What I Use Now: Non-toxic Household Cleaners & Personal Products

Knowing my propensity to over-research consumer products, sometimes a friend or family member will call me to ask my advice about a particular non-toxic cleaner, lawn treatment, or mattress. But recently my neighbor decided to completely overhaul all her household cleaners and personal products and asked me to share with her what I use. And as I pulled up some old blog posts to share with her on these topics, I noticed that while much of the information and reasoning behind my choices was still up-to-date, many of the products were not. Some products have been discontinued. Some have been replaced with less toxic or more effective ones.

So I decided to make an exhaustive online list of our household cleaners and personal products to share with her and others that I intend to continually update. This list shares what I am actually using now in my own home and with my own family, 10+ years into the eco-friendly journey. The page also includes links to posts on the category (laundry, kitchen, teeth, hair, etc.) and where to find more information about your own cleaners or my cleaners

I would also like to note that there are a lot of great green cleaners out there now (or you could make your own non-toxic cleaners, although I never have), but for certain categories, it took a lot of trial-and-error to find something that worked for us: in particular, dishwasher detergent and hair products (our family has thick curly hair). I hope my painful experiences will spare you some.


You will find the continually updated list here:
What I Use Now: Eco-friendly Household Cleaners & Personal Products

Did I leave something off that you'd like to see? Let me know in the comments below. 

You May Also Like

• 6 Tips for a Non-toxic Summer
• 6 Strategies for Choosing Non-toxic Personal Care Products 
• Natural Deodorant that Works for My Husband
• How Green Is Your Hair? Non-toxic Hair Care for the Entire Family
• Green Cleaning - How to Identify a Green Cleaner
• All posts on Personal Products
• All posts on Cleaning

Would you like more ideas and tips about Going Green Gradually? Sign up for my free email subscription to get each of my posts delivered to your inbox (I usually post one or two times a week). You can also follow me on Facebook, Google Plus, Pinterest, Twitter, or with your favorite RSS Reader. I hope to see you again soon!

Disclosure: This post may contain affiliate links. Your purchase via these links helps support my blog. Thank you for your support. Read my full disclosure policy here.

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How Green Is Your Hair? Non-toxic Hair Care for the Entire Family

We are a family of very thick, very curly hair. I am particular about hair products (I never use whatever happens to be in the shower when I stay at hotels or with family), and it always takes me a while to find non-toxic products that I like and that work for me and my family. I go through a period of mourning when a product I love is discontinued.

I last wrote about my favorite non-toxic hair products in 2013. Most of those products have been discontinued (sadly), or in some cases I have found something better. So here is an update. This post addresses the hair products my entire family uses.

If you are interested in the nitty gritty of my approach to choosing personal care products and the reasoning behind it, check out this post.

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6 Tips for a Non-toxic Summer

We've been topping 80 degrees regularly for the past few weeks and while slogging through the final month of school my thoughts are all about swimming, sunshine, and SUMMER!

Here are 6 tips for enjoying a safe, healthy, non-toxic summer.

Cover up and use safe, effective sunscreen. 

My preferred method of sun protection is to cover up with long sleeves and hats. But for long days at the beach and other outdoor adventures, you will also need sunscreen. When selecting a sunscreen for my family, I look for sunscreens that use mineral/ physical sunscreens as active ingredients and that offer broad spectrum protection. I choose mineral sunscreens such as zinc oxide and titanium dioxide as active ingredients rather than chemical sunscreens because chemical sunscreens are known endocrine disruptors. I look for broad spectrum protection against both UVA and UVB rays since both types of rays have been linked to skin cancer. I avoid sunscreens with controversial nanoparticles (mineral sunscreens are often nano-sized) and harmful inactive ingredients such as Vitamin A/ retinyl palmitate (which may actually speed development of skin cancer), or fragrance. Some of my family's favorite sunscreen products include:

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Minimize the Risks of Swimming in Chlorinated Pools

Last summer one of my kids' favorite activities was swimming with friends at a local pool. So this summer I decided to fork over the money for a pool membership. Which means I am committing to taking my kids swimming frequently in order to get my money's worth. But the pool is chlorinated, as most are, and swimming in chlorinated pools has certain risks. Nonetheless, I believe for my family the pros of physical activity and fun with friends outweigh the risks. Still, I'd like to mitigate those risks as much as possible. First a bit about the risks.

