ALLENTOWN, Pa. — Three-year-old Olivia Sullivan plucks an organic raspberry out of a container and pops the plump fruit in her mouth, while Sam Owens, not quite 2 and wearing footy pajamas covered with blue puppy dogs, winsomely pulls a thin yellow blanket over his blond curls.

Stacks of brochures on vegetarianism and print copies of Hip Mama, an irreverent e-zine for cutting-edge moms, sit on a table nearby.

In a circle of chairs surrounding a pile of toys, a group of mothers — and a few fathers — listens intently as Kim Schaffer of Clothesline Organics discusses fair trade in clothing manufacturing and the use of organic cotton, hemp and bamboo fibers in clothes.

Once a month, parents interested in what are called "holistic" parenting lifestyles — embracing back-to-natural things from organic foods to cloth diapering — meet in the room in the basement of the Bethlehem (Pa.) Area Public Library. Holistic parenting is a movement to parent naturally and raise children with a whole-person view addressing body, mind and spirit.

Suzan Walter, president of the American Holistic Health Association, says the concept of holism has been around for centuries but fell out of favor in Western societies during the first half of the 20th century, when advances in diagnosing disease and using medication as treatments created a dramatic shift in the concept of health.

Although the word holistic entered the dictionary in 1926, it didn't start to regain popularity as a lifestyle concept until the 1970s, says Walter. "People began talking about the mind-body connection and how everything is inter-related," she says.

The growing popularity of biofeedback and self-hypnosis spoke to a growing awareness of how the mind could affect the body physically, and Walter contends holistic concepts have slowly become mainstream.

Since forming just over a year ago in Pennsylvania's Lehigh Valley, Holistic Moms Network has attracted a devoted following, and meetings have drawn as many as 40 people curious about natural living, attachment parenting and alternative medicine.

They are part of a burgeoning national group with 90 chapters in 30 states and Canada.

Like most other local members, Palmer Township mom Melanie Bennett says she realized when her daughter Madelyn was 8 months old she was the only mother she knew who was still nursing.

Also an advocate of attachment parenting — a concept that includes baby wearing, in which the mother wears the baby in a sling, and co-sleeping, in which a baby sleeps in the parent's bed as well as extended breastfeeding — Bennett made her own baby food and wanted to hook up with other mothers with similar interests.

Bethlehem, Pa., resident and registered nurse Sarah Ongiri says after her daughter Olivia was born, she, too, was searching for other mothers interested in alternative parenting. She became involved with La Leche League, the national breastfeeding support group, but says she was interested in more than just breastfeeding.

"I wanted to explore other things," Ongiri says. "It's all about finding your tribe."

After hearing about the national Holistic Moms Network, Ongiri and Bennett decided to start a local chapter of the group. An initial open house in 2005 attracted 40 people.

"We had a great turnout," says Ongiri, who also has a 10-year-old son and is pregnant with her third child. "There were a ton of kids."

The two friends became co-leaders of the group and started holding meetings at the library.

The national holistic parenting group was founded in 2003 by northern New Jersey mom Nancy Massotto. It grew out of a small support group for parents interested in natural living and positive parenting.

"We all had been parenting differently from home birth to extended breastfeeding and were being roundly criticized and judged by family and friends," Massotto says. "I felt really alienated."

Massotto, who has a 5-year-old and a 7-month-old, both of whom were born at home, says she felt she also was being judged for the home births and for co-sleeping with her baby. She says she even got looks when she wore her newborn in a sling at the mall.

"It was so nice to be in a place where I feel normal," she says. "It was so empowering to have a place where I wouldn't be judged and criticized." She says the support group was a huge success, drawing up to 70 people. After a year, Massotto wanted to expand it into a national organization.

"I knew there had to be holistic parents everywhere who needed support," she says. "I've seen mothers break down and cry because they've finally discovered other co-sleeping, baby-wearing mothers."

The Holistic Moms Network was incorporated as a nonprofit group in October 2003, and now has 90 chapters in 30 states and Canada.

"It just exploded," Massotto says. "It speaks to a very real need and very important trend."

Holistic Moms Network, she says, is about information and choices.

"We're not here to advocate a certain set of choices," she says. "We just want people to be aware of alternatives. It's very personal choices and you have to choose what's right for you. People are doing various degrees of these things. There's no competition on how holistic you are."

But she believes the holistic movement is slowly becoming more mainstream.

"If Wal-Mart is carrying organics, you know people are doing things differently," she says.