They called you a bit of a hippie, almost certainly in an endearing way

A "silky mom" is one whose kids have all the sleek, modern gadgets, fancy clothes, etc. They hate dirt, and just want to watch their screens. They eat nothing but processed foods. They use fabric softener and dryer sheets. They are primarily concerned with keeping up appearances.

A "crunchy mom" is one whose kids have mostly wooden toys, hand-me-down clothes. You'll find them jumping in mud puddles and eating wild raspberries. They line-dry their clothes. They are primarily concerned with the happiness of everyone around them.

"Crunchy" is (usually) not a pejorative, and even if it were, a "crunchy mom" wouldn't concern themselves with such meaningless criticism.

https://www.youtube.com/@ReallyVeryCrunchy

https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=crunchy

In that context, it comes from "crunchy granola", aka the sort of hippie/hipster that tends to embrace that kind of trendy natural diet. Granola entered the hippie sorts back in the sixties and the terminology came around somewhere in the mid seventies to early eighties.

By the time I was in my teens, it was in use for those retro-hippie sorts that also tended to the more idealized parts of hippiedom. Those kids are now the uncles and aunts (and sometimes even grandparents or great aunts/uncles) referred to.

In that specific context, adding in the aunt/uncle part, it is a positive. However, it's also a tad condescending, if unintentionally so. That those aunts and uncles are something that needs an extra label to lump them into an outside group is often done because the person doing the lumping thinks they're better.

Truth? Some of the crunchy granola sorts are dipshits. They'll eat "natural" even if it isn't actually healthy. They'll rattle on about stuff that nobody else present cares about not because that's who they are, but because they're evangelizing. So some of the reputation for being hippie-dippie if you're also crunchy granola is deserved. Same with being a skeevy stoner hippy being often linked to the other labels.

It was a compliment. It means hippie, but more on the "let's take care of nature and each other" side of it.

Also I really need to start dragging my wife to asl classes, because I'm going deaf

it means they think you are a granola loving hippie.

it's outdated term, it's really from the 70s/80s where like, the first wave of organic grocery stores was all about selling bulk products like granola and other healthy food, which were all stereotyped as being owned and patronized by hippies. Ben and Jerries is a classic crunchy hippie brand, founded in 1978.

I remember growing up and when Farmer's Circus opened up a few towns over, we called it 'horse food for hippies'.

It refers to a preference for "natural" things. The kind of people who make their own peanut butter and grow their own veggies etc.

Like most things it's a personality trait that's cute and sweet when they're putting in the extra effort as a gift to another human–"I recently aged my own cheese and it came out really good; here's a sample to try!"

vs the nuisance of people those who use it as a measure of puritanical superiority–"you can't even keep a sourdough starter alive? It's not even hard! It's like you don't even care about the chemicals in store bread!"

Honestly I'm even over "people don't realize that having the time to keep a sourdough starter is a privilege because–" you don't even need to think that much about it. Literally anything can be harder or easier or a privilege due to the infinite complexity of the universe. Just stop assigning moral value to random behaviors by default. Eats the soul on both ends when you could be plotting the downfall of wealthy pedophiles.

Hipster, but outdoorsy

It means that wasn't a marshmallow in your hot chocolate, it was a beetle.

/only read the title

It actually comes from Cap'n Crunch cereal.