Gearhead Mom

Uplifting Article on Flame Retardants (Just Kidding About the Uplifting Part)

Jenny just sent me this Salon article about just how nasty flame retardants are.

Yuck.

GHM Gift List: Eco-Friendly Modeling Dough

Check out this groovy tube of five containers of eco modeling dough from Eco Kids - handmade in the USA with 100% plant-based coloring. This safe modeling dough contains no chemicals, no artificial dyes and no heavy metals. It is safe enough to eat but not tasty so kids won’t try again!

Each 4 oz container is made from 100% post consumer recycled plastic and the tube is made from 100% post consumer waste. This dough doesn’t dry out like many name brands. If left out overnight, just add a few drops of olive oil and it comes right back! Bonus: you can compost it when you are done! Comes in green, yellow, orange, pink, and blue. You can add a bamboo rolling pin for just four more bucks. Suggested age: 18 months+

I like that the sellers, peek a green, even give us a list of ingredients: flour, salt, cream of tartar, vitamen E oil, organic rosemary oil, sodium benzoate, potassium sorbate, citric acid and fruit, plant and vegetable extracts from beets, spinach, paprika, carrots, purple sweet potato, red cabbage, blueberries and tomatoes.

Happy Eco-Shopping!

Oh SIGG. The Webs That You Weave

Roger saw these bottles at his sister’s house the other day and laughed aloud. Then he told her that she probably doesn’t want to be drinking out of that anymore. Bad dog, SIGG. Bad dog.

Reusable Drinking Straws

I saw these reusable, polished stainless steel drinking straws the other day and thought they looked pretty nifty. They’re dishwasher safe, too. Anyone ever tried them? At first I wondered if they’d hold up after a few million bends from a four year old’s paw, but then read that they are angled into a rigid position. So my next question was whether or not my four year old would break them by trying to bend them a few million times.

RSVP International makes a fabulous line of products, by the way. I love that metal composter. The site is marketed for wholesalers though, but I found them on Amazon as usual.

Happy Friday!

Even the Easter Bunny is Green

Since Sy is allergic to dust mites, I try to avoid getting her yet another stuffed rabbit for her Easter basket. This year I picked up the awesome Indoor Gardening Kit from Green Toys for both Sy and her seven year old cousin. We have the tea set and it’s one of Sy’s favorite toys. It’s one of my favorite toys because a) it doesn’t make any noise and b) it’s made out of recycled milk jugs.

I’ll review them both after Sy gets the gardening kit.

Wheat Grass for the Easter Bunny

If you celebrate Easter and want a cute place to rest some eggs, plant some Easter grass!

I took a page out of Design Mom’s book and planted two aluminum tubs full of it with Sy last weekend. Yesterday was the first day we saw little nubs of green shoots peeking through the dirt. You still have time! I got the wheat grass seeds at the local nursery last year and still had plenty for this year’s crop.

Design Mom’s directions here.  (Photo via Design Mom via flickr.)

4/6/9 update: I so didn’t follow directions well enough. I didn’t put a thick enough layer of seeds. Our tubs are so homely and sparse.

Once Again I’ll Tell You About My Favorite Sunscreen

I went to the dermatologist the other day because I felt sure I had sun damage all over my face from almost four decades of Not Enough Sunscreen. Turns out I was right. My doc whipped out her handy can of Freeze the Crap Out of Your Face and burned those pesky pre-cancerous cells right off. Now I look like I have giant blisters on my forehead and nose, because oh yeah, I DO. Not without discomfort, freezing your skin off.

My doc recommended I get some SPF 60 sunscreen that they had there. I looked at the ingredients and couldn’t pronounce any of it but saw lots of nasty lurkers like PEG blech and oxybenzone yuck. I told her I wanted to stick with the all natural stuff I use for my kids. She said as long as it had at least 5% zinc in it, it had her blessing. I was very happy to see that my all time favorite stuff, the illustrious TruKid line, has just that in the Sunny Days sunscreen stick.

Woohoo! My nose will be safe from skin cancer and the rest of my body will appreciate keeping all the yucky toxins out.

Side Note: I see that TruKid now offers a lot of their products in a fairly inexpensive travel size, which I think is an excellent way to see if you actually like a product.

Keep Your Hands Clean Viciously Clean

I can’t believe I keep forgetting to write about one of my favorite cleaning products of 2008. Now that it’s almost St. Patrick’s Day, I might as well talk about a green product. (I know, I’m just that funny, aren’t I?)

My friend DeAnna, of Simple Peace (beautiful, organic and reusable shopping bags), turned me on to Modern Mermaids cleaning products last fall. DeAnna was at a trade show and started talking to Amy and Audra, tried their products and became an instant convert. She told me about their greatness, I called them, they sent me samples, I used every last drop and now I’m here to tell you to go check them out.

Modern Mermaids home, hand and pet cleaning products are made from:
100% Non-Hazardous, Non-Fuming, Non-Caustic, Non-Corrosive, Non-Combustible, Non-Explosive, Non-Toxic under OSHA (Occupational Safety and Health Administration) Standards.
I hate it when my hand cleaner explodes, don’t you?

