All that baby stuff

All of you parents out there will know this problem fairly well: What do you do with all of that baby stuff? There are a few options, some green and some not so green.

You can store everything for your next baby in hopes that you will be able to reuse everything and save some money. Of course this makes a lot of sense, but there are certain things that you probably shouldn't hang on to for too long. For instance cribs and car seats are constantly getting upgraded to make them safer and safer. If you want to get one crib to keep for future children as well I would suggest going with a very basic crib, in other words one without a drop side (which is often a cause for recalls in cribs) and slats that are fairly close together and preferably one made out of a nice solid wood or some other material that will really hold up. I know my son was very tough on his crib, but I anticipated that and bought him a solid wood crib without a drop side. I will admit the crib wasn't as convenient to use as some of the higher end cribs on the market, but it is still in good shape after he used it for 2 years and then had it as a daybed in his room for another 6 months. Of course saving everything can take a real toll on your storage space and you need to make sure that your possessions are protected from the elements. Also keep in mind that when you pull all of these things out of storage later they will need a really good cleaning before you can use them again. It is possible that not everything you stored will be in good enough shape to be used again either.


You can hand your old baby stuff down to a new mommy who could make good use of your old baby stuff. We were the recipients of some old baby stuff when we were expecting our little man so I can attest to just how helpful this can be to new parents. Of course keep in mind that not every new parent is happy to receive less than new stuff for their baby, but there are plenty of parents who would be more than happy to get their hands on some gently used baby stuff. Probably the best benefit of this method for dealing with all that clutter is that you get to see how happy it makes someone else to have your old things. Of course the downside is that this can be a very time consuming and sometimes frustrating method for clearing out the clutter. You will have to decide if the great feeling you get from helping someone else is worth the added time and effort on your part. That being said I really do think that if something was handed down to you then when you are done using it (if it is in good shape still) you should hand it back to the person or pass it on to another person.

You can sell your old baby stuff to a second-hand store or on Craig's List or eBay or at yard sale, etc. You get the idea that the ideas as to where to sell your gently used baby stuff is seemingly limitless. One advantage to this is that you will make a little extra cash which may help you buy some more gently used stuff that your little one needs as they grow out of their things. Kids always seem to be outgrowing their clothes and always seem to be in need of more stuff. Of course the disadvantage of this method is that it can take time to get rid the stuff since you need to wait for there to be a need for the things you have. It may be worth it to you to try to sell the big ticket items in particular though. Also you may get to see someone get really excited to get their hands on your old stuff for a great price.

You can donate your old baby stuff to a charity like the Goodwill, Salvation Army, or even a women's shelter, or other charity of your choice. The big advantage this option has is that you can probably get rid of everything at once and they may even be able to pick it all up from your place of residence for you. You also get a tax write off on your donations. This is a great way to go if you just have to get rid of a bunch of stuff quickly.

You can reuse some of your old baby stuff. Maybe make a quilt out of baby's old clothes (especially the ones with holes or rips in them that make them no so reusable). You can repurpose those receiving blankets as napkins. Just get creative and you would be surprised with some of the things you can reuse.

Remember that no one option is right for every person and no one option might be the only option that works for one person either, but all of these options are far greener than the last option which is to simply throw it out. Granted I'm sure there are probably times when throwing something out might be the only option you really have, but it should really be a last resort only.

Foothills Green Expo

Today we went to the first ever Foothills Green Expo which was hosted at Pacific Outdoor Living and was co-hosted with Phat Energy. Let me just say that I was really impressed by this very small green expo. The amount of services these two companies offer is rather astonishing. We are getting very excited about working on our yard now, previously I think we were a bit nervous about the whole thing though we were slowly figuring out what we wanted to do with the yard. Today these two companies just helped us to see how to really kick up the green in our yard way beyond what we had imagined.

Pacific Outdoor Living offers tons of services. They will even come out to your house and help you design your yard as well as what order things need to be done in and help you keep it all in your budget. We were most excited by the way that they can put your water storage underground and then put either a water feature or a permeable paver patio deck on top of the water storage area. I know it sounds a little confusing so I really recommend if you are intrigued by this look at their website or call them or even go down there and talk to them in person. You will be amazed at this, so cool not to need to have rain barrels all over the yard to store water for irrigation of the yard.

Phat Energy had these super cool Phatports. They are structures similar to a pergola style patio cover but they have solar panels on the roof area. You can use these as carports, patios, etc. We are really excited about the possibility of putting one in our backyard to cover our patio area. We had thought previously about an umbrella or a sail canopy or possibly even building a pergola style patio cover. This is super exciting though to think of having a covered patio that produces electricity to help offset our electrical usage.

Windows for a 1948 cottage

Sadly our house has only one original window left, well three if you count each of the windows that make up our bay window. The other windows in the original structure are aluminum windows that are leaking, with the exception of Ethan's bedroom which has a pair of vinyl windows and is not having any real problems thus far. We love the bay window and even before we bought the house we thought that getting it fixed was a good idea, no we haven't gotten it fixed yet.

Over the weekend we went to the Go Green Expo here in L.A. hoping to find some ideas for the house as well as other things. Well we had our first of the window people from the expo come over the other day to discuss replacing our windows with us. This window company's representative was too busy with another couple at the expo so I simply wrote down my information based on what I saw about them at the booth, they were a local company that manufactures their windows locally. Much to my surprise when the sales person showed up we quickly learned that they only sold vinyl windows which wasn't really what I wanted but I listened anyhow, well until he suggested that I replace my 62 year old bay window with vinyl windows. At that point he completely lost me.

