There is a nice article about Nurture Eco-Daycare in the Monday edition of the St. Catharines Standard. Here is the link http://ping.fm/Qe7HD or check it out below...
Day care nurtures kids, the planet
COLUMN
Posted By MATTHEW VAN DONGEN AND TIFFANY MAYER
Posted 3 hours ago
Lincoln Bannerman picks up a fist-sized yellow block and does what most other 16-month-olds would do.
He shoves it in his mouth. No worries. The yellow cutout of a farmer is made of wood and coloured with nontoxic paint.
The floor he's standing on is cork -- an ecologically sustainable alternative to hardwood. And the cheery green walls surrounding him, mom Karrie, and year-old Taylor Ranaud, are covered with paint sans volatile organic compounds.
Above the trio, a smiling earth looks down on them, the words "Love our Planet" emblazoned above it, while the busy Lincoln, fuelled by local and organic food, moves on to a toy sushi set.
Welcome to Nurture Eco-Daycare, Karrie Bannerman's new child-care venture for the young and the green.
The St. Catharines mother of two opened her home to young children in need of day care three weeks ago, offering parents something she's always wanted as a mother of two -- safe, healthy, ecologically-oriented child care.
Her search for such a program fell short when she returned to work after the birth of her daughter, Violet, 5.
"I found nothing like that. I found I had to make a lot of compromises for child care. If I liked the program, it had bologna sandwiches and pop tarts on the menu," Bannerman said.
If she found a day care where the menu was homemade, she added, safety and cleanliness seemed to suffer. So Violet had to make do with bologna and pop tarts.
After moving to St. Catharines and giving birth to Lincoln, Bannerman went back to work grudgingly, all the while thinking about how to make her dream child-care venue a reality. She soon realized it would be up to her.
Since then, Bannerman has redone her backyard, installing a playground on a bed of wood chips to cut down on grass cutting. She's planted a garden -- organic, of course -- that she hopes her growing list of children she cares for will help her with.
Songbooks with tunes chiming recycling themes, crafts using recycled items, activities such as sorting recycling items and nature watching, meals of local and organic food, playtime with locally crafted, nontoxic toys that foster imagination and cloth diaper service are all packed into a day with Bannerman.
She's in the process of applying for certification from the Eco-Healthy Child Care program for her earth-friendly day care.
While her services are more expensive than other day-care services, Bannerman said it's not about being the cheapest. It's offering what parents want.
And helping create a generation of green-minded individuals.
"I'm really hoping they will grow up and be different than the generation before my generation and know how to interact with their community," Bannerman said.
For more information about Nurture Eco-Daycare, visit http://ping.fm/HTWxn
Article ID# 1762019
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment