A Few Of My Favorite Things: Baby Products That Are Safe, Fun, and Eco-Concious
As of yesterday, I am the mother of a happy, healthy one year old girl named Emerson. In my year of motherhood, I have figured out a few things including what products I absolutely love and want every other mommy to have. We haven’t had to buy much thanks to our generous community of hand-me-downers. When we do buy, we do as much research as possible on function, toxins, and quality (so that we can hand them down someday). The following products are items that meet some eco criteria. All have made life easier, look great in our small space, or are loved by Emerson.
1. Born Free glass bottles
My husband and I are completely freaked out by plastic-even BPA-free plastic, particularly when heating it. We used only Born Free glass bottles for those middle-of-the-night expressed milk daddy feedings (thank goodness we’re not up at night anymore). We heated them in the First Years bottle warmer or in a pan of hot water (we’re freaked out by microwaves too) and had no issues with cracking. As an avid breast feeder, Emerson loved the stern sucking required from the flow-controlled nipple too.
2. The Svan high chair
This product is expensive ($250), but well worth the price given its look, quality, functionality, and long life. The Svan’s flexible design works as baby’s highchair and continuously morphs to fit “baby” through toddlerhood, childhood, and teenage hood. We live in a small space so it is nice to have a compact, nice looking piece of furniture in our kitchen and it’s easy to clean to boot.
3. Sophie the Giraffe
The word is out that Sophie the Giraffe is one of the most loved squeaky, fun teething toys ever. This classic French toy, made in the Alps with non-toxic materials is a happy distraction from shoes, electrical cords, and everything else nasty that baby tends to chew on when teething.
4. Natursutton All-Natural Rubber Orthodontic Pacifier
Luckily Emerson found her thumb early, but every now and then she loved to suck or chew on a pacifier. Again, due to our fears of toxic plastics, phalates, and BPA-full products, we found these fantastic natural rubber pacifiers, and Emerson loved them!
5. The Orbitz toddler car seat and stroller combination
We were given a handed down infant car seat. Given that our baby is huge, and now one year old, we started researching toddler car seat options. The first place we went is healthycar.org to see what the lowest toxin car seats were (toxic off-gassing in a small car compartment is a big problem). The Orbitz was one of two seats with a green rating, meaning it is made with the lowest amount of toxins. Next, we looked at a variety of consumer product ratings around the web and the Orbitz was a five star product from a user perspective on every site. In addition to being comfortable, convertible (it can go backward or forward and lasts up to 50lbs), it is the only toddler car seat I’ve found that fits to a stroller. We’ve always worn Emerson in the Bjorn or Ergo, but the girl is getting heavy and having an easy car seat stroller combo started to make sense. This is another pricey product, but, because of its many qualities, we’re going for it (well, OK. Grammy’s getting it for Emerson’s first birthday).
As a conscious consumer, I am thrilled to find more and more products that combine great design, quality, and eco-characteristics. I’d love to hear from readers what their favorite products are too.
To each his own, but when it comes to baby bottles, I’m personally more concerned about the safety of glass than BPA-free plastic. Yes, plastic isn’t the best choice for the environment because it’s made from petroleum and is not biodegradable. But it also doesn’t shatter into a million pieces when the baby inevitably drops/throws it…
Crimson Wife, I am using the Born Free glass bottles as well and believe me my son has thrown them a couple times and they always landed with a loud bang but in one piece on our floor. They are not made of normal glass like the ones we drink from. It´s much thicker so I am sure it takes a lot to actually make them shatter into a million pieces. We´ve used only two bottles to feed my son. They still look like new. I can only recommend them!
Check out the Mary Meyer Fuzz that Wuzz stuffed toys. They are made of 100 percent recycled plastic bottles. The sweet, soft toys reduce waste. Landfill Facts: Two million plastic bottles are used in the United States every ten minutes and 51 billion go into landfills annually. It will take 700 years before plastic bottles in landfills start to decompose. Less than 30percent of the plastic bottles in the United States are actually recycled.
We have 3 little boys and the thought of glass shattering scared us also, leading to the BPA free plastic. Perhaps the glass would have withstood the beating - it’s just a difficult psychological bump to get past.
thanks for the comments. I should have said that we stopped using the glass bottles with Emerson as soon as she started wanting to hold them herself. Thankfully, that was also the time that she stopped needing bottles at night so we no longer needed to heat milk in plastic or glass. We now use a variety of metal sippy cups for water–Foogo and Safe Sippy Cup are two great brands. I highly recommend the glass bottles until then!
Another informative blog from Allison! I would just like to add something about handmade toys. While my kids were at the local Waldorf parent-tot classes and preschool, I was taught to knit and make dolls in the waldorf style. Not only are these developmentally appealing “unformed toys”, but they are all made with only natural materials like wool, cotton, alpaca, etc (many of which can also be found organic). Even if handwork is not your thing, there are places to find these types of toys, including the website Etsy, a local Waldorf school may have a store, or a creative relative may be nudged toward natural fibers and Freya Jaffke books with patterns for farm animals. Thanks, Allison, for sharing your experiences!
The Orbitz is for sure a great car seat. Love the design and the way it’s easily docked to a stroller and rocker.