Happy Tuesday Night!

This past week was the best week in the history of our business, and I want to thank you all for that. It was just over a year ago that Alison and I started working part-time on Noss Galen Baby, and it was just this past September that we began working on it full-time. It has been a tremendous blessing for us both to be able to stay home with our twin girls, Ainsley and Sierra (now 22 months old), and as long as we have great customers like you we should be able to continue working at home with them until they're ready for college.

For this week's newsletter, I have written a short piece that could really change the way you shop for your child's food. I am not a biologist or a physician, but the word I have to pass along to you today doesn't require anything beyond an 8th-grade health course to figure out. So without further ado:

Restricted Area: No High Fructose Corn Syrup Allowed

I don't know about you, but we don't really watch our diets too closely. Our one rule is "no junkfood", but beyond that we eat and drink whatever we feel like at the time. I actually think this is a good way to go, too, because our scientists and doctors can never make up their minds about what we should eat anyway. Eggs are bad, then they're good. Carbs are great, then carbs make you fat. Meat will give you energy, then meat will give you cancer. Personally, I don't think they will ever figure it out. So we just try to follow the simple rule of "everything in moderation."

But not for "High Fructose Corn Syrup". Not anymore. What is "corn syrup" anyway? Basically, it is a sugar substitute that is used almost exclusively in the United States as a way to help subsidize our corn farmers and fight the trade deficit. And the standard variety of corn syrup does not seem to pose any threat to your health. But if you look at the ingredients list of your nearest candy bar or fake fruit drink (10% juice!), what you are likely to find is "High Fructose" corn syrup, which is a whole different animal.

You see, it turns out that the human body does not even recognize High Fructose Corn Syrup (or HFCS) as a food. We know this because the digestive system completely ignores it and passes it off to the liver. As you probably know, it is the liver's job to process waste products, not to digest food. So your body thinks HFCS is a waste product... so what? Actually, this has two serious effects.

First, you don't get full! That is a major reason why drink sizes at restaurants and gas stations keep getting bigger, and bigger, and bigger. Since most soft drinks use HFCS instead of sugar, people can keep drinking those mega calories without noticing they are drinking anything more than water (and in fact you can drink more Coke than water because it tastes so good). Because of this property of HFCS, Americans now eat far more food per capita than any other nation on earth, and our children are paying for it with early-onset obesity.

The second effect of HFCS, and the body's recognition of it as a waste product, is that it causes the liver to release unnaturally high levels of triglycerides (fat cells) into the blood stream. Having a high triglyceride level is directly correlated with an increased risk for heart disease. Because of this, HFCS is thought to be the most likely culprit in the ever-decreasing age of heart-disease patients.

So please, next time you are at the grocery store, check the label for "High Fructose Corn Syrup" before you put it in your cart. Your body doesn't recognize it as food, so neither should you. Plus, this gives you a great excuse for not buying lots of those "junkfood" items you don't really want in the house anyway.

So that's the word for today. I hope you all have a great week, and I hope we'll see you again soon at www.NossGalenBaby.com!

God bless!

Sincerely,
Paul

Paul & Alison Martin
Noss Galen Baby LLC
www.NossGalenBaby.com