 Remember the days when you use to climb and climb and climb way up to the sky...? Kids are drawn to trees, not to look at them or admire their beauty or even for shelter they are drawn to trees to climb. Recently I read an article about the difference in strength between kids now and over ten years ago. Apparently kids now are not as strong because of the lack of outside play they get. Apparently technology again is to blame with kid’s preferring to play computer games and watch TV indoors, sitting around for hours on end. We had a wonderful, big Jacaranda tree in our backyard that my sister and I use to climb all the time. In fact it was the focal point of our garden. It was our imaginary fairy house, pirate ship and space ship. We would spend hours climbing up and down from one vantage point to another throwing our pretend anchors out, fishing from a branch and then making dinner from our pretend galley. Then we would set sail once again all from within our Jacaranda tree. We absolutely loved playing down there in our backyard where our minds and bodies were free to learn, to imagine and to grow strong. It was just my sister and I up a tree with our imaginations. Let’s get our kids back outside into their own backyards or even better into our community backyards and start climbing trees again. I find it so refreshing observing the kids in our local playground scrambling up and down the huge paper bark trees playing hide and seek or just enjoying the sensation of getting to the highest point and being ‘on top of the world’. Although I believe today’s plastic playgrounds have in many respects replaced the humble backyard tree there is still that natural connection when a child sees a tree, a big, climbable tree, their eyes light up and the race in on…who will get there first to climb and climb and climb way up to the sky just like my sister and I use to do in our backyard. Do you see many kids climbing trees in your neighbourhood? I would love to read your comments below, please share. “Susan is a mum with a young family who has always had a passion for the natural world and living a healthy, chemical free life. She has spent the last 6 years in a quest to find the best certified organic products and produce for her family and the planet. She has several business interests now including a successful organic home business, www.organicfocus.net.” Add Comment  Giving kids the opportunity to explore urban nature makes for a brighter future for us all. From an early age I have always felt a connection with nature. I grew up in a typical three bedroom bungalow with a modest backyard in the suburbs of Sydney. Looking back, my sister and I had a fantastic childhood, supporting loving parents, security, freedom to roam, freedom to explore, great friends and our bikes! Our bikes were our vehicle to explore, roam and be free in our neighbourhood. We’d be out from dawn to dusk only popping in when our bellies started to grumble and when the night sky turned on the lights. We knew every tree, every pot hole, every crack in the footpath, the best bushes to do a wee behind, the best bush paths to explore and the best places to hide. It was an exhilarating, independent childhood. I also spent a lot of time with my dad in our garden (and where you can still find him today). Dad, I believe was the person that gave me the love I have for the natural world. He is definitely a nurturer and instilled in me that very value, caring for the environment and people themselves. From an early age our family had pets to love and care for and a flourishing garden to explore and learn from. We had fruit and veggies growing everywhere even under the famous hills hoist. Dad taught me so much in our backyard about the environment, about birds and plants, how to plant, how to grow, how to love and how to nurture. He taught me how species rely on each other to survive and how we all play a vital part in this beautiful planet. I don’t even think dad set out to teach me those things but just by being with him in our backyard, watching him, helping him, experiencing the joy of being outside with nature he showed me how wonderful and precious the natural world is and why it is so very important and worth saving. I recently read an article titled "How Ecologically Literate Are Your Kids?" On the Parentables website and it stopped me in my tracks. The author Kimberley Mok asked the questions, “Do you know if your kids can indicate where north is? Do they know from which direction the prevailing winds come from? Can they name some plant species that grow locally? Do they know where their food comes from? Can they describe how the hydrological cycle works? The answers to these simple questions are hints as to how ecologically literate they might be.” With our fast past, technologically advanced lifestyles we can easily drift apart from the natural world. How ecologically literate is my daughter and how ecologically literate am I in my new neighbourhood? This article really awoke my desire to once again nurture our local environment and hopefully give my little daughter the same experiences my dad gave me to help her see the wondrous world we live in and why it is definitely worth saving. The Healthy Family & Planet blog will showcase our journey within our local urban nature and hopefully deliver simple, cheap and fun things you can also do with your kids to experience, gain an understanding and love for your local natural environment. Our kid’s futures really depend on it so why not have fun nurturing our little environmental stewards. Did you spend most of your childhood playing outside? What did you love to do? Let me know in the comments below...thanks! “Susan is a mum with a young family who has always had a passion for the natural world and living a healthy, chemical free life. She has spent the last 6 years in a quest to find the best certified organic products and produce for her family and the planet. She has several business interests now including a successful organic home business, www.organicfocus.net.”  Guest Blogger today is our very own Peter Robinson who is also The Muscle Technician. Next time you are preparing a meal, stop and ask yourself what food groups are in the meal that you are planning to eat?
