Classes & Consulting

Daycares & Schools

The green mama has helped daycares and small businesses grow green. If you work with children or parents, the Green Mama can help you improve the health and quality of your space and your services and has experience with juggling the demands of DCFS with your green vision. From finding healthier toys and cloth diapering in a daycare setting to providing organic food and safer serving utensils on a budget, the Green Mama can help.  We are particularly adept at helping to connect you to other green providers so that going green can also save you green.  (Mama-owned and non-profit discounts are available.)

Green Businesses & Better Consumer Goods

The Green Mama has worked with companies that specialize in sporting goods, organic baby clothes, and healthier foods.  And with the stores that specialize in selling them.  Let us help you find better products, create a healthier "front of the house" experience, and then talk about your green choices in a way that reaches the many eco-curious consumers out there.  Ask about our special Preferred Green Product Marketing Assist package. 

Green Marketing Consultation

The Green Mama is a one-stop shop for learning more about parents interested in green living. We regularly meet and communicate with hundreds of green families. These parents represent billions of dollars in consumer choices.  And they are savvy. Make sure your client isn't just green washing, find out what other green mamas say about your marketing language, and otherwise position yourself to reach the ever-expanding market of eco-curious consumers. 

Brain food and community for the parents of the littlest green people.

The Green Mama Café is an interactive group for parents, especially new mothers, intended to foster community and provide support for families pursuing green lifestyles.  Session typically run a semester-long. Topics covered include those specifically baby-related, such a greener diapering and potty training tips, to topics for the whole family like how to eat healthier for less and how to compost. 

Structured Toddler Activities (available at all Green Mama Cafe sessions)
Your toddler or older child can attend a fun, semi-structured playgroup with early childhood staff while you attend the Green Mama Café. 

Location/registration: The Green Mama Cafe has three locations currently: The Evanston Ecology Center, The Peggy Notebaert Nature Museum (in partnership with the Neighborhood Parents Network), and Whole Foods Market Lincoln Park. 

Read the entire list of BRAINFOOD ITEMS for each class.

Green Parenting 101

Is your home making your kid sick? Are your child’s toys, clothes, and food safe? Do you worry you don’t have time to protect your family and the earth? There is a great deal of media attention about the risks associated with everything from the toys in your playroom to the water bottle in your purse. Yet, it is often hard to sift through the research, the advice, and the marketing to determine what is really important. As parents, grandparents, or friends, there are many simple, every-day ways to help protect the health of your child and the earth.

Green Parenting 101 is designed to help families navigate the various lifestyle options and consumer choices available. Learn more about how to feed your family better, avoid toxic toys, and green up your diaper routine. This is an interactive class that provides the research on a variety of timely topics of concern to families and provides real-world solutions for instituting change while juggling the restraints of family finances, time, and energy.

Live Green, Save Green

Ever wonder how you can save money and still get better food? Or, if the plastic you are using is safe? Or, the best ways to green your house and conserve energy?

Live Green, Save Green  will help both the novice and the eco-savvy navigate the various lifestyle options and consumer choices available to protect the health of family and planet. Learn the most cost-effective ways to green your life and feed your family better, how to avoid toxic plastics and toxic skincare products, resources for conserving energy and water at home, and tips for better and more affordable cleaning.  This is an interactive class that provides the research on a variety of timely topics and provides real-world solutions for instituting change while juggling the restraints of finances, time, and energy.

The Clean, Green, and Organized Playroom

Is your child’s stuff taking over your life? Are you worried about toxic toys and poisonous paints but overwhelmed by the overload of health warnings?  Find out which toys to boot, where to get the safest furnishings and paints, and how to get any room where kids play organized. And, how to get your children to keep it organized!  This class is co-led with professional organizer (of HGTV fame) Maureen Gainer Reilly, www.gainerorganizing.com.

Cooking Green with Chef King & The Green Mama

A hands-on (and yummy) class on eating local and seasonal foods without going broke. Get the skinny on healthy cooking during pregnancy and beyond, meals for adults and children, how to feed your family oganics without going broke, and how to max out your nutrients per bite.  This class is co-led with pro chef Ellen King.

The Living Green Family Series

Create community and learn! The Living Green Family Series goes in-depth on all the topics covered in the Green Parenting 101 workshop and many of the Live Green, Save Green topics, including: feeding your family better, creating meaningful celebrations, green personal care products, beyond cloth diapering, saving money and resources, and tips on finding good green goods.  The green lifestyle series is an opportunity to learn and share with a group of like-minded individuals and to create a support network that will help make green living fun and sustainable!

In-Home Classes or Personal Consulting

Schedule a private consultation or a class for you and your friends.  The Green Mama will come to your home and help tailor information just for you. Need to save money and resources but find it difficult to get away to a class?  Worried your cleaning routine is toxic? Need help navigating the toys in your toybox?  Wonder how to green YOUR diaper routine?   The Green Mama can help!  

The Un-Toxic Nursery

A nursery is often the most toxic room in a house.  The Green Mama can help you avoid pitfalls in the planning stage, mitigate the effects after it is done, and even help you find a green designer for the most fabulous green nursery around.  Get assistance from everything from paint brands to mattresses and where to get them for less.

SKYPE Consulting

Live far away?  Have a new baby and can’t get away? Schedule a “virtual” consultation or class and learn while sitting in the comfort of your own home. Invite friends or don’t.  As easy as watching TV, only a whole lot more fun.

A Green Mama “Non-Soap” Opera: Can’t get to a Green Mama class, but want to partake in a little more green learning? Or, looking for a trusted source to ask about all of your green-mama or green guy/gal issue? Invite any caste of characters you want for up to two hours of green mama goodness. Cost: $85.

A Green Mama Sit-com: Have a specific topic you want more information on? Or, need to ask a trusted source some of your parenting or living questions? Cost for up to 1 hour: $45.

A Green Mama Short: Just have a quick question, a green mama or green guy/gal emergency. Sign up for a short (up to 20 minutes): $15  
(Green mama discount: if you are a graduate of a green mama class, get your first short FREE.)

(Caveats:  The Green Mama can “visit” you via Skype or iChat.  She will try not to visit you wearing her bathrobe, but she can’t promise you lipstick. If you do not have a Skype account you can get one free. If you have no idea what I am talking about, then this option is probably not for you.  I can do almost the same thing, however, with an old-fashioned telephone line.)