Unwittingly Natural

My friend April (and fellow blogger) posted something on Facebook about a week ago that really had me thinking. Before I knew it, I was digging through my kitchen, medicine cabinet, makeup bag and my purse for all of the products that Ive been using that are either "all natural" or "cruelty free." What I found quite surprised me!

My little quest began in the kitchen. To start off, I am a very picky eater. Most of the recipes that I make, I eat them because I grew up doing so. I will admit, I have quite the love affair with salad dressing. Everyone is always saying how terrible it is for you, and while I agree I just couldn't seem to give it up. My woes with dressing started when McDonald's (Yes...Mcdonalds! I know its horrible for you, but read on...) started using Paul Newman's "Newman's Own" Caesar dressing. I was pregnant for my daughter at the time, and became insta-addicted to it. I would buy 5 packets of it at a time in order to use it on my "home made" salads. I even tried buying the Paul Newman dressing from the store, but it tasted awful and chalky. No matter what kind of dressing I tried, it couldn't compare to the kind found at McDonald's. After awhile I decided that it was crazy to only eat that one kind of dressing and to pay $1 a packet for a one time use item. So I stopped using dressing all together. However, this love for Paul Newman swayed me to buy my next favorite item...Paul Newman's Gorilla Grape Juice.

I am quite fond of grape juice. In fact it is my favorite! The reason that I bought Paul Newman's Gorilla Grape Juice was purely because I loved his salad dressing so much. The fact that it was all natural (and that he gives all his profit to charity) is just the icing on the cake. To be honest, I didn't know that it was all natural when I was eating the dressing. I didn't realize until I picked up the grape juice and started drinking a glass, when I noticed "all profits given to charity." Interesting! When looking in my pantry, it also weilded the following results...a jar of pasta sauce that my fiance picked up because it was $1. Not only was it delicious, and my favorite so far, but it also stated that it was "all natural." The same thing with my favorite salsa Casa Mamita that you can pick up at Aldi.

Next, I looked in my medicine cabinet. I remember back awhile ago thinking how much I hated toothpaste because not only did it burn, but it made my gums hurt. My babies also complained and cried about using what people consider "normal" toothpaste. So on our hunt to find one that didn't taste awful, burn, or wasn't terribly expensive...we found Tom's of Maine strawberry toothpaste. I didn't purposely pick up Tom's of Maine because it was all natural, but because it was one of the only kinds that I could find that wasn't solely marketed for children, or didn't taste like revolting bubblegum. However, my Pagan side was beaming with pride at having chosen one that wasn't going to slowly poison my children over time.

Lastly, I checked over my makeup and was amazed. Hard Candy is my favorite brand, hands down. I have their make up removing wipes, nail polish, eye liner, mascara, eye shadow...you name it I probably have some of it. I especially like their Eye'm tired eye depuffer. It makes me look like less of a zombie when working those terrible ten pm to seven am shifts. I was doing some research on Hard Candy and guess what, they are cruelty free and part of the leaping bunny program which monitors beauty products and keeps a list of those that do not test on animals. Hard Candy even has a lot of vegan make up as well. I contacted them to find an exact list, and they responded, saying that they will have a full list up on their new website when it launches!

All in all, I am quite proud of myself. I found quite a few all natural products (and even a bunch that I didn't list above.) Just think what I can do when I actually go out and TRY to buy all natural and cruelty free items? Comment below with all of your favorite all natural and cruelty free products!