Protein is one of the food groups that I am sure most of you are not consuming enough of. The question is, how much protein should we be consuming? Every meal should have a protein component to it ie; eggs for breakfast, meat with legumes for lunch and dinner. Carbohydrates are one food group that most people consume too much of especially processed carbs. Does this sound familiar? Toast for breakfast, sandwich for lunch, and pasta for dinner. Carbs are important as they give us energy, however processed carbs are devoid of vitamins and mineral components. They are negative calories. Sure they fill you up and give you energy but in the end, over consumption will deplete your body's precious energy reserves. If you're old enough you may remember back in kindergarten we used to make glue out of flour and water, these are pretty much the same ingredients for bread and pasta. Vegetables and whole unrefined grains prepared properly are a better sources of carbs. For the past 3 months I have been following a slow carb diet. This means no processed carbs for 6 days of the week and no grains. On one day of the week you can eat anything you like. So it's a high protein and vegetable based diet. If you are going to try this you must include lentils into your meals as they will help boost the protein content and also a great source of fibre and they will fill you up. If you rely just on meat and vegetables you will be starving. I urge you to take a look at the food that you are consuming as it makes a huge difference to energy levels, the suppleness of your muscles, your moods and your ability to recover from one training session to the next. If you are training, you really must increase your protein intake even more than you think. A lot of the above information was taken from the book Nourishing Traditions by Sally Fallon and the 4 Hour Body by Tim Ferris. What food group do you consume the most each day? Would love to hear what they are just leave a comment below. The Muscle Technician, Peter Robinson is a successful SLM Myotherapist. SLM is a full body treatment. It's a technique that goes beyond the standard massage using a combination of acupressure, trigger points and deep tissue massage that will restore total balance to your body, leaving you FREE FROM BACK PAIN.  Something I can always remember my mum telling my sister and I as children was, “don’t forget to put sunscreen on both your hands and neck as these are the two areas that show your age”. Looking at my hands now I should have taken my mum’s advice more literally, but it’s not too late! If your hands are looking a bit worn, wrinkly and dry especially from the cool, dry winds in the winter months treat them to an amazing hand spa. You won't regret it! Why Do Hands Age So Fast? The skin on the backs of your hands has few oil glands so it shrivels and chaps easily upon exposure especially around the joints. Add to this the overall fragile structure of your hands and you can understand why the skin on our hands is especially vulnerable to aging. You can however slow the aging process by protecting your skin with gloves and by using moisturizer and sunscreen all year round. Hand Care Tips:
 For your chance to win a Miessence Certified Organic Nourishing Hand Cream let me know why your hands really need it... just comment below! “Susan is a mum with a young family who has always had a passion for the natural world and living a healthy, chemical free life. She has spent the last 6 years in a quest to find the best certified organic products and produce for her family and the planet. She has several business interests now including a successful organic home business, www.organicfocus.net.” Healthy Choice for Tampons and Sanitary Pads 07/06/2011
 It amazes me now when I think about how naive I was in my late teens and twenties about chemicals in all the personal care products I used. I can honestly say I didn’t even consider it; it didn’t enter my mind at all. I just wanted to look and feel the best I could and used whatever products that would make me feel absolutely stunning and was marketed so well by the most beautiful young girl that particular month! This naivety also included my use of tampons and sanitary pads. I actually remember reading on the ‘how to’ tampon insertion instructions that I could suffer from toxic shock syndrome (TSS)!!! I didn’t even give it a second thought I just kept on reading. Fast forward over 20 years and my world, mind and knowledge have changed dramatically. My three year old daughter even reads (or pretends to…) the ingredients list on everything she picks up and says to me “no chemicals mum” or “it’s organic!”. Today, many women are concerned about the toxins in tampons and sanitary pads. But TSS is not the only danger in using these products. The following article from Treehugger summarises these major concerns and why I would recommend to all women out there to change to organic tampons and sanitary pads right away. ”The chlorine bleaching that is used to make tampons and sanitary pads look "clean" produces dioxin, a known carcinogen and pollutant. Dioxin settles in the fat cells of our bodies and stays there for the rest of our lives, building up cumulatively over time. Therefore, increased exposure means increased risk.” Plastics in sanitary pads are also a danger to ourselves and our environment, the ocean, fish and other sea life. This is something I wasn’t fully aware of until recently and was completely shocked by. Treehugger quotes Natracare, "Since 1985, the trend has been towards thinner sanitary pads using less wood-based pulp and increased use of synthetic super absorbents made from petroleum. Apertured plastic film is mostly used as a cover on sanitary pads and liners today, and is often called the 'Dri-weave top sheet'. In reality, it is simply just loaded polyethylene film - or plastic with holes in to you and me... Disposal of used sanitary products is either by flushing out to sea, incineration, or depositing