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Tuesday, August 21, 2007

Not Made in China

So I was at Target over the weekend looking for a hard baby toy that my daughter could chew on. My first born wasn't much of a chewer, even when she was teething, but the new baby's reason for being seems to be to get everything possible into her mouth. Like so many, I'm hesitant to buy something from China and learn next week that it isn't safe, so I read the packaging for all the baby chew toys they had. Every single one was made in China. Every single one.

Now I'm on a mission. For some reason, the fact that I couldn't find something not made in China has made it that much more important to me to do so. I'm happy to say that I have success finding some great toys made in America and Europe, and I want to share.

Now obviously - I make baby and kid toys, and I'm in America. My baby loves her blocks and her I-spy security blanket - she studies it and chomps away at it. I'm a big fan of simple, stimulating, home-made toys, but I can't make everything I want. So this is where the search comes in.

1. Etsy.com
This is always the first place I shop. I'm a part of the Etsykids street team, and if you just enter "Etsykids" into the search box you'll find a ton of great handmade kids stuff. So if you're looking for blocks, you can enter "blocks etyskids". This will help a lot because of the way the Etsy search function works, if you were to enter 'blocks' by itself, you end up with a lot of 'block prints' and other non-kid items. Using the Etsykids search will make sure you only get kid related results. There is one, non-etsykids shop I want to mention because of his cool toys: Stump Pond Woodworks

2. I found this cool list of Websites that sell mass-produced baby toys that are not made in China, if that's what you're looking for:
80% of toys are made in China, but not these!

I'm sure there are more resources out there - feel free to share any you've found in the comments section. Together we can avoid buying from China.

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

isn't it just digusting that almost everything we sell in America has been sent away to be made...I love finding the Made in USA tags and stickers on items...if I want something that is made in China, I'll go on vacation to China!


http://sweetspicestory.blogspot.com/

teresa said...

Thank you for the links, I will check them out and add them to my website, www.toysmadeinamerica.com. Please visit this site for an extensive list of American toy companies, brands and products, including lots of clickable links to some great American toy companies! Corporations may be outsourcing American jobs, but we can still make an effort to buy American!
Teresa

~ April ~ EnchantedDandelions said...

What a great post! I'm trying to make it a point to buy more quality toys for my children, expecially handmade!

Thanks for those links!

Cara said...

Good post! :) We've had good luck with giving our babe a wooden spoon. She loves it! :)

Alpaca Granny said...

Wow, I would hate to be a young mom today. We weren't aware of all the dangers like you are and probably gave our babies all kinds of horrible things - to say nothing of smoking around them. We just didn't know any better. I feel very fortunate my grown up kids are all healthy.

Blessed said...

hi there,

i have a site which i just created. I post all my hand made items there. I have limited contacts and relations in the united states.

i would be tremendously grateful if you could take some time to visit my site and link mine to yours

oneblessedsoul.blogspot.com

your time is greatly appreciated,
thank you,
godbless

(Angie) Norththreads: said...

These afre great picks, and Im an etsy seller & shopper fanatic!!!