Gifts for Earth Day: Green Toys

Environmentally friendly toys make being green easy for your grandchildren

by Phoebe Assenza

Natural Mat Crib Sheets

Green grandbabies already secured with sustainable wood cribs and PVC-free mattresses will need organic cotton bed linens to boot. Organic baby bedding maven Natural Mat offers supple options such as organic cotton percale fitted sheets and flannelettes.

Price: $45 and $46 for sheet and flannelettes, respectively.
For ages: Infants
Available at: BareBabies.com

100% Organic Cotton Veggie Toys With Crate

It may feel counterintuitive to teach a grandbaby about the wonderful world of vegetables with wasteful, plastic replicas. This chemical-free, organic cotton set is a smiley-faced and safe solution to getting your youngest acquainted with what she’ll find on future trips to the greenmarket.

Price: $24
For ages: Babies and toddlers
Available at: Amazon.com/baby

Pirate Ship Play Set

Leave it to a toy manufacturer that’s been green for more than 20 years (long before being green was trendy) to create a toy that’s not only ecologically responsible but loads of fun, too. This pirate ship from Plan Toys, made of sustainable wood and soy-based paint, has a crow’s nest, captain, and a crew of little sailors. The gangway opens up to a storage space where your grandtoddler can stash any booty he finds during his swashbuckling adventures.

Price: $40
For ages: 3 and older
Available at: Amazon.com

Sea Camp

Nothing boosts the right amount of eco-consciousness in a grade-schooler than sending him away for a week of total immersion. Environmental summer camps can teach grandkids about the big, natural world around them, as well as the basics of global preservation. The University of North Carolina-Wilmington holds five-day sea camps throughout June and July, and one week in August. Campers will trek through local beaches, bogs, and marine forests, familiarizing themselves with the region’s flora and fauna. You can browse similar programs around the North America here.

Price: $240
For ages: 7 and 8
Available at: UNCW.edu

Xeko Indonesia

Learning important, earth-preserving lessons is no longer limited to dry lectures in your tween grandchild’s science class. The Xeko game series incorporates logic and card collecting into a challenging game of saving the planet. Each game focuses on a different endangered region, and players link up related cards — for example, the Orange Pill Millipede card connects to the Madagascar card. The player that builds up the strongest “xeko-system” wins. Mission: Indonesia is the newest of the lot, with cards printed in soy ink and housed in an appropriately natural wooden box.

Price: $23
For ages: 8 and older
Available at: Amazon.com

Adopt an Acre Through the Nature Conservancy

Your worldly teen grandchild can personally save an acre of endangered rain forest without the hassle of chaining herself to a tree trunk or even booking a flight. The Nature Conservancy’s Adopt an Acre program will send your grandchild a personalized certificate commemorating her contribution to preserving the rain forests of the Osa Peninsula in South America (a photograph of which is also included). Donations start at $50, which will also get your grandchild a year’s subscription to Nature Conservancy magazine. It may inspire your next vacation together; perhaps an ecotourism jaunt to South America?

Price: $50 and up
For ages: As soon as they’re old enough to appreciate it
Available at: Nature.org