Monday, February 18, 2008

The Poison Plastic

I have in recent months been trying to rid our house of plastics. An absolutely impossible task to be sure, but a little at a time I am making headway. My biggest sucess has been getting most of our bulk cooking items into glass and what plastic we do have has a recycling number of 1, 2, 4, and 5. Basically not 3, 6 or 7. Those are the really icky ones.

Why am I doing this? Well, plastics can be bad, some of it really bad. It has been linked with genetic defects and cancer. I don't want my food sitting in plastic that may be contaminating our bodies. I don't want my kids sucking on toys that have mercury, dioxins, and phthalates etc. in them if I can avoid it.

Of course I do have kiddos, so getting rid of all plastics is NEVER going to happen. But I am also trying to avoid toys, such as those made in China, that might have painted/dyed with leaded paint. I am not going for perfection, just improvement!

I saw this cartoon online which is funny and talks a lot about how bad vinyl is for our bodies. I even showed it to the kiddos and we all went downstairs together to remove the shower curtain. Not sure how the mold thing will work out with that, but I will find something else I am sure!

http://www.besafenet.com/pvc/samsuds/index.htm

Plus the website that cartoon is on has a lot of other info on vinyl. Check it out.