in landfill sites. Various pollutants, including dioxins, are continually deposited in the sea through sewage waste and air pollution from incinerators. This not only irreversibly damages and contaminates fish and other sea life; it inevitably results in human exposure to these toxins when we consume these plants and animals." Natracare are my tampon and pad product of choice these days and I wouldn’t under any circumstances go back to super synthetic, unhealthy ones. They’re readily available in local health food and online shops which is wonderful. If you’ve just started on your journey to use less toxins in your home for the health of your family please change to organic tampons and pads right now, for you. Wouldn’t you rather use products that “are made from certified organic and natural, plant-derived materials that are chemical and additive free, and biodegradable, containing only organic and natural ingredients sourced from sound ecologically managed producers and certified free from animal testing.” Take a look at Natracare. Today, women are conscious of not wanting to load their beautiful bodies with toxins and synthetic chemicals (my three year old daughter even knows this!). Back in my teens and twenties I’m sure the words “toxins” and “synthetic chemicals” weren’t even in my vocabulary! Women today want natural and most of all SAFE products for themselves, their families and the planet and I don’t think that is too much to ask for…do you? 3 Ingredients To Detox Your Hair 01/06/2011
 Detox your hair and remove built up silicone derivatives from using commercial hair care products with a few baths of the following:
About six years ago I also took the challenge and did this very same hair detox and it definitely wasn't pretty. I had been doing a lot of research and was amazed, shocked and quite disgusted at all the toxic chemicals used in personal care products so I decided to start using Miessence (and now sell the Miessence range on my website www.organicfocus.net) that the EWG rates in its top 5 safest brands. I purchased the Desert Flower Shampoo and Shine Herbal Hair Conditioner and after a week my hair felt absolutely awful! It literally stuck to my head! I had no movement and body. It was at this point I turned to the shampoo "unclog" Narelle Chenery talked Sarah Wilson into doing. Don't stop reading now as my story does have a happy ending... The following is Narelle Chenery's explanation of why people MAY experience this when turning to 'natural' products for the first time (not all people experience what I went through) and the hair detox process: ................................................................... Hair Detox You may experience a hair detox for the first few weeks if you have been using hair care with silicone derivatives. Commercial hair care products often leave your hair coated with plastic from the silicone derivatives (dimethicone, cylcomethicone, any chemical with ‘cone’ in it) they contain. Miessence shampoos will not foam and the hair care will not work effectively until you have removed this coating by detoxing your hair. This can be done a number of ways: • Over time - using our products until it happens (slowly – the clarifying hair rinse will assist) • Detoxing your hair with a few baths of 1 cup sea salt, 1 cup apple cider vinegar 2 cups bicarb soda (hop in the bath and swish your hair around in it) • Making a paste of bicarb soda and our shampoo and washing your hair with it a few times • Making a paste of clay (one of our masks - or just clay from the health food store) with our shampoo and washing your hair with that a few times. While your hair is detoxing, it may feel dry and knotty. This is normal, as the hair is eliminating the silicone from your hair. Once they have been dissolved, you will find our shampoo foams and your hair is silky and soft. Protect Hair Repair will help with knotty hair during the detox process. ................................................................... After about one month of walking around with a hat on hiding limp, lifeless hair, the natural oils found there way back through my blocked follicles. I can honesty say I would never go back to using commercial hair products. My hair is now soft and silky and I'm not exposing myself or my family (we all use the Miessence hair care) to a cocktail of toxic chemicals. I even dislike the feeling of my hair after getting a wash and cut at a hair salon. Sarah also experienced greasy, limp hair through the detox but emerged at the other side shampooing "half as often" and styling with "sea-salt spray". Take a look at Sarah Wilson's blog for a "list of top non-toxic beauty tips and products from Sarah and experts". She also has many wonderful things to say about the Miessence product range. Just go to www.sarahwilson.com.au. If you are interested to view and possibly purchase the Miessence hair care range just go to this page on my website http://organicfocus.mionegroup.com/en/category/2 Have you gone 'natural' with your hair care? What products would you recommend? “Susan is a mum with a young family who has always had a passion for the natural world and living a healthy, chemical free life. She has spent the last 6 years in a quest to find the best certified organic products and produce for her family and the planet. She has several business interests now including a successful organic home business, www.organicfocus.net.” How to Break Down a Typical Ingredients List 06/04/2011
