5 Easy Ways to Raise a Green Baby

Having a “green baby” doesn’t mean going bankrupt on swaddling your children in $100 organic cotton blankets and playing with $200 wooden artisan toys. The following are five easy ways to raise your child in a cleaner environment—for the sake of the planet and for baby.

1. Buy secondhand. Secondhand clothes and furniture get a bad rap for being dirty. As long as you don’t equate buying secondhand with dumpster diving, this is untrue. Going through thrift stores, consignment shops, and even Freecycle with a keen eye can help save your family money while keeping items that will take thousands of years to biodegrade out of landfills. Out of sight, out of mind, but not for Mother Earth and for future generations, including your bundle of joy.

2. Choose natural fibers. Organic, sustainable, and fairly traded clothes will limit your child’s exposure to pesticide residue as well as protect underprivileged children around the world from the debilitating conditions of sweatshops.

3. Clean green. Don’t waste money on expensive green cleaning products, but don’t go the cheap route and allow fumes from bleach to harm your child’s lungs and skin. Make your own quickly and cheaply as outlined here.

4. Give up smoking. Cigarette companies aren’t the greenest establishments on the planet. Moreover, no matter where you stand on second-hand smoke, it’s no secret that cigarettes will burn a hole through your bank account. If you go through just one $5 pack a week, that’s $260 a year that could have gone to organic baby food.

5. Improvise. Rather than buying a plastic rattler (that may contain chemicals that could leach into your child’s mouth), line the inside of a Ribena bottle or small jar with pretty paper and toss in a few dried chickpeas.

Bio: Alexis Bonari is a freelance writer and researcher for College Scholarships, where recently she’s been researching scholarships for Spanish students as well as wrestling scholarship programs. In her spare time, she enjoys square-foot gardening, swimming, and avoiding her laptop.