial sweeteners or preservatives. They use stevia and erythritol (sugar alcohol found in fruits & veggies) to sweeten their drinks.
   
   


2. No phosphoric acid! This is what most cola companies use to give their drinks that carbonated zing, but it's horrible for your body. It softens your bones and teeth enamel as well as it neutralizes stomach acid so you don't digest the nutrients in food properly.
   
   


3. Real citric acid! According to the Zevia website, their citric acid comes from oranges, grapefruits, pineapples, lemons and limes. Most citric acid in the food industry is not extracted from citrus fruit, but fermented by mold from scrap molasses, waste starch hydrolysates and phosphoric acid. NASTY!
   
   


4. Triple filtered water! Most cola companies use regular tap water. I don't know what kind of filteration they use, but any filtration is better than none. My preference would be reverse osmosis. :)
   
   


5. Natural colors - the company worked very hard to find natural colors for their products. The orange soda is BRIGHT ORANGE, but it uses all natural annatto, from the achiote tree. Their cola flavor is colored with natural caramel color and their lemon/lime twist flavor is clear.

I just stopped by Whole Foods on my way home today and they don't carry this product. So I talked to the employee working that department and she was THRILLED. She immediately went to her computer and pulled up the Zevia website, brought up their wholesalers list and ordered the product! Yay! So if you live near a Whole Foods, stop in and request the product. Otherwise, you can find it at most PCC stores and small natural thrift stores. The Zevia website has a partial list of where it's available.

Lead-free bathtub toys

If your kids are like mine, they love to bring ANY TOY you'll allow into the tub or shower. With all of the recent news on lead (and other potentially harmful chemicals), I stopped letting them bring "plastic" toys in the tub. Then I happened upon some really cute, SAFE toys designed just for bath use!



They come in three different sets - I bought all three (hippo, frog, duck, ladybug, octopus, whale, turtle, bee & butterfly)! :) My little ones absolutely adore these! Even my FIVE year old! And they're so easy to clean - every time you wash your towels, you wash these too because they're made out of terry cloth.

We also own this company's Tooth Fairy pillows that my girls love. It's a super soft, squishy pillow (about the size of an adult's hand) with a small pocket sewn onto the top for the child to store their tooth. :)

Is lead really in everything?

My good friend over at ChewyMamas Unite just recently blogged about lead in artificial Christmas trees. To be completely honest, I hadn't even give it much thought at all until she mentioned it. *sigh* Apparently many artificial Christmas trees have lead in the PVC used to create the foilage as well as lead in the wires for the lights. Here's why:

• Lead is a flame retardant


• Lead makes the plastic around the wires (lights, power cords, extension cords) flexible


• Lead helps the plastic retain its color better

Unfortunately lead is toxic and can cause severe mental retardation. With all of the recent news on lead in kids toys, it's really brought to light the toxicity issue in general. People are paying a lot more attention to where their toys come from. Sadly everyone is mostly focused on just lead, because there are a lot more chemicals to be nervous about. But at least it's a start!



We have an artificial Christmas tree. I thought it was the better choice several years ago - not cutting down a real tree. We tried a living potted tree about 7 years ago and that was a pain. We potted it in our back yard, but what a mess... It was SO heavy and there was mud everywhere. Cut trees are beautiful, but why aren't there any bugs on them? Why are they so perfect? Because they're heavily sprayed with pesticides and fungacides. So what's the best solution? I don't really know.

There is one "lead-free" artificial tree making company that resides here in the US called USChristmasTree.com. They absolutely guarantee their tree won't contain lead. Unfortunately, there isn't a solution for the lights. I emailed the company and their lights to contain lead. They do not sell pre-lit trees because people want to avoid the lead lights, but they package them separately so people can choose to use them or not.

Another company called Living Christmas Tree has come up with a fantastic idea - renting living, potted Christmas trees. This is definitely an option I'd choose and it's not any more expensive than buying a cut tree each year. Unfortunately I don't know of a company doing this closer to my home. This company is in Oregon and does offer shipping to other states, but it is significantly more expensive.

Now the real quest? Find lead-free Christmas lights. If anyone has any leads on this, please share. :)

Scrappy Stockings

We have always had a mix of Christmas stockings. A couple of standard red and white fuzzy ones, some knit ones picked up at a drugstore that looked semi-handmade. I had one handmade several years ago, but unfortunately it didn't turn out the way I'd hoped.

