These Babble families are living proof!

Happy Earth Day! Yesterday on Facebook we asked you, our readers, to tell us what you’ve done to “green” your families’ lives. We can’t believe how many responses we got, and what incredible efforts you’re making to preserve the earth for future generations.

We were so impressed that we decided to share some of your responses with others looking for ways to be kinder to the environment in their daily lives. Gathered together below, your stories create an awesome list of tips for making every day Earth Day.  And if you’re interested in reading all of the responses we received, like Strollerderby’s Facebook page to scroll through them — and keep up with the latest parenting news. Continue reading »

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“Should This Be the Last Generation?”

That’s the provocative question posed by Peter Singer, Professor of Bioethics at Princeton University and Laureate Professor at the University of Melbourne, in his recent Op-Ed in The New York Times.

As someone who was pregnant and living in downtown Manhattan for 9/11 and its afermath, I often fretted over the future of the world my daughter was soon going to enter. Would she grow up in a war zone? Would she lead a life of suffering and deprivation? Luckily, my dystopian “Mad Max” vision of the future didn’t become a reality — at least not yet.

Singer wonders whether it is inheritantly good to be brought into existence. Is it fair to bring a child into a world with global warming, the threat of nuclear annihilation, environmental disasters and the rest ? Continue reading »

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1,100 beauty, food, and home products were recently put to the test by Health Magazine to determine which are the “healthiest.”  Their list of the top 78 buys ”that not only work, but are good for you too,” is surprisingly not as organic/crunchy/granola as you might think, though they do give nods to companies like Burt’s Bees and Seventh Generation.

Check out their beauty and home product recommendations after the jump!  I didn’t include their food recommendations, but you can read about them in the June issue of Health, on newsstands tomorrow.  Considering most of their picks were processed foods, I can’t be sure how truly healthy any of them are.  For example, Special K Blueberry Fruit Crisps are basically a diet Pop Tart, icing and all.  How we will ever win the war on obesity if a magazine that contends it’s about health is promoting processed diet foods over apples and oranges? Continue reading »

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Think twice before you let your kid play with your cell phone. Feed your children organic food whenever possible and don’t heat baby bottles or other plastics in the microwave. And don’t forget to test radon levels in your home.

These are just a few suggestions from the President’s Cancer Panel, which released its annual report yesterday.

There are thousands of cancer-causing agents in the air, food, and water which are posing “grievous harm” to Americans every day, the report concluded. Not nearly enough is being done to research and regulate these chemicals.

Although large studies have found no links between cell phone use and cancer, the report said that people would be wise to play it safe by wearing headsets and to make calls quickly, according to Reuters. Continue reading »

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Why buy when you can rent? Particularly when buying leads to a mess and a hassle, followed by death.

This is the thinking behind Scott Martin’s Christmas tree rental service, a Living Christmas. A landscape architect based in L.A., Martin was disturbed by the sight of tree carcasses littering the sidewalks after Christmas, and decided to infuse a little environmentalism into the holiday. Continue reading »

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What kid wouldn’t want to get eye-to-eye with a whale? How about eye-to-blow-hole?

Thanks to the Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society, any kid in America (or anywhere else for that matter) can. And don’t worry, Mom and Dad, they’ll walk out of the whole deal completely dry. Continue reading »

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In order to keep families pouring in the doors, most zoos are happy-go-lucky places where the animals frolic and play.

If that’s what you’re looking for, don’t take your kids to the Vienna zoo. That way you can keep pretending the world is one big happy place, where life for the animals is just the bees knees. Continue reading »

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