The Best Foods To Buy Organically!

Hey Girls!

I’ve noticed a lot of you have voiced concern about the environment in some of your blog posts and comments. One great thing to do for the environment and your health is to eat organically. Organic foods are produced with no pesticides, chemicals, or hormones and they often taste a lot better too! However organic grocery shopping is expensive and it’s hard for most families to afford to buy all organic food. So if you have to decide on just a few items to buy, here are the top foods that should be bought organically whenever possible because they are more chemically treated than other foods:

1.) Meat: Animals are often raised with tons of antibiotics to fight disease and hormones to speed up the animal’s growth, so they can be butchered and sold quickly. Buying certified organic meat (when food is certified organic it has the sticker pictured above on the right!) it means that farmers have met USDA standards where animals aren’t injected with anything and only consume organic feed.
2.) Milk: Did you know that pesticides and other chemicals have been found in women’s breast milk? This is proof that foods you consume that are sprayed with chemicals remain in your body! When milk is produced organically cows do not eat grain with pesticides and are never injected with hormones like rGBH or rbST.
3.) Coffee: Probably most of you girls don’t drink coffee yet (I don’t even drink it!) but if you do someday it’s another thing that’s important to buy organically. Buying Fair Trade Certified Organic coffee not only guarantees that chemicals were not used on the plants, but it also means that fair prices were paid to the farmers and that farmers were treated fairly!
4.) Peaches, Apples, and Strawberries: These three fruits have more pesticides than other fruits and are often imported from countries that have less strict regulations for pesticide use.
5.) Sweet Bell Peppers, Grapes, and Tomatoes: All these food have really thin skins that are often heavily sprayed with pesticides more so than other vegetables because they are so prone to insects. So because of the thin skin the pesticides leak through and contaminate all of the food making it impossible to wash off.

6.) Celery: Celery is even worse because it has no skin at all on it, so it's almost impossible to wash off the chemicals sprayed on it.
7.) Lettuce: Believe it or not lettuce is often sprayed with the most powerful combination of pesticides. If you can’t buy it organically, it’s really easy to grow it in a garden.
8.) Potatoes: This vegetable often gets sprayed with a huge amount of pesticides plus lots of fungicides which are added into the soil.

I don't want to scare you girls and tell you not to eat these foods if they're not organic! It's just that it's been proven to be better for you to eat organically because there are no chemicals and often more vitamins and minerals in the food! But even if you can't eat these foods organically, you should still eat them and enjoy them because they're good for you and contain important nutrients. What are your thoughts on organic food versus conventionally grown foods? Do you think organic tastes better?

The MyPyramid~A Great Way to Stay Healthy!

Hey Girl Bloggers!
I don’t know about you, but sometimes I worry that I’m not eating the right foods to stay healthy. That’s why I find the MyPyramid (pictured above) to be incredibly helpful! You can go to the online interactive MyPyramid Plan to help you choose the right foods and amounts for you. You just enter your age, gender, and how often you exercise to find out what you should be doing. It helps you to make healthy choices and find a balance between food and exercise.
If you don’t already know about the MyPyramid it’s an updated version of the old U.S. Food Guide Pyramid. The different colors stand for the different food groups and how much you need from each of them. Orange stands for grains, green for vegetables, red for fruits, yellow for oils and fats, blue for dairy, and purple for meats, beans, fish, and poultry.
Also you can tell from the picture that all the colors are different widths. For example green is a lot wider than yellow because you need lots of vegetables every day, but you should limit how much oils and fats you have. The reason why all these colors are there is because you need to choose a variety of foods from each group. Also the figure going up the steps alongside the colors is a reminder to get daily exercise. Teen girls should get at least 60 minutes of exercise every day. I like riding my bike, taking my dogs for walks, and playing badminton. Do any of you girls have fun exercises you like to do?
Sometimes I find it hard to get enough fruits every day. If you have a blender at home making a smoothie is a great way to get your “red” colors! This is one I particularly like:

Strawberry Smoothie:
2 cups ice cubes
3 cups fresh strawberries
3 tablespoons sugar
¼ cup cranberry juice

Be sure to use 100% real cranberry juice, not the sugary cocktail kind. Real cranberry juice is great for your urinary tract and helps keep you healthy. Strawberries are rich in Vitamin C and in phenols and antioxidants which protect the cell structures in your body.
Do you girls have any great healthy recipes you’d like to share?

All Your Ear Piercing Questions Answered!

Hey Girls! I’ve noticed a lot of you in the New Moon Girls message board have had some questions and comments about ear piercings. Let me give you some information so you know what the dangers are and what to expect!

The most common dangerous side effect of a piercing is bacterial infection. This is when the area around your new piercing turns red and swells and is often very painful! Be sure to clean it regularly with saline solution and soap and water in the shower, or with antibiotics.

Some areas with a lot of cartilage, like the top of your ear, can be much more dangerous to pierce because they can be harder to treat if they get infected. Antibiotics aren’t enough to treat the infection and sometimes the area will develop an abscess ( a collection of pus in the tissue) which then has to be drained by medical professionals. Yikes!

It’s also very important that you go to a well-known piercing parlor where the piercers wear plastic gloves and use sterilized needles. Be sure the place looks clean and make sure the autoclave (the machine that sterilizes needles) is working properly. If it is they should have a current Spore test that shows that the autoclave has been tested and approved. When needles aren’t sterilized infections can be easily transmitted. That’s why it is dangerous to try to pierce yourself or have a friend do it. Also be sure to get a set of aftercare instructions, so you know how to care for your piercing!
Piercings can be expensive too, usually at least fifty dollars, and if you’re not eighteen you need a parent to come to the piercing parlor with you.

Piercings can be fun and exciting, but I recommend waiting till you’re older to know for sure whether you want one or not! If you get a piercing and take it out later, it can sometimes leave an ugly scar! And yes piercings can hurt! Basic ear piercings in your earlobe aren’t too painful, but cartilage can hurt a lot! Also a lot of the time the initial piercing isn’t too bad, but the weeks and even months it can take to heal can be painful.

So be sure you think a long time about whether you really want a piercing, and always ask your parents for permission first! If you have any other questions about piercings or stories to share feel free to post a comment!