Creating a non-toxic Home
Non Toxic Home
This may be a longer page, so bear with me. Or even better, search only for things you’re curious about (cntrl + f to search).
Here are the subjects I’ll cover:
- Cleaning your home
- Making your home smell lovely
- Non toxic bedding
- Non toxic laundry
- EMF’s
When I realized how toxic most products are, I kind of lost my mind. I threw everything out. Cole came home to a crazy lady with empty pantries. BUT in that wild time I tested many products and spent a lot of money - most of it I don’t regret. If you’re like me you’ll change everything about your house in 2 months. If not, take your time, read blog posts! Hopefully this one can help, as well as many others.
Cleaning your home
To clean our home I use a few different products.
- For truly nasty things, I use Force of Nature. It smells like bleach which can make me uncomfortable but it’s actually truly a safe product. Here’s more info:
The science behind it: it mixes salt, vinegar, water and electricity to create a spray that kills basically all germs. Here’s the catch though: I don’t want to kill all the germs in our home! If you don’t know much about terrain theory, the basic idea is that if you create a super duper clean environment without germs you’ll have a weaker immune system. If you live in a normal, diverse environment you’ll encourage your bodies natural capacity to have a stronger immune system.
I use Force of Nature on our trash can when it’s stinky, our bathroom and my wooden cutting board after I cut meat on it or dirty veggies sometimes.
You’ll get a little discount by using my referral code.
Making your home smell lovely
There are a million reasons why you shouldn’t use fragrances in your home, but I’ll just share a few.
- Chemicals used to make fragrances are classified as allergens, hormone disruptors, asthma triggers, neurotoxins & carcinogens.
- They contain phthalates, which are linked to cancer, reproductive and developmental toxicity, endocrine disruption (hormones), birth defects, respiratory issues.
- They can pass from skin into blood
- Fragrance can hide hundreds of toxic ingredients. That’s right: if you see the word “fragrance” on a bottle of anything, it could be hiding hundreds of other toxic chemicals.
Because of this, I don’t use candles, air fresheners, perfumes, those things you melt over a heater, etc. The only thing I’ll use for a nice scent is an essential oil diffuser. Just so you know, most brands of essential oils are REALLY bad for you. They’re toxic and should not be diffused in your home. It seems like the best options are Young Living and DoTerra, even though they’re MLMs. As you can tell, I’m not an MLM hater. I have friends that sell both, if you need!
Non toxic bedding
This one is more of an investment. We slept on our bedding for 1 1/2 before switching over, and we’re still not fully non-toxic.
1. Mattress:
We still use a “toxic” one, but thankfully it doesn’t smell bad. If your mattress smells toxic, it is. This is a phenomenon known as off-gassing. Because our mattress is not actually safe, we used this cover to at least keep the toxins in… it’s not the best solution but I will say our mattress used to smell like a grandma (because we got it from Cole’s grammy), and when we used this protector it totally disappeared. This is the product we got: here!
Doctor G did a whole podcast about mattress toxicity, it’s definitely worth listening to when you’re searching.
One thing to note: when we have little ones, Lord willing, I’d like to invest in getting them organic mattresses. This will definitely be spendy, but I would be really bummed to make them spend most of their time breathing in toxins as babes.
2. Blanket:
This is where the investment part came to play - I waited a few months and saved up for this one, and I even think I got it during a sale (by the way, it’s on sale as we speak!). We got the Light, and it actually keeps us warm so unless you’re freezing most of the time I’d grab Light. It’s not organic, but they use no pesticides/toxins to create this blanket. It’s perfect for us!
3. Pillow:
Please don’t judge me on this, but I decided I’d make my own pillow. It was a disaster, but I use it every night and LOVE it. It looks ridiculous under the pillowcase, and makes me giggle every time I see it. I bought organic linen, a bag of buckwheat hulls, and used Cole’s Grandma’s sewing machine like a crazy person.
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Buckwheat hulls: here
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For the outside of the pillow, you can get a cheap organic sheet from Target! Or order some online.
All you’ll do is sew a rectangle and fill it with the hulls - then close it. The hulls are awesome because when you lay your head down it kind of envelops the shape. I won’t embarrass myself by showing you my sewing skills!
4. Sheets, pillowcase:
I got the Organic Magnolia bedding from Target! I really like it. It's soft but not too silkie, you know? There are all kinds of options online, so just get what’s in your budget.
Non toxic laundry detergent
I’ve used a few products, but my favorite by far is MyGreenFills. I use their unscented laundry detergent (the scented one is nice, but it’s too strong for my sensitive nose), their Oxyboost for whites, and stain removers.
The ingredients are clean, and it’s a great sustainable option with little waste since they only send you a jug once that you just keep using. I actually stopped using the jug and use a large glass Ball Jar (it’s silly, but it just looks nice!).
Our favorites:
- Detergent
- Dryer Angels
- OxyBoost
- Stain Remover
- Laundry Machine Cleaner
I’ve never used the softener, because I’m not a full grown adult yet.
I also really like the detergents on OrganicDarlings - all safe and good prices!
Here's a link: check it out.
Non Toxic Electricity
This is a funny one, but it affects your entire home! You could use the perfect products but have so much dirty electricity that it totally ruins your health and sleep. This is still in the works, but I do share about the Somavedic here!