Consumer

We have quite a few toys belonging to the Thomas and Friends wooden railway. Somehow I missed the news of the recall of some of the Chinese-made toys until last night. Though I am usually a nerd who is on top of these sorts of things, I seem to have other tasks keeping me busy lately. I was reading a TIME magazine article last night, saw a picture of a James engine (yep, I know the names too) and I had to get out of bed to figure it out. Turns out we have a caboose and two traffic signs affected by the recall due to lead in the paint. I am glad that Luke has been past the stage of mouthing toys and Caroline hasn't yet gotten her hands on the trains. (Incidentally, I'm also glad our pets don't eat any of the foods which were recently recalled. We were lucky on that one). I'm not sure how a parent could avoid toys from China because they are so pervasive. It has me thinking, though.

The folks at Thomas and Friends are clever because they include this little "Yearbook" catalog with every new set! Luke has realized that it's a great tool for finding his next "need." Here is my little consumer developing a need for the Emily engine.
I try to talk about how we are thankful for all the engines we already have while explaining we can't have every engine we want. Hard to explain to a two-year-old, but good practice for me!