If you remember back a few months ago to my Erzulie Cosmetics post on beautiful, truly natural makeup, you may have thought that it couldn’t get any better (I know I didn’t- and I’m still enjoying ALL of the products!). But excitingly enough, it does. Rhonda Demars, founder of Erzulie Cosmetics, has also created a new line of baby skincare products. In my opinion, they are the best products you can buy to care for a baby.

The product line is called Nature Babyz and is featured on Etsy.com. The products include shampoo, conditioner/detangler, body wash, baby powder, chest rub (the natural alternative to Vick’s, which has some very questionable ingredients), lotion, butt balm, a calming mist that smells amazing (I spray it on my pillow every night), and baby oil.

You won’t see any scary ingredients in these products and they are truly made with the end user (a baby!) in mind. Unlike huge companies that obviously (by their chosen ingredients) choose profits over a baby’s health, Erzulie Cosmetics carefully selects ingredients based on health and functionality. Babies simply don’t need to be slathered in mass-produced chemicals to be clean and moisturized. Mainstream ingredients may be cheap for big producers, but they are harmful and unnecessary and will be absorbed into a baby’s skin.

You won’t find any cheap fillers or dangerous, mainstream ingredients in the Nature Babyz line. You can also rest assured that the products do NOT contain any of the following ingredients: sulfates, gluten, talc, chemicals, parabens, PEG’s, glycols, acrylates, synthetic silicones, phthalates (plastic esters), BHT, petroleum bi-products, synthetic fragrances, or DEA.

As an example in comparing mass-produced baby products to Nature Babyz, if you’ve ever checked the ingredients on a bottle of baby oil at a pharmacy or grocery store you know that the oil is usually close to 100% mineral oil. Hopefully, you are already familiar with the dangers of mineral oil (you’ll find some extra-shocking information here), but it is an especially bad ingredient for babies.

The Nature Babyz oil; however, has the following ingredients: sunflower oil, jojoba oil, grapeseed oil, olive oil, vitamim E, and lavender essential oil. These are expensive ingredients to use because they are so much healthier, but the 2 oz bottle is only $4! The other items are priced similarly, and are really quite reasonable considering the quality.

Overall, the Nature Babyz products are gentle and healthy; you might even enjoy them for yourself (I’m thinking of trying out the shampoo next!). Remember that a healthy baby is not one that is covered in mainstream, chemical-based products that can lead to effects such as cancer.  Don’t let your baby pay the price for government and corporate irresponsibility, healthier products are available!

Not only is it disappointing that mainstream society does not provide much in the way of healthy products, it’s outright dangerous. The average consumer of large chain purchased food, home cleaners, and personal care products is set up to absorb hundreds of harmful chemicals that can eventually be passed on to their children.

I recently read an article called “Kids & Chemicals” by Dr. Sarah Lantz (PhD) which describes a study performed back in 2005 on a mother and her baby. The mother was a regular shopper who bought food at major grocery chains and purchased cosmetics and personal products at department stores. During her pregnancy she was tested for 290 chemicals that she could have either absorbed, inhaled, or ingested during her life.

As you might guess, the results were extremely alarming. The mother’s body had a mix of chemicals that began when her own mother was pregnant for her. Aside from specific chemicals from her father’s photography lab as a child and plasticisers from a paint factory that leaked downstream from her college, there were others more common as listed below:

• Perfluorinated chemicals (which may impair fertility & can inflict a number of other dangers)
• BPA
• Chemicals from sticky tape, non-stick pans, household cleaners, & carpet protectors
• Phthalates from cosmetics, shampoo, and other personal products
• Lead & dioxins
• Mercury (from childhood vaccinations)
• DDT (which is now banned)    *Splenda consumers take a quick look at this

Unfortunately, once tested, the baby was found to already house most of the same chemicals as the mother, including DDT. He had received the chemicals as the mother had some of her own, through the placenta, umbilical cord, and breast milk. He still has the possibility of absorbing additional chemicals- through the food and drinks he is provided as well as from the products used on his skin and environment.

Although this example is of just one case, the mother lived as a number of us do- shopping at large retailers our food and the products we absorb into our bodies which are truly NOT healthy for us. Sadly, I believe that a large amount of the U.S. population probably has these chemicals in their bodies.

In fact, the article states that the Environmental Working Group found an average of two hundred pollutants and chemicals in blood from the umbilical cords in ten babies born in the fall of 2004 in the U.S. There were a total of 287 chemicals found in this blood which came from garbage, gasoline, burning coal, pesticides, and unhealthy product ingredients. Most astonishing yet, of these 287 chemicals, “180 cause cancer in humans or animals, 217 are toxic to the brain and nervous system, and 208 cause birth defects or abnormal development in animal tests”. In other words, we are killing ourselves (and our children) with the products we use and the chemicals we ingest from our food.

In case you’re thinking that once born, babies are not at much risk, the articles also notes a variety of reasons why babies and children are actually more susceptible to these chemicals than adults:

• Their body weight is lower & and they have less enzymes that help detoxify
• Their blood brain barrier is not yet mature
• They consume three to four more times the food of adults in proportion to their body mass
• Their skin is more “permeable” than the skin of adults

I have personal (and much more basic) observations that lead me to believe babies are more at risk:

• Babies tend to put everything in their mouths (including plastic items that could contain BPA)
• Baby formula is NOT safe and there are laws actually allowing chemicals in it
• Babies touch many surfaces and put hands in their mouths; if those surfaces were cleaned with harsh chemicals, they could ingest the residue
• Baby shampoo and cleaning products have very disturbing ingredients- take a look next time you’re at a large retailer

Although we cannot help what our mothers may have been in contact when we were in the womb, we can now do our best to be aware of dangerous chemicals and remove them from our lives, to our benefit and the benefit of our children. Babies are brought into this world dependent on their mothers; they have no control over what is provided to them, but you do.

