How clueless we can be about the world that surrounds us? I'm not even talking about comparative global politics, I'm just referring to the things that are placed before us to consume. When my first baby was born, I refused to buy into the new generation of baby bottles. Do you remember the plastic shells that one could outfit with a plastic bag/pouch for the formula? Disposable bottles, I think they were called. I had a gut instinct - new mothers would be served well by listening to their proliferating gut instincts- about baby formula delivered in a plastic bag.
My youngest brother Mario is 8 years younger than I, and I was very much part of the ritual of feeding him his milk when he was a baby. How simple things were: 8 glass baby bottles, 8 nipples, 8 screw tops, recycled from my next to youngest brother, washed and sterilized with boiling water every night, and fresh untainted formula into the baby's tummy, every day, 7 days a week. I can still smell the sterilized kit of bottles,particularly because when I had my baby, I did the same.
There was no 7, 8 , 9 or for that matter, there was nothing stamped onto those bottles that could come back to haunt us. I'm referring to hard plastic made with the molecule BISPHENOL A or BPA, which is now being found harmful to humans, and definitely so to infants. The number 7 is the one you are looking for and unlucky me, I found it in several plastic containers in my all-plastic-container drawer. The Nalgene bottles that had solved so many health and recycling issues for me: STAMPED 7, my favorite recycled container: STAMPED 7.
A professor at the University of Missouri at Columbia, discovered in 1997 that BPA could transfer from mother to fetus acting like estrogen estrogen. You can read more about this scary thought at http://abcnews.go.com/Health/story?id=2138565&page=1
I installed my favorite water filtration system in four faucets in my new house (they are not STAMPED 7), because quality of drinking water, ice and cooking water is at the top of my list of how to live in a sustainable, healthy, green home. It is the Everpure 400. That may not sound familiar, but if I tell you that Starbucks uses that very filter to open up anywhere in the world? Now we're on the same page. There is nothing comparable to the sweet pleasure of soft water that tastes...like nothing, not to mention my gourmet cafe salvadoreno -roasted the day before I come back from El Salvador by my Tio Coco, who takes care of my coffee needs- which tastes like gold.
I installed the filter in my kitchen, bar, butler's pantry and upstairs media room to service our evening needs. I've noticed guest drink more water and coffee than ever before. Unconsciously, its the taste of purity that makes an impact. Most importantly, having these filters would allow me to use reusable container to grab water on the go, to stop buying individual bottled water, and to have the best water on the road. Do you understand my plight at this very moment?
The #7 has been uncovered, my Nalgene bottles have been shelved, and I'm leaving the house to go exercise every morning having to gulp a glass- yes GLASS- of water before I leave, and chug more when I get back. I'm going to solve this, because water is all I drink, so I'll keep you posted on my solution. As for baby formula, glass is recyclable and pure so chuck your plastic bottles, and be sure to use the best filtered water for your baby's needs.
If you have a solution, would you share? For more information on the drinking water filter, visit my website www.casaconceptdesign.com and visit my resource guide.