The Dangers of Swimming in Chlorinated Pools

Feel free to skip over this section and go straight to the strategies for minimizing the risks below. We don't all need to know the depressing details! But for those interested, here goes. When contaminants such as sweat, hair, sunscreen, or urine mix with the chlorine in the pool, they form disinfectant by-products, or DBPs. One type of DBP, chloramines, is responsible for the strong chlorine smell we associate with pools. DBPs are known respiratory irritants. Many DBPs are toxic or suspected carcinogens.

Indoor chlorinated pools create an additional danger compared to outdoor pools because of the enclosed atmosphere. I have long disliked indoor pools because of the mugginess and extra strong chlorine smell (which is actually chloramines) of the indoor air. Volatile chemicals can be transferred from water to air and then inhaled by swimmers and spectators. Outdoor pools offer greater ventilation.

Numerous studies have connected swimming in chlorinated pools to health problems, particularly for the very young and the highly exposed (for example, elite swimmers and pool workers). Health problems associated with exposure to chlorinated pools include increased risk of respiratory problems, childhood asthma and allergies, DNA damage and bladder cancer (see this discussion of the effects of DBPs). Several studies have highlighted the risks of swimming in indoor chlorinated pools in particular. For example, studies have linked swimming in indoor pools to testicular damage, as well as asthma and recurrent bronchitis in children. But the research on DNA damage and cancer is in the early stages, and the research reviews on chlorinated pool exposure and childhood respiratory problems that I read stated that the connection is inconclusive (since some studies find no connection, or even associate swimming with a decrease in respiratory symptoms).

For me, the bottom line is that toxic chemicals are present in and around chlorinated pools, and while researchers are busy studying the health effects of those compounds, my family will enjoy the benefits of recreational swimming while doing our best to mitigate our exposure to harmful chemicals.

© Depositphotos.com/witch999

How to Limit Exposure to Harmful Substances in Chlorinated Pools

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9 Ways to Limit Your Family's Exposure to Toxic Chemicals: Top Tips for Parents and Parents-to-be

Recently I was asked what advice I had for parents or soon-to-be parents who want to limit their family's exposure to toxic chemicals.

In putting together this post, I've thought long and hard about my response. I've been in those shoes and when you first try to learn more about toxic chemicals in everyday products it can be extremely time-consuming and overwhelming. And at a time in your life where you are already probably quite overwhelmed and short of time! This post is my advice for busy overwhelmed parents who want doable, affordable steps that will significantly limit their family's exposure to toxic chemicals.

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Toxic Teflon: 10 Ways to Minimize Your Family's Exposure

To learn more about the story of toxic Teflon, read last week's post:
Toxic Teflon: How a Deadly Chemical Evaded Regulation and Ended Up inside 99.7% of Us

PFOA (Perfluorooctanoic Acid) or C8 is an essential ingredient in Teflon and for decades was used in a huge range of different products (nonstick cookware and bakeware, pizza boxes, coatings for eye glasses, waterproof clothing, and stain-proof coatings for carpets, to name a few). Because of exposure through consumer products and due to exposure as a result of the disposal of millions of pounds of chemical waste into the air, water, and landfills, 99.7% of Americans have PFOA in their blood. (source 1)

Studies have tied PFOA to an incredible range of health effects throughout the body, often even at very low exposure levels. These health effects include:

• ovarian cancer
• prostate cancer
• lymphoma
• reduced fertility
• arthritis
• hyperactivity
• altered immune responses in children
• hypotonia, or 'floppiness,' in infants" 
• ulcerative colitis
• high cholesterol
• pregnancy-induced hypertension
• thyroid disease
• testicular cancer
• kidney cancer

(sources 1, 2)

The story of toxic Teflon is a horrifying illustration of our broken regulatory system, and proof that consumers cannot rely on the reasonable assumption that if something were truly dangerous, companies wouldn’t be allowed to sell it.

