Welcome! I’m Kate, the original Modern Alternative Mama.
I’ve been at this natural living gig since early 2009, although I’ve been interested in natural health my whole life. When I was a little kid, my dad did yoga, was a vegetarian, and was very insistent that we take our supplements!
This grew into a passion for herbalism, gardening (I have nearly 50 indoor plants and a 1000-sq-ft+ outdoor garden), cooking from scratch, and more. As I’ve learned, I’ve been eager to share with others, and help them towards a natural and healthy life, too. That’s how the blog was born.
I’m a mama to 6 kids — 5 of whom were born at home — and we unschool, practice gentle parenting, full-term breastfeeding, co-sleeping, and all that good stuff. We live on a peaceful 10-acre homestead, where we play in the creek and look forward to dandelion season every year.
I’m now a professional herbalist and owner of Earthley Wellness (one of the fastest-growing businesses in the Midwest Region in 2021 and 2022, and in the whole country in 2021 according to Inc Magazine), as well as the author of Natural Remedies for Kids, published by Quarto Press in August, 2015.
I hope you’ll stick around here so we can do life together!
Hi Kate! Just found your blog after buying the Healthy Living ebook Bundle. We have so much in common! I’ll be a new follower of yours! We are planning our 2nd home birth for March 2013 as well! (Ist was natural hospital birth, 2nd was very successful home water birth!) Excited to learn more of what you have to share! ~Sarah
Kate, like Sarah, I discovered your blog through the ebook bundle! I, too, have much in common with you! Had a question about something in your Against the Grain book. Is it possible to have your email? So exciting to find more women that I have lots in common with! I always love lots of extra encouragement as a new mom! We welcomed our first child, in May, 2012, at home!
Hi, I’m so excited to have stumbled upon your blog quite by accident! I have some things in common with you and in the areas that I am not like you, I long to be like you and admire you. I cloth diapered, am doing extended breast feeding, I want to learn to cook real food and I wish I could live a self-sufficient lifestyle, although I think that that last part will be really hard to achieve for me personally since my lifestyle is so far from that. I will look to your blog for encouragement and inspiration!
Hi Kate, so glad to have discovered your blog. I am a 65 years old German nutritionist, and have raised my 2 girls much like you . I am, however, pretty much upset about your attitude towards grains. Humans have lived on WHOLE grains for more than 10.00 years, how could this essential food be causing disease? I would be glad to share my upcoming ebook “raw food for babies” with you with lots of information and recipes. It is a proven natural alternative to formula if breastfeeding is not an option.
It’s that you go through my thoughts! You seem to learn much concerning this, such as you published a e book inside it or something. I believe that you recently is capable of doing with some s. do. to push the solution household slightly, but rather than which, this is great site. An outstanding read. Let me undoubtedly come back.
Hi Kate! So i came across your article “why I don’t and won’t take prenatal vitamins.” Loved it! So my plan has always been to forgo prenatal vitamins and do it naturally through food, because that’s what people have been doing for the majority of history: eating food. Unfortunately I have not finished my research on best foods, and menus, and everything yet… and my husband and I may be expecting our first soon (which we are excited about the potential of this!). Needless to say, I feel in a bit of a rush now to figure this all out, because I do want a healthy baby! I NEED HELP!!! i would love to chat with you some so I can get this figured out asap… do you have any meal plans or stuff like that available. I might not even yet be pregnant and already I feel like a failing mama. :/ I would love some help/advise. I know it will all turn out just right in the end, but at the moment I feel overwhelmed. Thanks so much, and thanks for your article and blog.
Hi Erin,
Yes, I have a bunch of meal plans, and a book called “Healthy Pregnancy Super Foods” which happens to be our featured book this month, only $5. These are great places to start. We also have http://www.modernalternativemama.com, that’s another good resource. Nobody is perfect and you won’t eat a perfect diet and that’s okay! Just by checking into it and trying to cook healthy you are doing the best you can. 🙂
Hi Katie
I found your post on Raw Milk and that there is a group….I’m in central Ohio and I would love to have more info and join. Please let me know any pertinent info. Thank you
Kelly
Hi Kate! I found your blog online while looking for alternatives for antibiotics for my daughters sinus infection. I am new to learning about natural healing remedies, even though we are a very health conscience family. I live in Gulf Shores, Al and my husband and I also are in the process of getting land to become self sustaining. Lol, we even want chickens and the whole nine yards.:)Thanks for all of your tips. I look forward to reading your posts!
Question, I grew up on a dairy farm in Central Ohio and we are starting to milk at home to feed the calves that we raise more efficiently. I have always been told you SHOULD NOT drink raw milk while pregnant. I also asked my OBGYN and he said steer clear of unpasteurized anything while pregnant, there are too many factors in milk production while pregnant. Have you heard any of this?
Thanks,
Brandi
Hi Brandi! Yes, mainstream medical professionals will tell you not to drink raw milk while pregnant. However, I (and others) strongly disagree with that statement. Know your farmer, and their sanitation practices. I drank raw milk throughout my pregnancy (as many others have as well) and was perfectly fine. Nourishing Traditions and Weston A. Price foundation both recommend raw milk during pregnancy (in large quantities).
Ladies, I was born in Europe, grew up watching my mom and grandma cooking from scratch, no fast or frozen food. I am alive thanks to grandma’s cow milk. No raw milk – is such a nonsense here in America! I applaud you going back to your roots and common sense!
I am too glad to find a local farmer that I buy raw milk from and lots of organic meat & produce.
Thanks for commenting, Iryna! I wish it were all common sense here too!
Hi! I stumbled across another post of yours and have now been sitting here for a while reading through your other posts. It feels like we have a lot in common, although our lives probably also look quite different (I only have two children for a start, and I live in New Zealand). But I am also passionate about holistic health and wellbeing as well as real food. Nice to ‘meet’ you & I will be following along 🙂
Thanks for visiting me, Meryl! It does sound like we have a lot in common!
Kate,
I couldn’t find a better place to contact you about this: I think you have a bug somewhere on your site. I’ve been subscribing through feedly, and often also click through on your pinterest posts. Each time I pull up your site from my phone, after a few seconds on your site, I get sent over to the Apple app store to look at some random app. Yours is the only one that it happens with, and it happens even hwen I haven’t touched my phone for a while, which is why I think something has happened on your end. I just wanted to give you the heads-up. I love your site. Thanks for all you do!
Are you the same Kate from Kitchen Stewardship?
Two different people. 🙂