Lead Painted Toys: Whatcha Gonna Do?

My Mom knows about every recall that happens. I'm informed about them all whether I have the item or not. She's actually quite diligent, but the information has never proved very useful to me, until recently.

She called to ask me if Baby still had her really cool Baby Einstein Blocks, and then proceeded to inform me that the blue block had a picture of a turtle that was painted with lead paint.

Oopsie.

After I hung up, I hustled upstairs to try to find the offending blocks, thinking about the many times since the summer that I've had to search through a toy box or a closet for a plaything that may or may not be able to poison my child.

Yes, I'm annoyed.

I had to throw out my peanut butter, and stop eating take-out tacos because of salmonella. That was bad enough.

Now my children's toys are out to get them!

First, I had Nod's Diego toys recalled. Then Boose's Barbie playsets. Next I was checking Bal's, Thomas the Train and Geotrax toys. Now, Baby's blocks?

When I got to baby's room, I was careful not to make too much noise and ruin her nap. Searching through her toy box I found the red, green, and yellow blocks, but where was that darn blue turtle block. Then I spotted it. It was right there. In the crib with my sleeping child. In fact she was holding it in her sleep. My heart stopped.

Now I'm not stupid enough to think that her life was horrifyingly in danger right at that moment. My heart stopped because I realized the real impact of what is going on with all these recalls. Our children love their toys. They talk to them. They run with them. They cuddle them as the sleep. As parents we expect that the toys will not hurt them, yet it seems like cost cutting measures have put our kids at risk. Is anyone surprised that we're angry?

What would happen to me as a mother if I repackaged poison into a toy shaped form and gave it to my child to play with? And yet, the punitive aspect of what happens to these companies doesn't seem to be more than a, "Don't do it again."

What annoys me the most about this situation is how helpless I feel. What am I supposed to do, open up all the packages at the store and scrape samples to test with my expensive lead detection kit?

That's not realistic, but here are some things I can do.

• Call the customer service lines for the toy makers and complain, a lot. I can also boycott toy makers who repeatedly think that its more important for them to make money than for my child to get to live a healthy life.


• Write to my legislators and tell them to get to work making sure the products sold in our country are safe.


• Find alternate items to purchase for my kids. (movies, books, clothes, movie passes, zoo tickets, magazine subscriptions, etc)


• Tell my kids the truth (in terms they can understand) about the lack of accountability with manufacturers so they know why I can't in good faith purchase something that may or may not be dangerous.


• Tell grandparents to buy alternate items for the kids.

So that's what I've done and will continue to do. Short of whittling my own toys...that's the best I've got.

Anybody know how to whittle?

(Thanks to the people at Parent Bloggers for posting about this. More information on safe shopping ideas to keep your kids safe. can be found at Consumers Union)

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