I allowed my grandson to play with lead CPSIA!

[#1]

Yes, that's correct. While in the attic, my husband found a huge box of his toys from boyhood! My 4 year old grandson had a ball with them! He loved asking me if this "old-timey" toy was around before or after I was born, etc. And the Evil Knieval (sp?) toys really made him smile.

Now my hubby was born in the great year of 1965 and I am sure there's lead in most of them.Ialso have a HUGE vintage children's book collection and my grandson is now showing interest in those as well. He played with those toys for 2 hours and did not want to go home but keep playing!

The point of my post is this: I love my grandchildren just as I do my own children and would lay my life down for anyone of them, literally and do NOTHING to hurt or harm them in anyway. I have worked in medicine for 20 years as well. The time my grandson, myself, and my husband spent with these toys will be an everlasting memory and now everytime he is coming over he calls to ask me if he can play with the "old timey" toys and I say "of course you can sweetheart. They are yours.

[Former_Member]

everyone's stories and memories are so beautiful to me! Thank you everyone and yes we are young grandparents..wait a minute, I don't feel all that young! and I'm 4 years younger than my hubby. We married VERY young and are still married, even after playing with all those lead toys! Now that's a miracle in and of itself!

Bobbinalong...how beautiful! My grandparents would tell me those wonderful stories as well. I only wished I had listened a little more closely as a child to those stories because now with my grandparents gone on, I would listen with 100% attentiveness to those stories as I appreciate days gone by way more now than I did then.

[Former_Member]

nikwolf...Amen, I COULD NOT HAVE SAID (SHOUTED) that any better myself!

[Former_Member]

Unfortunately, hard Drugs,alcohol, and cigarettes will HARM/KILL way more children in this generation than trace amounts of lead in old toys and books EVER WILL! And yes I'm SHOUTING!! BECAUSE I'M DAMNED MAD ABOUT THIS!

[bobbinalong]

It isn't even about the drugs, alcohol, and cigarettes being harmful. Our state of Ohio is in a dangerous position right now where more kids are going to bed HUNGRY. We have food banks in our town and they are always in need. Never had those before. Our town has always been prosperous. Our state has been hit hard by unemployment. DHL pulling out, for one. This was where Jay Leno came to visit and did a free show.

If it is a difference between having a shop on Etsy, selling kids' items, or selling on a street corner, or donating to a thrift shop or a charity -- and a kid going to bed hungry, I think I know where my heart will be. If it is a difference with a kid having a used toy to play with, wearing gently used clothing, and this stupid law, you again know where my heart is.

I think it is time again to find these reps in Congress and sharing my anger. (In a gentle way, of course.) Are they awake? Certainly they must have a heart. Time to find out!!

[Former_Member]

Love your story. I'm sure I played with lead as a child finding old toys in the attic too. I know my son uses lead every day. I give him permission. He's been doing it for nearly 2 years and his lead level is the same as before he started. We have it checked every year. He's on a shooting team. What do they shoot out of air rifles, you got it lead pellets! He practices at a superfund site too. The only person ever to be contaminated was a kid who licked the floor. Of course I want to protect children but I think that the lead is one of the least of our worries. I know my son is not involved with gangs, drugs, alcohol or sex because he's busy doing something he loves that will eventually pay his way through college.

[Former_Member]

i have TONS of books and barbie dolls and other things from mid 70s to 80s and BOTH of my kids play w/ them....
if they were good enough for me...they are good enough for my kids!

[Former_Member]

You are the Best Grandma out there, Go Green! GO Vintage!

[5erg]

Such a sweet post:)

[MaryElizabethArts]

America has some serious control issues.

[SOUTHandMAIN]

I dont buy my three grandchildren new plastic toys. I give them all vintage toys or toys made from wood. The best toy I purchased for them was from here on Etsy!

[Former_Member]

ChicKidsClothes says:
I don't know how any of us made it to adulthood without getting lead poison, or so you would think with the new laws.


I think the real problem is the junk they import from China.
__________________________________

I agree big time, but we {american's} need to stop buying it.. I have for three years now... I can't remember the last time I was in a mall or walmart.. and I am doing just fine with all that crap...

[HectanoogaPatterns]

Yeah,

I was born in 1945, back in the dinosaur days.... and we ran with scissors, we sat in cars without seatbelts, or car seats, heck, we sat in the back of trucks for long journeys on the highway (for what they were back then... (not multi-lanes, just a road with no houses on either side) We had lead paint everywhere on the walls, ceilings, cribs. We sprayed DDT to kill the flies in the house.

But now we live in a country where we have regulation upon regulation on food products, and anyone who tries to open a restaurant better be prepared for lots and lots of red tape on food handling...... and then we import most of our food products from countries where they have absolutely no food regulations. Whoops,.. something wrong with the system!

[SparxsDesigns]

Hectanooga says:
Yeah,

I was born in 1945, back in the dinosaur days.... and we ran with scissors, we sat in cars without seatbelts, or car seats, heck, we sat in the back of trucks for long journeys on the highway (for what they were back then... (not multi-lanes, just a road with no houses on either side) We had lead paint everywhere on the walls, ceilings, cribs. We sprayed DDT to kill the flies in the house.

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Yep, and we all turned out okay. I was born in 1964.

[Former_Member]

I'm only 17 and I still ride in the back of trucks. I never got badly hurt from it.
I played with toys my Grandma had, have been reading books printed around and before the 1920s and collect them now.

Exposure to those toys and books never made me sick. They helped build my curiosity in history and old things. Because I was allowed to play and read those things I didn't watch T.V. on Saturday mornings like all my friends, I begged and bartered with my mom to go see my Grandma so I could find new things and hear stories about how she grew up and what it was like in Norway.