In some ways, C8 [or PFOA] already is the tobacco of the chemical industry — a substance whose health effects were the subject of a decades-long corporate cover-up...And, like tobacco, C8 is a symbol of how difficult it is to hold companies responsible, even when mounting scientific evidence links their products to cancer and other diseases. (source 1)

While U.S. companies have participated in a "voluntary" (read "unenforceable") phase-out of PFOA, the not-so-different replacement chemicals industry is now using instead appear to be just as problematic. (source 3)

Does What I Do Matter?

In the face of this kind of information, it is easy to feel outraged but also helpless. However, I take the same stance with PFOA that I do with all other toxic chemicals I learn about. While I cannot eliminate my family's exposure, I can refuse to support these companies financially and minimize my family's exposure to PFOA (as well as the novel “fluorochemicals” that have replaced PFOAs in consumer products) whenever possible. Here are some ways to do that.

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Toxic Teflon: How a Deadly Chemical Evaded Regulation and Ended Up inside 99.7% of Us

There is a prevailing sentiment among well-meaning people who don’t want to be unduly influenced by alarmists and worrywarts: if something were truly dangerous, they wouldn’t be allowed to sell it. Unfortunately, this logical line of thinking has been disproven time and again as a result of our broken regulatory system. The story of Toxic Teflon, as recently laid out in The Intercept’s three-part series, is a horrifying illustration of this fact. 

DuPont Suspected Teflon Harmful for Decades

PFOA (Perfluorooctanoic Acid), also known as C8, is an essential ingredient in Teflon (first introduced in 1946). DuPont is by far the leader in PFOA use and emissions in the U.S. Due to recent court battles many internal documents from DuPont have been uncovered, including “write-ups of experiments on rats, dogs, and rabbits showing that C8 was associated with a wide range of health problems that sometimes killed the lab animals…[and] hundreds of internal communications revealing that DuPont employees for many years suspected that C8 was harmful and yet continued to use it, putting the company’s workers and the people who lived near its plants at risk” (source 1).

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Protect Your Family with Safe Sunscreen by Goddess Garden {Review}

This post is sponsored by Green Sisterhood. All opinions are my own.

Get outside!

As parents, it is hard not to worry about all the things in life that could go wrong. Unfortunately, there are risks even to simply enjoying the great outdoors! Where I live we have to contend with West Nile Virus from mosquitoes, Lyme Disease from ticks, rattlesnakes, mountain lions, accidental injuries, and, of course, skin cancer. Most people know that skin cancer is the most common form of cancer in the U.S., but what you may not know is that rates of skin cancer have tripled in the last 35 years. Sun safety -- covering up and using safe, effective sunscreen -- is especially critical for children, since serious childhood burns can double a person's chance of developing skin cancer.

So does this mean we should avoid spending time outside? Of course not! After all, the benefits of spending time outside (and the risks to spending too much time indoors) cannot be ignored either! The amazing benefits of time spent in nature include: reduced stress, better attention and cognition, better immune functioning, decreased anxiety and depression, and an extended lifespan! While time indoors exposes you to indoor air pollution as well as health problems associated with a more sedentary lifestyle. Recently scientists have even suggested that too much time indoors may be responsible for the rapidly rising rates of myopia (near-sightedness) in youth.

