My Green(er) Kitchen

I used to be a paper towel addict. They were used for literally everything you can imagine in our house and we went through a ridiculous amount each week. I knew there were cloth alternatives, but since that involved more laundry I wasn't too interested. One day it just clicked for me though. I was standing in the grocery store staring at yet another package of very expensive paper towels and I realized... I was quite literally throwing my money away on them. That was when I decided to kick my habit.

Going in to the switch from paper to cloth I knew that my system would have to be easy in order for me to stick with it. I did a bit of research and ended up finding these fabulous unpaper towels from Athena Creates. I bought a family pack of 56 because I knew I wasn't going to want to do laundry too often, and then I bought a cute bamboo organizer to set them in on the counter. These unpaper towels have been amazing! They are made from cotton birdseye fabric and are about the same size as regular paper towels. They clean better than paper, wash up well, and we use them for almost everything that we used to use paper for. (Dog messes still get paper. Yuck!)

The next thing I had to figure out was what to do with the dirty ones. I found this wet bag at My Beautiful Girl and just had to have it! I have an accidental rooster theme going on in my kitchen, so this wet bag was perfect. It has the perfect amount of space for my unpaper towels and washes up beautifully each time.

My favorite reusable kitchen products, though, are these washable bowl covers that I got from MBG to match my wet bag. They have elastic to fit snugly around all shapes and sizes of bowls and casserole dishes. The adorable cotton print on top has a food safe nylon hidden under it. If they don't get too dirty a wipe with a damp cloth is all they take, and if they happen to need a wash they go right in with the unpaper towels. We absolutely love being able to reduce our use of aluminum foil and plastic wrap in our kitchen with these!

I also bought cheap microfiber cloths from the auto cleaning section of the hardware store for cleaning around the house. They get tossed into a laundry bag in our basement and washed separately from everything else.

So that's my green kitchen set-up! I love how much I have reduced our paper towel usage since switching to cloth and my purchases have already paid for themselves a couple times over with the cost savings of not buying paper towels.

I'm linking up to Your Green Resource this week. Check out other blogs via the linky at SortaCrunchy!

*Disclaimer: I am not affiliated with the shops mentioned in any way and they did not sponsor my review. I purchased products from them of my own accord and all opinions here are my own.

Sometimes you just need to feel epic.

I forget sometimes that what I do has significance. The daily monotony can get to me and it seems like all I do each day is change diapers, wash diapers, offer my boob to Ava every hour (high needs baby!!), and (maybe) make dinner and do the dishes. Sometimes it just seems impossible to get everything done. When I need a pick-me-up I make a cup of coffee and play this song:

This song makes me feel like I just ran a marathon, climbed a mountain, and conquered nations. I'm really not sure why or what it is about it. It just does.

I finished telling my birth story to a friend a few weeks ago and she exclaimed, "Becca! You are WOMAN." And that's how this song makes me feel. What I do is important.

I. AM. EPIC. 

I. AM. MAMA.

I. AM. WOMAN.

My thrift haul today

I'm joining up with the links at SimpleDesign this week to share my thrift finds. I headed out to the thrift store today to find some towels to use as dog beds and hit the jackpot on a couple cool vintage things!

 Hand-crafted wooden pull toy: $2.

Pair of vintage chairs: $20.

I'm so excited about finding a cute wooden pull toy for Ava! I've been watching for one for a while now. The chairs need some serious TLC but with some sanding and a few coats of bright paint they are going to look so awesome! I'm thinking maybe purple, green, or red, but white would be pretty too.

What I Wore Wednesday

I am so honored to be featured on Megan's blog, SortaCrunchy, today for her What I Wore Wednesday feature. She asked a while back for brave volunteers to share outfits and I decided to send her some of my postpartum transition outfits. This is a really difficult phase of life for a lot of reasons and often cute clothes are the last thing on my mind. Megan's blog challenged me to step out of my comfort zone, pull together some cute outfits, and post the pictures. I can only hope that my outfits help other mamas get some inspiration for their postpartum wardrobes! The best tip I can offer is: thrift shop! There is nothing better than finding a great deal on a piece of clothing that will only be worn for a short time. Click here to see her post and my transition outfits!

Baby steps toward a greener life, or how I became an earthy-crunchy mama

It all started with cloth diapers.

My initial interest in cloth diapers has led me down a path toward being counter-cultural and "earthy-crunchy" in many areas of my life. The more I learned about how cloth diapers would save me money, keep waste out of landfills, and keep chemicals off of my baby's bum, the more I realized that those were goals that could be achieved in other areas of my household as well. Through wonderful bloggers who I respect and read faithfully I learned about reducing waste in my house, using natural solutions instead of products with chemicals, and saving money by reusing things or re-prioritizing what is truly important.