Sy has such major allergy/asthma issues that the idea of greener cleaners is very palatable to me. The less indoor pollution in my house and on our bodies, the better. I got my hands on the kid’s foaming hand cleaner and I was hooked.

New Thinkbaby Feeding Set

Ooh. I was just doing some reading over at The Soft Landing blog and saw that they are giving away an exclusive new Thinkbaby feeding set. Cool!

The Feeding Set Includes:
9oz/250ml Bento Box with air-tight, leak-proof lid
10oz/300ml Soup/Cereal Bowl with lid
10oz/300ml Low Profile Baby Bowl with lid
7oz/200ml Kids Cup with chunky handle
Contoured Spoon and Fork with easy grip handle

ZRecommends did a nice job reviewing the set, as usual.

Easel Paper

Sy is a serious easel paper user. She draws about two things per page and insists she have a clean slate to create her next masterpiece. I rolled up about about 50 feet of said masterpieces today and I was going to put it in the recycling (Am I a bad mom for not saving it all? Probably.), but then I thought - hey, we’ll just use it as wrapping paper for the holidays.
I’m hoping she’ll very proud to have her work on display as opposed to having a total hissy fit about me destroying her fine art.

Nothing like a three year old art tantrum to really set the mood for the holidays.

Leaf Mobile

Sy and I have been collecting leaves to make a leaf mobile this weekend. You can learn how to make this fun fall craft over at design*sponge.

Picture via design*sponge

Frustration Free Packaging

Ever succumb to wrap rage? Amazon is partnering with companies to create frustration free packaging

The Frustration-Free Package (on the left) is recyclable and comes without excess packaging materials such as hard plastic clamshell casings, plastic bindings, and wire ties. It’s designed to be opened without the use of a box cutter or knife and will protect your product just as well as traditional packaging (on the right). Products with Frustration-Free Packaging can frequently be shipped in their own boxes, without an additional shipping box.

Cool!

babysoy is babysoft

We are very lucky to be the recipients of at least four different sets of hand-me-downs in the Super Cute Boy Baby Clothing department.  Baby G has about 50 options each morning as Sy and I pick out his outfit. Lucky for Sy (she loves to do the selecting), G is a spitter-upper of epic proportions, so we change his clothes a LOT during the day. One of my favorite hand-me-down bibs is from babysoy, a company I’d never heard of before G’s arrival. It’s the softest damn piece of clothing I’ve ever felt. I try to keep it on him as long as possible (about two hours, given his spittyuppiness) because I love to feel it against my skin. I did some reading and found out that the entire line over at babysoy is made from soybean fiber. How cool is that? Eco-friendly, sustainable and soft as hell.

Dunno what soybean fiber is? Neither did I.  Soybean protein fiber is a sustainable and botanical textile fiber made from renewable and biodegradable natural resources - the leftover soybean pulp from tofu and soy milk production. Its 16 amino acids are healthy and nutritional for our skin. It is a green textile fiber that possesses the superiorities of many natural and synthesized fibers.

And like all totally bitchin companies out there, it was started by a MOM who wanted to do her daughter right in this world.

Flannel Wipes and a Thermos

Sy had such sensitive little skin when she was a newborn, wipes frequently made her rashes worse. After the Hazard Scale of Doom reminded me that wipes are not as non-toxic as I thought, I remembered what we used instead when Sy was a newborn: plain old baby wash clothes and a Thermos Vacuum-Insulated 2-qt. Beverage Pot with Pump Dispenser (the technical name) of warm water. The Thermos keeps the water warm all day long, so all you do is pump a little water on a cloth and clean that cute little bottom. Sy’s rashes appreciated the gentle touch. Once her skin toughened up, we went to wipes, but I think we probably did the Thermos method for at least three months.

This time around, we are using super soft flannel wipes instead of wash clothes. They come in packs of 15 wipes (which you go through so fast with a newborn), so I got two sets. I do laundry about every other day right now, so it’s no big deal to throw these in with the wash. The flannel wipes are soooo soft, just like a baby’s bottom. When I run out before laundry day, I just use one of the 3000 baby wash clothes we seem to have.

This method is clearly a little more labor intensive than wipes, but I think the benefit outweighs the (ever so slight) hassle.

Organic Mattresses

I’m still doing research on what sort of mattress to get Offspring, Version 2.0. I want an organic one, but do I want wool with no coating or do I want cotton with polyethylene (food grade plastic) on it in case I get another massive puker like I did last time? I emailed a query to Jennifer and Jeremiah over at ZRecs to see what their thoughts were. Jennifer said she’s still looking into it as well. It seems to be such a mixed bag.

If you know what sort of mattress you want, but don’t know where to buy, you can start at the Great Green List; they have a fairly large list of retailers and etailers. Debra’s List also has an exhaustive array of green conversation topics and links.