The solution is clear: spend lots of time outside (we aim for at least 30 minutes in nature everyday!) but be aware of and mitigate the risks. We come inside at dusk when the mosquitoes are out in full force. We check for ticks after hikes. We discuss with our kids how to recognize and react to rattlesnakes and mountain lions. Whenever practical, we cover up with long sleeves, long pants, and hats while outside. And during the sunny summer months in particular, we wear sunscreen. Lots and lots of effective & safe sunscreen. Because some sunscreens do not effectively protect against UV rays, and others contain toxic ingredients that may actually increase your chance of cancer and other health problems.

Choose a Safe & Effective Sunscreen

When selecting a sunscreen for my family, I look for the following:

• Mineral or physical sunscreens rather than toxic chemical sunscreen. Mineral sunscreens reflect sunlight and provide a physical barrier between you and the sun's rays while chemical sunscreens absorb the UV rays. Chemical sunscreens such as oxybenzone are also known endocrine disruptors.
• Broad spectrum protection against both UVA and UVB rays. UVA rays damage DNA and cause aging, while UVB rays cause burns. Both types of rays have been linked to skin cancer. 
• No nano-particles (generally considered to be particles smaller than 100nm). Many sunscreens that use mineral sunscreens utilize nano-particles to avoid the sunscreen leaving a ghostly white sheen on your skin. But there are health concerns associated with applying super tiny particles to your skin.
• Free of harmful ingredients such as Vitamin A/ retinyl palmitate (which may actually speed development of skin cancer), fragrance, hormone disrupting chemicals, liquid plastics, and alcohols. 

Garden Goddess Organics sunscreens offer all the above and more!
Goddess Garden sunscreens use only mineral sunscreens, provide broad spectrum UVA/ UVB coverage, use only safe non-toxic ingredients, and are free of nano particles. In addition, they are

• Certified organic, gluten-free, and non-GMO
• Biodegradable and reef-safe (so important if you spend time in the ocean!)
• Made with recyclable packing 

We have been using Garden Goddess Organics products for over a year. Last summer we used Garden Goddess sunscreens nearly daily for swim lessons, beach trips, hikes, and other frequent outdoor adventures. While wearing the sunscreen as advised (reapplying every 2 hours, or more often when in water), we never got burnt. It rubs in easily and does not leave any ghostly white residue. We love the convenience of the continuous non-aerosol spray and trigger spray for wiggly limbs ready to jump in the pool, run across the sand, or hit the playground. Garden Goddess makes the only safe and non-toxic sunscreen spray I am aware of, and it’s the only spray I have ever considered using. We use the tube lotions almost daily on our faces. The sport sunscreens offer 80 minutes of water resistance and are perfect for swimming and beach days, or active outdoor adventures that will involve lots of sweating!

So get outside and enjoy nature, worry-free! When you use Goddess Garden Organics sunscreen, you can protect your family against sun damage without any adverse effects on your family’s health or the environment.

Buy (with a discount!) Safe Sunscreen

You can try Goddess Garden Organics sunscreen yourself for free right now! Simply be one of the first 600 people to sign up for their newsletter. The first 100 people to sign up receive 1 oz tubes. I keep this size in my purse at all times, just in case I ever forget my regular tube. It is also a great size for travel! The next 500 sign ups receive free natural sunscreen sample packs (perfect for on-the-go!). Offers good while supplies last. Note: all free 1 oz tubes and sample sunscreen have been claimed.

You can purchase Garden Goddess sunscreen for 20% off now through July 31st with the code #SunSafeGoddess. Don't miss this chance to stock up for the summer!

Pin for later!

Would you like more ideas and tips about Going Green Gradually? Sign up for my free email subscription to get each of my posts delivered to your inbox (I usually post one or two times a week). You can also follow me on Facebook, Google Plus, Pinterest, Twitter, or with your favorite RSS Reader. I hope to see you again soon!

Disclosure: This post may contain affiliate links. Your purchase via these links helps support my blog. Thank you for your support. Read my full disclosure policy here.

