Toys

Hannah at Cultivating Home put up a great link to another post on toys not made in China. Great information and links for even more information.

I especially liked the tips on making toys. Kids I have worked with have enjoyed this so much and some things are actually much better homemade, such as play dough. The commercial stuff is often to stiff for little fingers and comes in too small an amount for working with multiple kids or making bigger things. I also like that homemade play dough is cheap enough that no one feels guilty if colors get mixed or it gets contaminated in some way and has to be thrown away. After an illness, for example, I throw away play dough if they have been playing with it while sick.

Here's the recipe I use:

Cooked Play-dough

I let children in my care who are old enough to sit in a high chair steadily start playing with this dough but use your best judgment. Kept in a plastic container or zipper bag it keeps for quite a while while retaining its smooth, soft texture but I like to replace it every few months or even more often if a child still puts their hands in their mouth a lot. It has no preservatives other than the high salt content so if it ever smells off toss it. I've never had this happen but you never know.

Combine in a medium saucepan: 1 cup flour, 1/4 cup salt, 1 tsp. cream of tartar

Add and whisk until smooth: 1 cup water, 1 Tbsp oil, Food coloring add just a little bit at a time until you get the desired color. Any type of food coloring can be used. Do not use paints though to keep the end product non-toxic. I have never cared for a kid who didn't at least taste test!

Cook over medium to medium-low heat until it clumps together and pulls away from the sides of the pan. Some people add fragrance (essential oils) or extracts but I never do to cut down any possibility of irritation.

Take it off the heat and turn over onto a cutting board (preferably plastic), wax paper, or an easily cleanable counter top and let it cool just enough to handle. This doesn't take very long, only a minute or two. Start kneading the very warm dough, the more you knead it the smoother and more elastic it will be. When you feel it is cool enough for little hands to handle pass along chunks of it to the littles to knead too.

The first few times kids play with it I usually make sure they play with it on an easily cleanable surface, such as a cheap plastic table cloth, to make sure the coloring doesn't stain anything. It never has but I don't take chances ;)