I've become addicted to this wonderful website called Etsy.com where everything is handmade. I've met some of the nicest people from this website and the products have been fantastic. My latest purchase was a set of new Christmas stockings for the whole family. I chose this "envivronmentally friendly" seller because she uses scraps to make her products and the end result is an extremely unique item! Huge green thumbs up from me!

Spongetta (The Land of the Misfit Fabric) gets her materials from lots of different sources, such as a local seamstress who does alterations for bridal salons, discontinued upholstery samples from a furniture store, thrift stores, yard sales and rescues from the back of fabric stores. All of these materials would have been thrown out otherwise. I'm drooling over the patchwork pillows she has listed right now! :)

I received my stockings in the mail today and I am so pleased! I chose three out of her store and then had a fourth custom made for my oldest daughter who loves purple. They're a bit oversized, which is awesome for stuffing them full of goodies each year, fully lined and well-made so they should last for years to come.





Happy shopping!

Greening your house - CFL bulbs

It feels so good to make this small change in our house. We just replaced every recessed light in our entire house with CFL's (compact fluorescent lamps) today. Home Depot has a whole section dedicated to CFL's and Puget Sound Energy has $3 coupons PER BULB!!!

So if you buy a two-pack, use TWO coupons, saving $6. Woo hoo! Since we bought mostly small and large flood lights (for the recessed cans) which are sold in 2-packs, this was a fantastic savings! We also bought CFL's for our master bathroom's vanity strip of lights... Fluorescent lighting and makeup typically don't mesh well so we'll see how that goes... :)

The 4-pack for standard light bulbs (like lamps & things) had a separate 4-pack coupon that was different from the others.

Sea Salt - Iodine

A while back, I wrote a post on Sea Salt. Make sure to read that one first since this post won't go into the details of why it's so good for you.

While on vacation in the midwest, we almost bought some sea salt for hubby's grandmother... But we decided against it when we realized that was probably her main source of iodine since she very rarely eats fish or seaweed and who knows if she takes a good quality daily multi. At a MINIMUM, people should get 50 mcg of iodine per day. Recommended is 120-150mcg for proper thyroid function (improper thyroid function causes an enlarged thyroid - goitre). Worldwide it’s the #1 cause of mental retardation in children.

We don't worry about that in our household for several reasons. First, we take an extremely healthy liquid multi that contains 160mcg (106%) of iodine, cultivated from 9 different types of seaweed. We also eat fish at least once a week, either cooked or in the form of sushi with seaweed.

With everyone’s current “fear of salt”… many people are probably not getting enough iodine nowadays. I’m guessing most of America doesn’t eat as much fish or seaweed as we do. I was reading online last week... and it’s really sad… If a person is getting some iodine in their diet, but not ENOUGH, they won’t get goitre… they’ll just slowly develop hypothyroidism, causing dry skin, hair loss, fatigue and slow reflexes.

Pay attention to where your iodine comes from in your multivitamin and make sure it's not overprocessed. The less it's processed, the more "bio-available" it will be for your body to absorb. Although the overprocessed kind will still meet the recommendation for proper thyroid function. This is why I like the Liquid Health brand liquid multivitamins because the nutrients are more bio-available and it doesn't contain any sugar, starch, salt, wheat, gluten, casein, yeast, corn, milk or soy derivatives. Just vitamins, minerals and EFA's. :)

So when you make the switch to PURE sea salt (ingredients list should show ONE ingredient), be sure you're getting enough iodine from other sources. :) Those other sources are a much healthier way to get your iodine anyway!

More competition for Whole "Paycheck" Foods, Publix Supermarkets

I knew this would begin to happen. Do you remember Boston Market and how everyone thought they were the best thing ever for hot family style foods? Then the grocery stores realized they could easily remodel and provide areas in their stores for the same purpose, which killed BM's market share. The shares tanked and they ended up closing most of their stores after over expansion.

I love Whole Foods, Wild Oats, PCC, etc, but I'm sure you have noticed can very expensive to buy Organic from Whole Foods. In addition, Whole Foods and Wild Oats were two of the only national chains and for a while, were able to command higher prices. While there expansion has not been as aggressive as Boston Market, I think Whole Foods may have taken their situation for granted. I've told Ferbit that it's only a matter of time before the supermarkets begin to expand their organic sections. Plus, smaller stores like Trader Joes will begin to carry more organic foods to enter this hot market. I'm sure jitters about new competition is why Whole Foods stock isn't performing that well.