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Eat Less Plastic: 33 Ways to Keep Plastic Chemicals Out of Your Family's Diet

Plastics, so convenient, so ubiquitous, so problematic. While it's probably impossible to eliminate plastics from your life entirely, you can and should try to keep them out of your food. Harmful plastic chemicals such as BPA and phthalates are in our bodies, and researchers believe they most commonly enter our bodies through ingestion via our mouths. But it's not enough to avoid BPA or other specific plastic chemicals. The absence of an effective toxic chemical policy framework means that toxic plastic chemicals (such as BPA) are often replaced with another untested chemical (BPS), which all too often is later found to be just as problematic (the so-called "toxic treadmill"). The issue is the undisclosed additives. As plastic-free living guru Beth Terry explained in an interview:

The issue is, it is impossible to know if any plastic is safe. In addition to the problems we know about, plastics can contain thousands of possible additives to affect the hardness, or softness, or slippery-ness, and manufacturers don’t disclose what their recipes are. The number on the container tells you what type of plastic it is, but it doesn’t tell you what else has been added to the plastic. If you don’t know what’s in it, you can’t tell what will leach out of it. The additives are not bound to the polymer, and when the plastic is subject to stress (light, heat) it can leach. (source)

As a 2011 study famously demonstrated, almost all commercially available plastics leach endocrine disruptors when subjected to common-use stresses, such as microwaving or the humid heat of the dishwasher. Recent studies have connected plastic chemicals to autistic behaviors, reduced sperm count, irregular heartbeats, and higher blood pressure. In fact, researchers recently concluded that "there is a greater than 99 percent chance that endocrine-disrupting chemicals [including BPA and phthalates, found in plastics] are contributing" to neurological effects (such as attention problems), obesity and diabetes, as well as infertility and other male reproductive disorders.

When trying to keep plastic out of your diet, keep in mind the following:

• Children are more susceptible to health problems caused by plastic chemicals due to the fact that they consume a greater amount of food relative to their body weight and because of their rapid pace of development. The safety of children's dishware and foods should be top priorities. Because fetuses are also particularly vulnerable, pregnant women too should take particular care to avoid eating plastic. 
• Fat, salt, acid, heat, UV light all promote the leaching of plastic chemicals into food. This is why if you leave your plastic water bottle in your car on a hot day, your water tastes "plasticky." It is also why canned foods that are acidic (pasta sauce), fatty (coconut milk) or salty (soup) contain higher levels of BPA. Naturally, plastic chemicals more readily migrate into liquid foods as well. This is why I pay special attention to how high fat, salty, acidic, and liquid food products are packaged. 
• Styrofoam, PVC/ vinyl, PFCs (such as Teflon), and hard clear plastics (originally made with BPA and now the no-better BPS) are especially to be avoided. While all plastics are suspect due to undisclosed ingredients, these plastics are widely accepted to be harmful to human health. 

With those general guidelines in mind, here are 33 specific tips to help you and your family ingest less plastic.

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How to Prevent Early Puberty in Girls

Early puberty. A phrase that strikes fear in the heart of this mother of two young girls. I don’t think any parent wants her daughter to deal with breasts at the age of 6, or menstruation in the 4th grade. So several weeks ago, when I happened upon an interview with pediatric endocrinologist Louise Greenspan and clinical psychologist Julie Deardorff on the topic of early puberty in girls, I listened with great interest.

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Ask Kroger to Keep Toxic Chemicals Out of Your Family's Food

Safer Chemicals Healthy Families and their partners have been working on a campaign called Mind the Store for nearly a year. I love the Mind the Store campaign, because while we certainly need and should continue to seek governmental action on toxic chemicals, the regulatory and legislative process can at times be painfully slow and disappointingly political. #MindtheStore is a fabulous way for consumers to directly demand quick action from businesses, who will in turn have a stake in pressuring the government to adopt meaningful reform. In response to the efforts of Safer Chemicals Healthy Families and pressure from everyday consumers like you, big retailers like Walmart and Target have developed their own comprehensive policies to screen out over 1,000 chemicals in products on their store shelves.