My home has less toxins, we waste less, and throw away less since I first heard about cloth diapers. I've become passionate about things like extended breastfeeding, natural childbirth, cloth diapers, baby-wearing, un-paper towels, reusable alternatives to disposable products, natural alternatives to chemical-based products, and real food. Every little change takes us one step further toward helping our environment and our budget, and every time I fold a load of cloth diapers I am so thankful that I discovered this wonderful doorway to a more eco-friendly lifestyle. I'm going to start writing a few posts here and there on some of the things I've changed around my household to be more environmentally conscious and I'll occasionally post reviews on some of the products I've found that I just love.

After all... how do you not fall in love with a cute fluffy bum?!

A new beginning and a fresh start

It seems fitting that I restart this blog with the story of Ava's birth. She is after all, most of the reason that I gave up writing here for a while. My preggo tiredness didn't leave me with much energy to care about the garden or my blog. This year though I'm hoping to be more organized and more motivated. The garden is cleaned up and our seedlings are all planted in starter trays and I am ready for a fresh start. So with no further ado, here is Ava Josephine's birth story.

My labor with Ava was long, difficult, and not quite as I had planned. It began at midnight on a Wednesday right as we were heading to bed. I never really had a slow start with contractions. They started off close together and stayed that way most of the labor. I labored with Ben's help all night, and our doula came in the morning to our house. We continued just taking them one at a time and worked through the day until about 6 pm when our doula thought that I was getting close to transition. My contractions were almost on top of each other at that point, coming every two minutes and lasting for a minute and a half each! We headed to the hospital and after we got all checked into our room a nurse checked my dilation and we discovered that I was only at 3 cm. I was disappointed, but I was determined to keep going without pain meds. Ben and our doula were so fantastic and helped me focus on working through each contraction.

A few hours later I was still only at a 4 and we got more bad news: I was positive for Group B and no one had noticed it in my records until right then. We had to quickly decide if we wanted the antibiotic IV and then it took three nurses and five different veins before they got me all hooked up to it. When they checked me just after midnight and I was still at 5 cm, I knew I needed some help. I had been at it for 24 hours so far and been awake for 42 hours, and I knew that I needed to sleep and get some energy back so that I could still push her out! They had the epidural in by 1 am and we all settled in to get some sleep.

I woke up around 4 am and a nurse checked me and found that I was at a 6. The doctor on call told us that she wanted to either break my water or start Pitocin, but I was still hoping to avoid any further interventions. We told them that we would prefer to wait a bit longer, so we were told that they would come back at 6 am to check on me and then would want to start some interventions. One of our dear friends from church was praying in the hallway for us, so I asked our doula to go get her so that we could pray for things to start moving. Ben, our doula, and our friend all gathered around to pray that God would bring our baby out in His timing, and then we settled back in to sleep, pray, and wait.

What an answer to prayer we got! No one bothered us again until 8 am and when they did finally come in to check me, I was at 9.5 cm! My OB was there since I was now laboring during business hours, and at 9:45 am she was ready to have me push. My water broke on its own during my first few pushes, and after that my body took over. Ava was turned sunny-side up, which we think is why she was taking so long, and so my OB had me try some different positions to get her to rotate. They finally worked and through back labor and feeling everything despite my epidural, Ava was born at 11:56 am on a Friday after two hours of pushing and a total of 36 hours of labor! She was 9 pounds even, and 21 inches long. She was limp when she came out and had swallowed some meconium, but after a little bit of the doctors working on her she was all cleared out and had a good loud cry going on. She has been a champion nurser from the start and such a strong girl, able to hold her head up on her own since birth.

Learning to do this whole Mom thing has been awesome, challenging, exhausting, and a huge blessing. Even though the birth didn't go how I had planned, I don't regret anything. We have our girl here now and that's all that matters.

Garden Fresh Pasta Sauce

A quick recipe for your enjoyment. Ben and I improvised this as we cooked and ended up with a fabulous final product. This is a great easy way to use up some of the surplus of tomatoes that you may have this summer! The measurements I have included are approximate since we were tossing things in as we went. Just adjust to the taste and texture you like.

2-3 T Extra Virgin Olive Oil
2 T Red Wine Vinegar
1 T Butter
2 cloves Garlic, minced
2 - 4 cups baby bella mushrooms, sliced thick (amount used depends on how much you like mushrooms!)
6-8 large tomatoes or 10-14 small tomatoes, chunked
1 small handful fresh basil, chopped
1 small red chili, minced
salt and pepper to taste
1 - 2 tsp red pepper flakes
1 - 2 tsp dried marjoram (sub in fresh if you have it!)
1 8oz can tomato paste

In a large skillet or sauce pan heat up a couple tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil. Add red wine vinegar, butter, and minced garlic.
Toss in baby bella mushrooms. Add more EVOO if needed. Saute on high for a few minutes until they show some color and soften a bit.
Add in tomatoes, making sure to include juices. We chunked our tomatoes right over the pan so as to keep all those juices in the sauce.
Add basil, red chili, marjoram, red pepper, salt and pepper. Gently boil at med-high heat 5 - 10 minutes until the juices start to concentrate.
Add can of tomato paste to thicken sauce. Simmer for another few minutes to bring the sauce together and thicken to desired consistency. Check spices and add more as desired.
Serve over al dente spaghetti or other pasta of choice.