Wood Toys – A Safe and Eco-friendly Option for Kids

Many parents are worried about the dangerous plastics and the high lead content of the toys their children play with. If you are concerned about the health of your child, why not choose wood toys instead? This simple material is much safer for children and it also doesn’t cause the environmental damage that plastic toys cause.

Wood Toys – Many Generations of Fun

Wooden toys have been used by children for many hundreds or even thousands of years. They date back to the Ancient Greeks and the Egyptians and wood has been used to make toys in many societies throughout history.

In recent times, technology has allowed us to great synthetic materials such as plastic. However, even though toy making has evolved, many toys are still produced in the traditional way from wood.

For example, there are toys like the BigJigs Rolling Sorter, a puzzle game designed for babies and toddlers that teaches about shapes and colours. You can even find a complete Checkout Register made from wood!

Advantages of Wooden Toys

What are some of the advantages to using wooden toys? Here are some of the benefits that come with using this material:

More Environmentally Friendly

Some people think that using wood for toys is wasteful and harmful for the environment, but the truth is that wood is a very environmentally friendly material. Wood comes from renewable sources such as tree farms, which are managed with sustainable forestry methods. The practices of these tree farms ensure that the area can be reforested without compromising the quality of the environment. Many wooden toys are now made from bamboo which is a sustainable source as it grows much faster than most other types of wood. Hape is a leading manufacturer of quality bamboo and wooden toys, stocked by who’s It For.

On the other hand, toys that are made from plastic are not biodegradable and they can leach chemicals into the environment when they are disposed of. They also take a lot of resources to refine and produce.

Reusable

Did you know that most of the plastic toys that kids use end up broken or discarded after a short period of time, often ending up in landfills? Wooden toys last a lot longer and they can be passed down from generation to generation.

Safer for Children

Another major advantage of wooden toys is that they are much safer for children to play with. It is a totally natural material that does not have any of the dangerous toxins that synthetic materials or plastics have. Toys that are made with PVC plastic have leaching properties, meaning that the toxins can leak out over time, but wood does not. This means that you don’t have to worry about your child’s toys leaching harmful chemicals through to their skin.

When you are buying older wooden toys, make sure that they have been made with lead-free paint. Some older toys are made with paint that contains lead, which can also be very dangerous for your child.

Buying Wooden Toys for Your Child

There are many different retailers out there who currently sell safe and environmentally friendly wooden toys for children. When you are shopping for wooden toys for your children, you will have plenty of choice. For example, there are wood toy makers such as Hape and many others.

Many of these companies are not sure if they will be able to compete, because of the high cost of getting their products tested for lead under the Consumer Protection Safety Improvement Act. The Homemade Toy Alliance encourages you to contact your local Congressional office and ask them to change the CPSIA so that it doesn’t apply to small toy makers – because they cannot afford the expensive tests that are required.

Consider Making Your Own Toys

Another idea to consider is to make your own wooden toys. This allows you to choose the wood that you would like to use to make your child’s toys and craft them in any way that you choose. There are websites out there, such as Wood Marvels that sell the blueprints for a number of different toys so that you can figure out how to make them on your own.

There are many advantages to giving your children wooden toys to play with rather than toys made from harmful and toxic plastic. If you are concerned about the future of the environment as well as the health of your children, why not keep this option in mind?