Yet Kroger, the largest grocery chain in the United States and one of the largest worldwide, with over 3,500 stores and sales of over $98 billion, still doesn’t have a policy to screen out and eliminate toxic chemicals in their products. Yet we especially need grocery stores to keep toxic chemicals out of the products they sell. Recent studies show that food packaging is a primary route of exposure to dangerous toxins such as phthalates. Another study published earlier this year found 175 different toxic chemicals in materials that come into contact with food.

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5 Ways to Avoid Toxic Styrofoam

Polystyrene Causes Cancer and Messes with Your Hormones!

Styrofoam and other polystyrene plastics have been enjoying a bit of notoriety this year. Earlier this year styrene (the building block of polystyrene) was finally listed as “reasonably anticipated to be a human carcinogen” by the National Research Council, a designation long fought by the styrene industry. More recently polystyrene, the primary building block of expanded polystyrene foam (a.k.a. styrofoam*) and other plastics, was found to seep estrogen when exposed to heat and UV light. That styrofoam takeout container isn't just carcinogenic. It's messing with your hormones too!

Bad for You, Bad for the Earth

In addition to causing detrimental human health effects, polystyrene products have numerous detrimental effects on the environment. The polystyrene manufacturing process creates large amounts of liquid, solid, and gaseous hazardous waste. Styrene plastic products are almost never recycleable and will persist for hundreds of years in landfills.

Foam litter is notoriously difficult to control. Polystyrene foam breaks apart easily and its lightness allows it to be readily dispersed by the wind, which is especially problematic and expensive for cities that need to limit trash in waterways. In California, styrofoam accounts for 15% of storm drain litter and is the second-most-common type of beach debris. It is also frequently mistaken for food by animals and seabirds. Due to these issues, dozens of cities have banned expanded polystyrene foam all together.

Eventually, I'd love to see this toxic plastic banned everywhere, but until then, here are some ways you can keep polystyrene's toxic chemicals out of your body and the environment.

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Is Your Home Shoeless? 3 Critical Reasons to Leave Shoes at the Door

As we enter the winter months and the holidays, keeping shoes out of your home can become a little more challenging. But the benefits are worth it! Removing your shoes (and encouraging your guests to do likewise) reduces the amount of toxic pollutants in your home, decreases the time and money you spend on cleaning, and promotes the development of healthier stronger feet.

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Wild Mint Shop Helps Parents Avoid Toxins in Toys

This post was sponsored by Green Sisterhood. All opinions are my own.


Every holiday there are headlines about the toxic chemicals that can be found in children's toys. While some progress has been made in recent years, there are still plenty of materials to avoid. This situation presents many dilemmas for parents and gift-givers.

Let's say:

You want to purchase an open-ended well-crafted toy for a child you love, but when you browse the toy sections online or at major retailers, you can't figure out if the manufacturer uses safe materials.

-OR-

Your mother-in-law is planning to buy a gift for her grandbaby, and you are worried she'll choose one you don't feel comfortable letting your baby play with and mouth.

-OR-

Your child received cash as a gift that she plans to spend on a toy, and you want to guide her towards a non-toxic, sustainably-made toy without being a micromanaging negative controlling-pants.

What is the answer for all of these dilemmas?

Wild Mint. 

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7 Simple Ways to Reduce Your Family's Exposure to Toxic Flame Retardants

© Depositphotos.com/alenkasm

Flame retardant chemicals are Persistent Organic Pollutants, meaning that they are toxic, persistent, bioaccumulative, and capable of long-range transport from their original source (flame retardants have been found in high concentrations in polar bears and the Inuit people). They have been linked to "cancer, neurological deficits, developmental problems and impaired fertility" (source). Fetuses and young children are particularly susceptible to their effects. They are also nearly impossible to avoid.

