Basic Rules of Avoidance, and Good News.

Good news first:
As my husband puts it, my eggo is preggo!

Growing a baby is making me even more serious about avoiding certain things in food, and certain appliances.  So here is what I consider to be a beginner's guide to eating healthier.

Avoid processed foods as much as possible.  When shopping always read the labels on anything packaged you are about to buy.  I will put it back if it has:

• Soy.  In moderation this is OK, but this "good source of protein" messes with your hormone levels (as a woman)
• High fructose corn syrup (HFCS) or corn syrup.
• Modified anything.
• Hydrogenated oils.  These are trans-fats and thus bad for you.  Partially hydrogenated is worse than fully hydrogenated.  They do this to extend shelf life.
• Artificial coloring of any kind.  Particularly caramel color, or anything with a number (yellow 5, etc.)
• An ingredient list more than five items long for no good reason (generally there is not a good reason for this)
• An ingredient I cannot pronounce.  Usually I put the product on hold and research the offending ingredient because there are some things that aren't bad for you, but are still big long science-y words.

I don't think I missed anything there.
I'm still starting out, but I can tell you that cutting all of this stuff from my diet has really made a difference.  Even before I was buying mostly organic produce I felt better.  I don't miss it, either.  Occasionally I'll get a craving for Pepsi, but that's pretty easy to fix with one of the glass-bottled ones (I call them Mexican Pepsi; they come from Mexico, as do the glass bottled Cokes).  The sodas in glass generally don't have HFCS in them.  They do, however have caramel color, so I only rarely indulge myself.

Another thing I try to do is avoid plastic packaging.  Who knows how hot the warehouse was (depending on what you're buying) or the stockroom at the grocery is.  Acidic things are something I will not make exceptions for if I'm buying them for cooking/eating.
For example: I buy white vinegar.  I use it to cook and to clean, but I buy the big plastic jug to clean with and the glass bottle to cook with.


Household cleaners:
I went biodegradable with my dish soap and my laundry detergent so far.  The products are more expensive, but with the dish soap I use much less of it because it is more effective than the cheap-o store brand stuff I used to buy.  I can't say about the laundry detergent, as I purchased it prematurely (it was on sale) and still have some regular detergent left.
The next thing I'll be looking for is biodegradable dish detergent for the dishwasher.  We use a lot of dishes, so the washer gets run quite a bit.  I run it once a day on average, sometimes less.  I like my machine because it has air dry and low energy options, so it's generally efficient.  Particularly because I'm a bit lazy when it comes to dishes.  And we don't have a drying rack right now.

I use vinegar water to mop with, and to clean off walls/counters.  Depending on what I'm cleaning I'll do a mix of half vinegar to half water, or a quarter vinegar to three-quarters water.  The latter formula I use mainly on counters and appliances while I use the former on floors and almost everything in the bathroom.  If I'm feeling extra cheap I'll use the quarter to three-quarters on the floor as well.

I do have 409, Windex, Comet, and generic Drain-O in my cabinets in various places around the house.  These I use rarely and they're mostly surplus from before I started switching.  I have Bona for my wood floors because the mop I bought happened to come with a bottle of cleaner (bonus!) but I will be switching to really diluted vinegar when that runs out.
The only thing (and I don't know where it came from, it just magically appeared under my kitchen sink one day - and I'm not joking about that, I have a thing against this stuff) I am actively pouring out is an aerosol can of disinfectant.  This is taking a while because it's full and I can't throw away a full can per trash collection rules.  So I spray as much as I can without backlash into the dumpster when I think about it.

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I talked earlier about avoiding microwaves.  I guess I should also be avoiding my laptop and other electronic devices.  I have been avoiding the laptop (sans today) for the reason of eye strain, but now I have extra reason to not bring it with me to work.  At work the laptop goes on my lap, so that's probably not good.

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There you have it; a small guide to how I got started.
And I do recommend taking this slowly as the price differences can be daunting.  Not to mention how overwhelming it is to overhaul your entire diet and some of your lifestyle.