This article from CNN/Money is a further example of what I have been talking about. Publix, a large chain in the south is opening a smaller sized chain store called GreenWise. Even though it is a separate store, it can still leverage the strong buying power, shipping, and warehousing of Publix.



I would really like to see Whole Foods succeed and believe they made a great decision merging with Wild Oats. It was really funny to see people arguing during the merger that these two companies would form a "monopoly" in the organic foods market. Whatever!!

As Whole Foods grows, one thing that concerns me is the amount of money they put into their new stores in order to be green. It's great to be green to help the environment and save energy costs, but at some point it can get a bit obnoxious and waste unnecessary expenses. They also have a practice of paying more for stock items, because they want to make sure the supplier makes more money. It's really dangerous to set alternative prices (price floors) against the free market, even in the organic/local market.

Here are a few quotes from the article that says it all…

"Prices really draw in consumers. Most consumers can't go out and spend their whole paycheck on natural products," she said.

In recent years, Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (WMT), Safeway Inc. (SWY), Albertson's and other big supermarket chains have also expanded their organic offerings and other smaller supermarket chains including Kroger Co. (KR), Lund Food Holdings Inc. and Hannaford have become certified organic retailers.

"I can't wait," said Kim Jones, 40, of Jupiter, who only buys organic and often shops at both Publix and Whole Foods. "It will be nice to have one-stop shopping at GreenWise and hopefully their prices will be more competitive than Whole Foods."

Moooooooo

Many people who know I'm into nutrition automatically assume everything I buy is organic. Which is not the case. Buying local is way more important than buying organic. Milk is a perfect example.

We buy raw milk that the girls and I drink and then hubby buys pasteurized milk for himself. It's not that he doesn't love raw milk, but it's so extremely expensive, we try to keep a mix. We also buy half-n-half for our coffee. But we don't buy organic - raw or pasteurized.

Sadly, Horizon Organic (owned by Dean Foods) is the largest producer of organic milk. Notice their products are ULTRA-pasteurized? It's because their "organic" cows are being treated about as well as their non-organic cousins. They get a smidge more room and are fed organic grains, but they're still smashed into miles of open warehouses, stepping in their own rivers of poo, breathing in heavy amounts of ammonia (sad attempts to keep the place clean and cover the feces stench). Many of the animals are sick (from being fed grain when they need grass and then living in their own pathogen/parasite infested poop) and they have vets standing by to monitor their status. Factory Farms regularly give antibiotics (mixed into their food) because of their horrible living conditions to keep them alive. If you treat organic animals the same way, but cannot give them antibiotics, that breeds massive infection. So they must "ultra-pasteurize" the milk because it's so full of pathogens. The photos you see online of happy cows at pasture are BEFORE they're sold to Horizon for milk production. Horizon loves to highlight this to downplay what happens to the animals as soon as they step onto one of Horizon's facilities.

In this case, local is more important than organic. Sunshine Dairy is our favorite (second to raw). They bring in milk from individual farmers in the area - the individual farmers insure loving care and quality and most focus on sustainable farming practices. Antibiotics are only used to save the life on an animal. Once better, the animal is repeatedly tested for antibiotic residue before re-introducing it back into the herd for milk production. The milk is not ultra-pasteurized and from what I've read on their website, exceeds state guidelines. THIS is more important to me than any expensive USDA Organic label.

Being a Parent: Update

This is an update to my earlier post on Being a Parent. And I've really got a good update too! :)

My little sweetie has been working SO HARD for the past two weeks on improving her behavior. The magnets have been a huge success and every morning she picks out a new one. The first week, she had four fantastic days, but permanently lost her magnet the other three. This past week, she's kept all seven (lost it, but re-earned it a few times)! As extra incentive, my mom promised her a REAL PEDICURE if she made it the whole week. :)

So here's the photo my mom snapped of her earlier today getting her pedicure (sitting in a spa massage chair) at a little nail salon nearby. She used her cell phone so the quality isn't so great, but it's really cute. My mom said she intently watched EVERYTHING the woman did - filing, lotion, massage, painting, etc. She picked out purple polish and then they painted two little white flowers with rhinestones on her big toes.



The German immersion program starts back up Tuesday so hopefully her behavior continues to improve. I emailed with the owner (really small school) and she said she will totally support my magnet reward program and keep me updated each time when I pick her up.