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How to Buy a Sofa without Toxic Flame Retardants

Although I would have been happy to keep our decade-old sofa set for a few more years, my two-year-old helped me decide it was time to purchase new sofas.

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Are Full-fat Dairy Products Good for You?

Reconsidering Full Fat Dairy

For years my family has been eating organic whole plain yogurt produced by a local creamery. I chose whole yogurt (over lowfat or nonfat) mostly because it was creamy delicious. In addition, I had read that whole dairy products were important for women during their child-bearing years, and that doctors recommend whole dairy products for children under the age of 2 because young children need lots of fat for their developing brains. Also there is the fact that, as a general rule, we aim to eat foods in their most natural and least processed state as often as possible.

But recently I began questioning the healthiness of whole fat dairy.

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Avoiding Toxins in the Backyard

School's out and that means that my kids are spending a lot more time in our backyard. I am a big fan of outdoor play for kids and adults. Unfortunately, there are several ways that we adults inadvertently make our backyards less of an ideal play location for our children by introducing toxic chemicals. Here are some ways you can make sure that your backyard stays safe and eco-friendly this summer.

Pesticide-free Bug Control

In my area, hot weather means bugs. They sneak in your home looking for moisture, shelter from the heat, and, of course, some morsels to eat. Just the other day the Pesticide Salesman stopped by my door to let me know that two of my neighbors were spraying for ants and spiders and did I want to sign up too (at a discount, of course!) so that they didn't all run into my house when he, "flushed them out" of the neighbors' yards and crawl spaces. Turns out I'm much more worried about the neurotoxins in pesticides than ants and spiders, so I turned him down. But I'm not a huge fan of bugs in my house. I've had ant, fruit fly, and cockroach invasions and lived to tell the tale, without the use of toxic pesticides! This is my tried-and-true ant bait/ trap (keep away from little hands and animals), and a non-toxic spray we use around the perimeter of our house to discourage cockroaches. House spiders are generally welcome at my home! Check out Beyond Pesticides for safe alternatives to toxic pest control.

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The Non-toxic Eco-friendly Sandbox

Does Play Sand Cause Cancer?

Last summer I purchased a used rigid plastic sand box with a cover on Craig's List. Once I had the sandbox, all I had to do was buy some sand. Unfortunately, this decision was not as simple as I had hoped.

If you live in California, you've possibly seen the Prop 65 cancer warning on bags of play sand. That's because the super cheap fifty pound bag of sand you can pick up at home improvement stores or garden centers isn't actually sand. According to Healthy Child Healthy World, "'Play sand' is a manufactured material made from ground quartz that can contain carcinogenic crystalline silica and a mineral called tremolite, which is related to asbestos."  You can read more about the classification of crystalline silica as a human lung carcinogen in this OSHA document.

Some emphasize that the risk is mainly an occupational hazard for sand blasters who experience intense and prolonged exposure to the crystalline silica dust. While children certainly aren't subject to the same degree of exposure as sand blasters, parents still may not be comfortable with their children inhaling respiratory irritants linked to cancer. The issue isn't the silica, which is present in all sand, but the size of the particles. Finer particles can be inhaled into the lungs, causing respiratory irritation and an increased risk of mutations and tumors. So if you see a dust cloud above the sand box, you have an issue.

Non-toxic Sand

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Non-toxic Baby Care: the Best Free, Online Resources

When I first became concerned about environmental toxins after my first child was born, there was plenty of information about eco-friendlier choices scattered around the Internet, but no concise simple guides to get me started. I ended up purchasing several books (which I now love), but as an eco-novice I found the amount of information in them overwhelming and difficult to absorb or implement. What I really needed was a short and sweet green guide for sleep-deprived new parents. But at the time, I wasn't able to find anything like that online. Not so anymore!

Here are a few excellent online guides for natural baby care that are free, concise, and doable.

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