Now I am back to the drawing board so to say looking for windows that will suit a 62 year old house that has been maintained very well overall. We still have the original wood floors, the original cabinets, the original tile counter tops and back splashes, the original tile work in the bathtub. Granted I don't plan to save all of it because the tile is in pretty bad shape, but I would like to maintain the original integrity of the house as best I can and to me that doesn't include vinyl windows.

Well last night I got a call from one of the other window companies that was at the expo, this was one that we actually got to talk to at the expo and learn a little bit about their product. I'm not certain how I feel about their windows yet as they are something a bit different from the old fashioned wood windows, but they are definitely closer in appearance to our bay window than many modern windows. I set up a time for someone to come out and discuss our windows with us, after all who knows if they will be the right option for our house or not.

Go Green Expo - L.A.

For us Pampers and the other big brands were never really an option regardless of the environmental impact of them because of our son's very sensitive bottom, of course it was never our intent to use the big brand diapers. Before our son was born we had ordered a case of Seventh Generation diapers to get us started. Later on we switched to gDiapers which are a hybrid diaper. They have flushable, compostable inserts that you put inside the vinyl liner. The vinyl liner is snapped into the little g pants which close in the back making it more difficult for little hands to open the diaper.

When we were at the Go Green Expo we got a chance to meet up with Michelle Carver Schnoor of gDiapers. gDiapers are something we have been using for about 2 years now. We initially bought them because they were more environmentally friendly disposables than the Seventh Generation diapers we were using at the time. Shortly after we began using gDiapers I then learned that some moms were using prefold cloth diapers in their little g pants so I went ahead and gave it a try. While the prefolds worked quite well in place of the flushable inserts they were quite bulky. I tried making my own cloth inserts to use in the g's so that they wouldn't be so bulky, but I never had great success getting them to be trim like the flushable inserts without causing a diaper rash on my little one's sensitive bottom.

I was ready to give up on my gDiapers when he outgrew his medium pants, but then gDiapers introduced their own cloth inserts. Excitement really overcame me when I heard the announcement of the cloth inserts. I was more than happy to order myself some more gDiapers and some cloth inserts and I awaited their arrival as patiently as I could manage. Let me just say that I absolutely love the new cloth inserts for gDiapers. They are nice and trim and easy to clean and are very absorbent. I do still use the flushable inserts from time to time as I always have, but for us the real love of gDiapers is the ability to use cloth in them. They are so easy to use and we rarely have a leak with them thanks to the nylon liner.

I even passed on our old mediums to my sister since her little one is smaller than ours. She absolutely loves the gDiapers with cloth too and is planning to use them on their next little one who she is expecting in March. These diapers hold up really well and can be passed on or saved for the next little one or even resold to another mom.

Go Green Expo - L.A.

We went out to the L.A. convention center today for the Go Green Expo. We had a very nice time there and learned about some great new products and even found some companies that we might be able to use in fixing up our newly acquired house.


Probably our favorite find of the day was the Vapur water bottles. We had been looking to replace our old Sigg water bottles with something free of BPA. These bottles are super cool. They fold completely flat when they are empty, are easy to fill up with water, have a sport cap for easy drinking, and you can even fill them half way with water and stick them in the freezer over night so you have ice cold water. We are already falling in love with our new water bottles, and the 2 and 1/2 year old is a huge fan already. He loves that he can squeeze the bottle to get the water out rather than having to tip the water bottle to get water out - much easier for the little one.

Master Bathroom (part 4) - shaving mirror

My husband had one additional request, a shaving mirror. We had one in the house we used to rent and I admit it was rather useful to have it. Now that he started straight razor shaving he thinks this will be even more useful to have than it was in the rental when he was just using a safety razor. I didn't realize just how expensive these shaving mirrors can get, some of them were several hundred dollars a piece. I knew there was no way we wanted to spend that much on a shaving mirror, at least not right now, so the search went on to find a reasonable shaving mirror for a more budget minded price. I actually managed to find one that extends up to 30 inches from the wall and is only $24.86 at The Home Depot. I figured that getting one that extends that far out might be rather useful, especially when I am cutting my own hair - getting the back is always a challenge. Of course if money were super tight I did actually find one for $4.99 at IKEA that reviewed equally well, but it only extends out 10 inches.

Master Bathroom (part 3) - extra storage

Once I decided that medicine chests were out of the question I moved on to finding some additional storage for the bathroom vanity area. I knew we really could use some additional storage that was easier to access than the storage we currently have under the counter top and would also be more attractive than just leaving the counter full of stuff as it currently is. It is really nice to be able to have some things out where they are in easy reach. I decided that maybe a black wrought iron look would be the best fit with the French antique theme I was hoping to achieve in the bathroom. Unfortunately most stores currently only sell free-standing storage units for the bathroom or single glass shelves that you mount directly to the wall. When I saw this one at IKEA for 19.99 it reminded me a bit of one I used to have at my parents house that was mounted to the wall for a bit of additional storage. I like the slightly less modern feel that this style of shelving option for a bathroom provides and the black wrought iron style of it will help it fit in with the black and white accents in the bathroom.