For ten years this West Coast company has transformed recycled milk jugs into toys like this Farm Playset. Everything gets packaged in recyclable cardboard printed with soy ink. 2 years+, $50.
Employees in a welfare-to-work program sew and stuff these organic-cotton friends. For each bear you buy, one is donated to a child. Birth+, $25 Baby Sherpas and $45 Sherpa Bears.
A 12-person, family-owned operation in Grand Rapids handcrafts these Classic Lowercase Blocks. Request a custom set for $2 a block if you just want to spell out your child’s name. 2 years+, $38.
These were created in 1913, modeled after sticks and spools. A wooden “classic” version is made in China, but production of plastic sets began in the States five years ago. 3 years+, $50 for a 150-piece set.
A parent who appreciated a no-spill cup applied the idea to a container of bubble solution. Twenty-five years later, Little Kids is still helping us save our soap. 3 years+, $15.
Architect Frank Lloyd Wright’s son John invented these a hundred years ago, inspired by one of his dad’s designs and honoring the fact that Honest Abe was born in a cabin. Horseshoe Hill Station, 3 years+, $30.
In 1837 John Deere crafted the first steel plow, which helped Midwestern farmers plant the prairie. Now the company that bears his name licenses kids’ toys like this Plastic Pedal Tractor. 3 years+, $110.
