Made in China - NOT!

I'm so sick of these toy recalls, aagh!  I'm done with buying crap.  We'd gotten into a bad habit of giving the kids a dollar or two and taking them to the dollar store, basically, to buy crap.  Crap that breaks.  Crap that contains who knows what kind of chemicals.  Crap, crap, crap.

My secret pastime for a while now has been reading craft / sewing blogs.  I'm inspired every day! (More on that later).  Some of these bloggers have posted great alternatives to buying crap.  

Soulemama just wrote a great post about this great wood shop that has fun wooden fruit,  doll like shapes you can paint, even wooden acorns!   And Amy Karol over at Angry Chicken (great name, eh?) posted a lot of alternatives to buying crap here.  I especially like the idea for this simple dollhouse.

Get the CD box for the dollhouse, some wooden dolls from Casey's wood, some paint, fabric, a few decorative items, and some lucky kid can decorate their own dollhouse and dolls!

I think that will be one (or two) Christmas gifts down.