Safe and Natural Toys
There's nothing like seeing your child's face light up as he makes new discoveries, and playing with toys is an essential part of this exploration process. Unfortunately, not all toys are safe - or ideal - for our little ones. Yes, it seems like there are new product recalls every day for children's products, but these recalls rarely acknowledge some of the every day dangers in toys.
For example, yesterday, I was looking to buy a small bead maze to include in my son's first Easter basket. I searched for Melissa & Doug toys on Amazon since I was under the impression that they were one of the safe, natural wooden toy companies that you can trust. As I perused the reviews, I saw many excellent reviews for the bead maze from parents and caregivers who were making conscious decisions to only buy natural and safe toys for their children. Then one review caught my eye. It said that arsenic was an ingredient in the red wire.
According to Wikipedia:"Elemental arsenic and arsenic compounds are classified as "toxic" and "dangerous for the environment" in the European Union under directive 67/548/EEC. The International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) recognizes arsenic and arsenic compounds as group 1 carcinogens, and the EU lists arsenic trioxide, arsenic pentoxide and arsenate salts as category 1 carcinogens."
I checked HealthyToys.org and found that when the toy was tested in July 2008, the red wire contained 51 parts arsenic. The page does provide the following notice:"Product details below reflect testing performed by HealthyStuff.org prior to January 1st, 2009. Data shown should not be considered accurate or representative for similar products manufactured or sold after January 1st, 2009."I hope that this means the toy no longer includes arsenic as an ingredient, but it still scared me enough to decide against buying the bead maze - or any Melissa & Doug product - until I learn otherwise.
I'm not sharing this story to bash Melissa & Doug by any means. I know they have many wonderful safe and natural toys, and I appreciate their efforts to be a safe and natural toy company. I wanted to share this with you to remind you that as parents and caregivers, we are the front line for our children's safety. We can't just rely on hoping we hear the latest product recall on the evening news to provide our children with the safest possible environments.
It's important to read reviews, check additional resources, and ask for recommendations from people and sources you trust before making purchases for children because unfortunately there is no better watchdog than ourselves at this point.
Luckily, I received some excellent recommendations for safe and natural toys from my readers and from members of Natural Parents Network, so I wanted to pass them along to you. Since Baby is only 9 months old, we haven't purchased too many toys yet, but based on what we do have, I can personally endorse Plan Toys for having great products. Baby loves his PlanToys Roller
Here are the recommendations I received:- Little Sapling Toys (Check out this Little Breastfeeding Symbol Teething Toy - I want one!)
- Etsy - An excellent resource for safe, homemade toys.
- Plan Toys & Magic Cabin both carry sustainable harvested wood toys with non-toxic paints or stains or sealants.
- Haba Toys
- The Aurora Forest - The Grimms line from Germany was specifically recommended to me.
- Palumba
- Nova Natural
- Ikea
If you have recommendations for safe and natural toys, please share in the Comments section below. Thanks!