It can be so confusing reading ingredients lists...what actually do all those numbers mean and the incredibly long words that are almost impossible to pronounce? Keep on reading for some tips on how you can keep toxic chemicals out of your life by simply knowing how to read an ingredients list. How to Break Down a Typical Ingredients List Break it up into thirds: 90-95% of the ingredients in the first third of the list make up the majority of the product. The second third, 5-8% and the remaining third, 1-3%. So for example, if the first ingredient listed is Water then the majority of that product is made up of Water falling into the 90-95% bracket.    For more information on our certified organic Miessence Intensive Body Cream just click here (our sister site will open up in a new window). ***Remember to always look for the logo – guaranteed organic certification. Why should we be an informed consumer? * To not be fooled by green-washing and slick marketing * To protect your family from toxic chemicals disguised as ‘natural’ ingredients * To create a better world through consumer power I never use to read ingredients lists and now I love it! Try it out for yourself and you too will be on your way to protecting your family from toxic chemicals. What made you start to read product labels? “Susan is a mum with a young family who has always had a passion for the natural world and living a healthy, chemical free life. She has spent the last 6 years in a quest to find the best certified organic products and produce for her family and the planet. She has several business interests now including a successful organic home business, www.organicfocus.net.” 5 Ways to Prepare your Health for Winter 03/04/2011
 At the moment I’m recovering from an early Autumn cold that has really knocked me for a six! It has certainly made me reflect on why and how we should look after ourselves all year round but especially during the colder months. Looking back on the last couple of months, I’ve been super busy with my organic business and looking after my beautiful family that I have definitely neglected to look after ‘me’ with regards to eating well and staying active. I have also neglected the ritual of some ‘me’ time to nurture and appreciate body, soul and environment. It just absolutely amazes me how our bodies respond and let you know that something’s not quite right. Observe and listen closely to your body to find out what’s really going on inside. Reflect and take action to look after your health and wellbeing. Here are my 5 ways to prepare for Winter: 1. Build up your immune system 2. Eat wholesome organic food 3. Keep up your exercise routine 4. Add garlic to your meals 5. Take a break, get out in the sunshine and smile :) What are some of your tips to prepare your health for those cold winter months? “Susan is a mum with a young family who has always had a passion for the natural world and living a healthy, chemical free life. She has spent the last 6 years in a quest to find the best certified organic products and produce for her family and the planet. She has several business interests now including a successful organic home business, www.organicfocus.net.” A Healthier Home = A Healthier Family 24/02/2011
I really started to learn and become aware of living a healthier, organic, chemical free life about 6 six years ago now. My experience began with the introduction of eating whole foods and a suggestion from a friend to always read ingredient labels on the back of products. This one simple suggestion completely opened my mind to what we are actually putting into our bodies and our children’s bodies that we're not aware of. What exactly are all of those chemicals and numbers I’m ingesting? Some words listed in the ingredients I couldn't even pronounce! This was the beginning of my journey and now my passion to investigate and pass on my knowledge to others about focusing on organic living for a healthy family and planet. My hope is that I can teach you to make small changes for a safer home for your family…your children. A safer home for your family will contribute to a safer world for us all. As HealthyChild says, “What’s more important than the health of a child?” I just watched the HealthyChild video A Wake-Up Story which I found on the Vintage Indie blog and found it very inspiring…please take a look.  I had another big wake up call yesterday that comes my way now and then to remind me about how prescious my body is and so amazingly intelligent. I’ve got a million and trillion moles and freckles on my body that I get checked every six months and it so happened that one little freckle decided to let me know that something wasn’t right. Firstly changing colour, and then changing shape a collaborative decision was made to take it out which happened yesterday. For me, something like this is a timely reminder about a healthy protection from the sun - a balance between sensible sun exposure for a necessary Vitamin D fix and sun protection with a safe and natural sunscreen. For now my body will heal my wound and continue to let me know in some way if something is wrong and when everything is right. Remember to listen and observe your precious body because it will let you know… The secret to healthy sun protection: 1. Use Miessence Reflect Outdoor Balm – apply generously 20min before exposure to the sun. 2. Reapply Miessence Reflect Outdoor Balm EVERY TWO HOURS. 3. Cover up - invest in some light cotton long sleeve sun shirts, especially for kids and don’t forget rashies and hats! What are some of your secrets to sun protection? If you have any favourites I would love to hear them, please comment below. “Susan is a mum with a young family who has always had a passion for the natural world and living a healthy, chemical free life. She has spent the last 6 years in a quest to find the best certified organic products and produce for her family and the planet. She has several business interests now including a successful organic home business, www.organicfocus.net.” |    Welcome!“Susan is a mum with a young
family who has always had a passion for the natural world and living a healthy,
chemical free life. She has spent the last 6 years in a quest to find the best
certified organic products and produce for her family and the planet. She has
several business interests now including a successful organic home business, www.organicfocus.net.”   ArchivesJune 2011 CategoriesAll |
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