Green Options

I spent this weekend at the biggest conference for bloggers in the world, Blogher or as we know it on Twitter #blogher09! Bloggers streamed into Chicago from all walks of life, including a few Eco Childs Play bloggers. I was able to attend the conference thanks to my sponsor, Goddard Child Development Centers.

Editor’s note: The following post was originally published on Green and Clean Mom. “Green & Clean Mom can inspire you to try a little harder, be a catalyst for change and to offer you some new tips and news on how to be the green, sexy and sassy mom…I know you are!”

There is nothing like getting dirty and finding things in nature. Children learn when they see, do, touch, and experience. To be a green mom, I have to let my kids just get dirty. They have to dig for worms, feel the soil, sometimes taste it and figure out what those worms are doing. It means scrubbing finger nails and taking long baths to soak but it helps the children understand for themselves what a worm is, how nature works and exactly what it feels like to figure something out. From all of my children’s exploring they have figured out, without me teaching them, that worms like dark, moist places to live. They know where the slugs are and which rocks to turn over. I did not teach them any of this but through exploration they have learned.

Take two professional women who are busy raising their families, a growing concern about the environment, and the need for a flexible business, and what do you get? Well, if you are Catherine Flanagan and Jane Holt, you launch a home energy auditing business called Green Homes.

Catherine, a lawyer, sought out a more flexible career after the birth of her fourth child. The she and her husband added an addition to her house, and she began to realize the impact that she could have helping others to make their homes as green as possible. “It was also important that we do something meaningful and challenging,” she said.

Living outside of the US for a while helped raise Jane’s awareness of the need to become more environmentally friendly. Jane has always hated waste, but while living in Mexico, Jane wrote a freelance story about garbage that really opened her eyes to how wasteful the American lifestyle can be. “As things became more Americanized, the amount of garbage became colossal,” she said.

Feel like you are alone out there in the Eco wilderness? Are you the only one on your block who buys organic food; the only one who recycles; the only one who worries about phthalates? Sure you can go online and find a large community of like-minded moms but, what about in your neighborhood?

I recently had a blogger mom from my neck of the woods e-mail me asking me to write more on local opportunities. I can, but better yet, I can let her know how to meet moms just like her and me and probably you.