Why we do what we do

For a little over a year I have been making many of my family's necessities. We started out with what we clean our house with, because I was concerned about the chemicals and the smells around my new little one. Eventually I started making laundry detergent, and body washes for us as well.

We are still adapting to some of my creations. Some of our homemade items were easier to adapt to than others. Things like toothpaste has been on and off again as we try to attune our taste buds to new flavors.

We started this change for several reasons.

1) First and foremost we wanted to make sure we were surrounding ourselves with higher quality ingredients and fewer unneeded additives.

2) We want to reduce our waste. By making our own things we buy products in bulk so there is less packaging. We also reuse things like spray bottles rather than filling landfills with them.

3) We think things should be in their purest form when we consume them. That's the way they were intended to be used.

4) We feel it is important to be good stewards. God gave us this earth to take care of. That means using our resources wisely. We love the book, Serve God Save the Planet by Matthew Sleeth. It is a great book that shows that Christians can and should be concerned with environmental issues.