More to do about Crayons

I am amazed and humbled by the response to my little post about crayons. There are lots of great comments following that post, so be sure to read them all. Here is a comment that started a new mystery for me to investigate:
Anonymous said... "This is only hearsay, but from someone I trust. Her grand-niece tested as having a high level of lead in her blood, and when the person sent to investigate saw her RoseArt crayons, she said, "There's the problem" and claimed that RoseArt crayons contain lead. I can't find anything on the Internet about RoseArt in particular although there are some warnings about lead in imported crayons. Has anyone else heard about this? "

Well, this sent me on a search to see what I could see. I found some interesting articles you can find here, here and also here. Even if you don't read all of those, be sure to read this one. It seems there is much more to do about asbestos in crayons than lead in the colorful, waxy sticks of childhood delight.

My advice? Just don't let the children chew, suck or inhale the dust of their crayons....just to be safe. (wink, wink)

What do you think?

Works For Me Wednesday : Dress-Up Clothes

With five little girls in our home, playing dress-up is a favorite activity. The dress-up clothes box is the first place little girls run to when they visit out home. It is always fun to watch them play and admire how fancy they look!

My tip this week is about how to store dress-up clothes. I found this wonderful Rubbermaid Hidged Storage Box about 4 years ago. It has been great! Plenty of room for the ever growing dress-up colection, without having to worry about whether things were put away "nicely" inside it. Personally, I don't care if the clothes are tossed in so long as they are IN and not all over the floor of the girls room.

A side note to this subject is how to choose and where to buy dress up clothes. (I knew you were going to ask! LOL!) Don't, I repeat, DON'T buy dress up clothes at a toy store like Toys R Us. Most of their "dress-up" clothes are terribly expensive, cheaply made and consist of mostly sequins and feathers. My girls prefer "real" clothes to dress up in. Where to shop? Goodwill and other thrift stores (garage sales work too!) have great items at a fraction of the cost of Toys R Us. I will look in the bargin bins first to see if there is anything suitable there. A few dirt spots don't bother my girls and I can usually get them clean anyway. I choose items several sizes larger than their normal size for my girls to wear. Women's clothing is just too big and I don't have the time right now to alter them to be shorter.

The funniest thing I have discovered is that the more hideously gaudy the dress (ribbons, bows, poof, lace, layers, etc.) the more the girls love it! I found this one dress at Goodwill that is a satiny material, with a hideous floral print, with layers of poof, and gobs of lace and ribbon. I really didn't want to buy it, it was just that gaudy! I did decide to buy it and it is one of their absolute favorites! It is a smaller size so they don't wear it past about 5 years old. Hopefully by then their "taste" in such things will start to improve!

Please don't think that gaudy means slutty. We don't do slutty. No spaghetti straps, strapless, skimpy, form fitting, etc. Just pretty or fancy dresses that are slightly too big that they can wear just for playing.

We also have a bear and rabbit costume in our dress-up box and a cowboy outfit for my 6 y.o. son (he needed something to dress up in when his sister are playing dress up). Sometimes you can find scrubs and army gear at thrift stores, which also make great additions to the dress up box.

And, that is what works for me this week!! Check out lots of other Works For Me Wednesday tips at Shannon's Rocks in my Dryer blog!