I still play with those old toys, I still sit and listen to my Grandma's stories and was inspired to start crafts by those stories Grandma told me and will be working like hell to study in Norway to learn even more about my family. I believe if I hadn't ever been exposed to those stories I wouldn't be at all who I am today.

It's a shame so many kids growing up now won't be able to have that. Parents are being told from every direction that things are dangerous to your children. Things that were fine a year, or a month, or even a week ago.

I know one lady who works with my mom who is so scared by it all that every time her children go out to play the moment they're inside she wipes them down with baby wipes, makes them shower, and then covers them in Germ-X. She's so scared of them getting sick that she's made her children scared and now they don't want to play outside with friends. Instead they sit and watch T.V.

They don't even get ice cream from an ice cream man because they hear about children disappearing on the news and their mom is afraid the ice cream man will take her babies.

[2RavenChicks]

Trixiefaerie says:

They don't even get ice cream from an ice cream man because they hear about children disappearing on the news and their mom is afraid the ice cream man will take her babies.

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It's not the ice cream man she's afraid of trixiefaerie - it's the lead in the ice cream!

[Former_Member]

I love all of the great shops I have found through this thread!

[Former_Member]

What a great story!

Reminds me quite a bit about an email I received not too long ago. If I still had it I would post it here. The email made mention of things that most of us experienced growing up...like riding our bikes without helmets and 10 pounds of padding. How we sat close to the TVs, held boom boxes up to our ears, and so on.

The first thing I thought of when I read it was CPSIA.

[blithebutton]

In other countries kids/adults still ride without seat belts and car seats. Egypt is the best example I can think of, most Americans wouldn't even be able to drive there because it's like trying to drive through Manhattan X 10...yep, no car seats/seat belts. I had a bigger problem with it than my inlaws, because they're used to it.

I remember sitting in the back seat of my mom's 1985 Ford Escort when I was 4, no car seat. Sickens me to think that my kids will have to be in some kind of car seat/booster until they're what, 7? 12? Are you kidding me? I was in a rollover accident when I was 9--my mom's car flipped 5 times and we both survived with nothing more than a bump on the head for me and a concussion for my mother. Of course we owe our survival to seat belts. If that would've happened today I guess I would have had to be in a booster seat.

We did have bike helmet laws go into effect for our state when I was 9 where you had to have a helmet on your head if you were riding on the street under the age of 12. So I just didn't ride my bike on the street until I was 12, and you better believe I didn't have any cops breathing down my back asking to see my ID. haha. I used to ride EVERYWHERE.

What are the elementary schools going to do, they already had to cut their budgets and now they won't be able to use any leftover unused children's art supplies etc for the next school year. Of course no one thought of that. And schools are already suffering from No Child Left Behind.

I don't like the direction this country is going. I really don't.

[blithebutton]

Furthermore...kids on school buses don't wear seat belts or booster seats, and they ride at 4,5 years old. So why should they have to be in a freaking car seat in your own car until 7 or 12? Doesn't make any sense to me.

[Former_Member]

2RavenChicks
2RavenChicks says:
Trixiefaerie says:

They don't even get ice cream from an ice cream man because they hear about children disappearing on the news and their mom is afraid the ice cream man will take her babies.

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It's not the ice cream man she's afraid of trixiefaerie - it's the lead in the ice cream!

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I lol'd so hard at that.

These things are getting so ridiculous. Soon there's gonna be laws that your kids can't play outside without padding until 15.
Or you have to stick them in a bubble.

[Former_Member]

My 6 year old recently asked if we could repaint the floor-to- ceiling shelves in his room, and I told him no because there is lead in the original paint from when I was a little girl.

These shelves were originally pink, green, and orange (can you imagine? Think 70's). I played Barbies on them, ate on them, kept every treasured item on these shelves when they had the lead paint on top. And I'm alive and kicking.

At 12, I got industrious and sanded (now I know that's a bad thing to do with lead paint) and repainted them all by myself. I was so proud.

It's great to protect our kids, but it's sad to live in a totally padded world. Kids in a Bubble with a cell phone, computer, wii, and tv for their play time.

[Former_Member]

I live in an old house (1897) & my pediatrician asked me at my son's 18 mos. check up if he had been tested for lead poisoning?!?! I said, of course not,I thought that was for old baby beds(like I slept in!) peeling homes that have obvious peeling paint,etc....you know, the typical stories we've all heard. He said, if you live in a house older than 20 yrs., you must have your child tested! I havent done this. I'm sorry, but I know children can get into all kinds of things( I have 4 of them!) but I seriously doubt my child will find any lead paint underneath layers of nonlead paint to peel & proceed to eat to before I see him & stop him! This is crazy!!!! Let the parent/grandparents do their job... I think we're all capable of policing our own children w/out the govt. telling us what we have to do!!

[Former_Member]

Now what's wrong with old books?? Not only did I play with toxic toys, we also played with mercury! Boy was that fun. I'd never dream of letting a child do that now.

[Former_Member]

My mother had 4 kids
My foster mother had 4 of her own
My mother in law had 6 kids

We all played with toys that likely had lead paint
We all lived in houses with old paint. Our moms did not feed us that paint.

We all were put to sleep on our bellies.
Mom washed our cloth diapers in non-organic bleach.
We all rode in cars without seatbelts, on each other's laps (LOL, that was fun, unless you were the big kid with two bony butts on your lap).
Mom let us play with the mercury when the thermometer broke, but she told us not to eat it and not to touch it.
We played in the dirt
We scraped our knees when we fell off our bikes without helmets or seatbelts.

We are all relatively healthy, relatively sane, and yes, still alive.

I can understand some of the rules and suggestions, like laying baby on his back (my daughter would NOT sleep on her back, so I put her on her belly), and seatbelts and car seats.

But sheesh, some of these rules and regulations are getting ridiculous!!!