If you want a resource to help get you started, you can visit chemicalfreeparenting.com which features a book by Dr. Sarah Lantz called Chemical Free Kids that might be helpful (I even located used copies on Amazon.com).

-The article referenced is from a newsletter called “Organic & Natural” by the Organic & Natural Enterprise Group in Australia

One of my Christmas gifts I can’t get enough of is a beautiful bamboo blanket I received from my mom. I love this blanket because, not only is it a very generous size, but it’s luxuriously soft (almost like cashmere) and best of all, completely organic and sustainable.

The advantages of choosing bamboo over another material like cotton are numerous. Bamboo fiber is incredibly strong and durable, comparable even to steel. You can see this evidenced by the fact that bridges and houses are constructed from bamboo too.

Bamboo is also one of the fastest growing plants, growing up to a foot and a half a day through the spring and summer! Add in its low maintenance growth cycle (no pesticides and little care required), and weed-like spreadability, and this crop has become a viable alternative to conventional cotton.

Of course, these benefits are a double edged sword, and the booming industry has caused bamboo forests to drop dramatically and endangered species that are dependent on bamboo have taken a hit too. As with all things in life, balance is key. Consider growing your own bamboo or donating to programs already doing it.

If you are anything like me, you probably have a wide variety of body care products claiming space in your bathroom. From facial soaps and lotions to nail polish and makeup, I’ve been guilty of using a variety of brands whose ingredients I did not fully question until now.

Once you begin reading the fine print on your bottles, it is likely that you will locate highly questionable ingredients that could be negatively affecting your health (especially long-term). For example, whatever lotion you apply is being absorbed directly into your skin and most hair products are not rinsed out and stay on your head all day and perhaps night.

If you find questionable ingredients on your products and would like to see what they could mean for your health, check out this Cosmetics Database to search out specific products and view their health ratings. This site has safey ratings on over 40,000 cosmetic products. These thousands of product ratings include makeup, skin care, hair care, eye care, nail care, baby care, oral care, and fragrance. Every product that I’ve searched from my bathroom (other than local and farmers market purchases) has been on the site and provided me with a clear and fact-based health rating.

The Costmetics Database uses the following rating system for the products: 0-2 are “low hazard” products, 3-6 are “moderate hazard” products, and 7-10 are “high hazard” products. It also will tell you if the ingredients in your product are linked to cancer, development and reproductive toxicity, restrictions, warnings, and more. In case you do not own the product you are looking at, it lists all of the ingredients on the product label as well as any directions and warnings. It even breaks down which ingredients are the most hazardous and gives them an individual rating!

Also, if you click on a heading just to see a list of products in a category (for example, in hair care or skin care), the database will give you a list all of the products starting with the lowest hazard ones. This makes it easier to locate safer alternatives if your current products prove to be dangerous to your health.

Overall, I have found this cosmetics database to be a great tool in evaluating the products that I use in my everyday life which could potentially harm my body. I hope you find it useful in evaluating your current products and speculating on new ones. It has been a great help to me in determining what products should be allowed in my bathroom and on my body. And yes- believe it or not, the picture shown above is my post-cleanout picture, with only a few potentially bad bottles left that I just couldn’t bear to get rid of yet.

Leave it to the FDA to let another chemical seep not only into our lives, but into the bodies of our most precious and delicate human beings- babies. Not only has the FDA allowed the slip of melamine into potentially 90% of U.S. sold baby formulas, but they have set a newly allowable amount based on no testing!

Melamine is a toxic chemical that causes kidney stones and kidney failure (these are only the known harmful effects) and was at first combined with formaldehyde and used to make sturdy plastics. Now this chemical has been discovered useful as a cheap filler in powdered foods and in simple nutrition tests conveniently looks like a protein (which would be an acceptable and necessary nutrient in baby formula).

Prior to the top three brands of U.S. baby formula being tested for melamine (due to a China formula scare involving the substance), the FDA’s website noted that for baby formula there was no safe level of melamine contamination. Not surprisingly, shortly after Enfamil, Nestle, and Mead Johnson (who make approximately 90% of the baby formula sold in the U.S.) baby formula tested positive for melamine contamination the FDA proceeded to announce a safe level of melamine contamination in baby formula as one part per million. This contamination level was notably set at just over the test result levels for Enfamil, Nestle, and Mead Johnson. In addition, no scientific testing was noted in defense of this newly defined acceptable contamination level.

As our babies are defenseless against this chemical, it is important that we spread this news to all parents and parents-to-be. They are the ones that can monitor their baby’s diet and ensure that toxic chemicals do not enter their bodies. Breast-feeding is a wonderful way to help ensure that chemicals such as melamine do not enter a baby’s system.

Breast milk is a nutritional substance that even science cannot reproduce. The vitamins and nutrition from a mother’s breast milk are natural and necessary for a baby. Although scientists can attempt to model it through baby formula, this still remains a mass produced factory item where profit can take the upper hand to health. Take charge of your baby’s health and avoid the baby formula the FDA is defending because they are NOT putting the health and safety of your baby first.

Thanks for checking out openeyehealth.com – we are here to serve you with relevant knowledge about the issues that matter most. We would love to hear your ideas and comments – visit again soon for more updates!