Affordable Non-toxic Bath Products?

I agree that the stuff is horrible. I too buy my products at a health food store. Or try amazon....I like everyone soap for every kid. Big 32 oz bottle for under $10..cheaper than most taxic products. Dr bonners is good too. All those at home parties have big markups.....just start looking around. Even Walgreens has the ology line which is good and not too expensive.

LOL @ "Moderation is key". (No offense to the person who wrote this, just making a point.) How do you "moderately" bathe your kids??? The information you heard is accurate. Take a look at the back of Johnson and Johnson baby shampoo for example. You will most likely see Quaternium 15. Q15 is formaldehyde which is also a known carcinogen. If your child has eczema, psoriasis or any other skin condition, you definitely don't want to bathe them in anything containing Q15 once you see what it does to the skin.

I agree with Chelle...and that is just 1 example.

Here's another...laundry detergent contains carcinogens as well and it takes an average of 10-11 rinses to remove all traces of it...do you know anyone that rinses their clothes that many times? That carcinogen is then on your skin everytime you wear clothes, use a wash cloth, a towel, cover with a blanket, etc. Carcingens don't have to be ingested to get in your system, they are also absorbed through your skin/your pores.

I don't use the store bought stuff either. I buy non-toxic personal care, cleaning, and laundry products. If you look at the prices, most say that is expensive but if they look at the fact that it is concentrated and is equal to multiple bottles of their standard products (so you use less at a time), it is often the same or cheaper but more importantly safer.

You can get stuff from the healthfood store that can be reasonable. Also, stores are selling non-toxic products as well that are reasonably priced. She is right that the conventional stuff is terrible, especially for kids but everything I buy for my son is under 10 dollars.

Our 'safer' favorites are California Baby and Love Me Baby Me. There's another line (which we haven't tried) that's supposed to be good, but a bit expensive, called Dolphin Organics. Environmental Working Group (EWG) has a very good website that helps when choosing safe products (cosmetics, bath products, sunscreens, etc.) and foods.

burts bees. $7-15 for shampoo/body wash.

I'd rather spend more than go with low cost chemicals.

Find a local health food store and check out what they carry. I see many different brands when I go and they are not that expensive. And yes most products they are sold in the average store contain all kinds of chemicals. I like California baby (100% natural) for my daughter or Method brand products, you can find both in Target.

I know a lot of families who use Biokleen dish detergent for their kids baths. We use it regularly for our dishwashing because it doesn't put anything nasty down the drain and in the tub for Kiddo. (Many bubble baths also lead to UTIs and we like that this product is very concentrated yet mild on skin and is scented with orange oil, not perfume.) We also use the Burt's Bees Baby Shampoo and Wash, or Weleda Calendula Baby Soap if we need a bar soap. My son is five, and these products all work for him.

(by the way, I'm aware that Burt's Bees was bought by a larger corporation, but it looks as though the product itself is still environmentally friendly and doesn't contain the sulfate/phthalates, etc that we are wanting to avoid.)

I love how folks these days are so quick to push the panic button. Growing up, you bathed with SOAP and water. Not body wash with eleventybillion moisturizers, not Bath gel that is all squishy and doesn't lather, but honest to goodness soap.

You can't have saponification without lye(NaOH, also called Sodium Hydroxide or caustic soda), period. If it's soap, it's got lye in it. You can make it out of wood ash, but most people have lost the art. Rebatching(a popular way to make soap these days) takes pure unscented cured soap chunks, and adds natural ingredients like Goat's Milk, Coconut and olive oils, and oatmeal, then colours and scents. It still has lye in it, but the main work has already been done.
Many "non-toxic" bath products have this, and it's cousin, Potassium hydroxide(which is supposed to be less caustic)used in many liquid soaps and washes.

Has anyone taken HS chemistry and seen what sodium and potassium in it's raw forms do in water? It's the way one blends it with other natural ingredients that make it INERT. Simple science. People for centuries have been washing "potty mouth" out with soap, and as far as I know, nobody has ever died from ingesting a bit of lather.

I have a few insect allergies. I have used for decades(on the advice of my grandparents and great grandparents), Fels-Naptha soap. Most folks say it is caustic(due to it being used in hand washing laundry). It has White Camphor and Citronella oils in it, making it ideal for washing clothes when camping, as well as your body, and has the benefit of keeping bugs like mosquitoes away. I also use Kirk's Coco hardwater Castile. I have sensitive skin, and can use it easily, and it has a lovely lather. I've washed my son with both at one time or another. I find that it cleans more effectively than body wash.
I do make a nice skin balm to remoisturise our skin after bathing, which has ZERO chemicals, and is CHEAP, and EASY to make(a recipe which I have posted many times here, and will give away whenever someone asks).

I find that washing with body wash cleans less effectively than soap, as the things that are supposed to eliminate the need for lotions negate the "soap" you scrub with.

For both kids and grownups, places like LUSH are both eco and vegan friendly. They break down in great detail where they get their ingredients, and how they are hand made in small batches. Now if a place like LUSH can make Vegan safe products and do use things that you consider "toxic", what does that say about your information on toxicity? They've never as far as I have researched, been told they have false advertising, and I can reproduce several of their products in my kitchen with what I have in my fridge and cabinets, so I'd be tempted to believe it's as advertised. I also buy some of their things because I like their business philosphy.

I have another question for you to think about and answer for yourself--Do you wear perfume or use hair styling products? If they are not handmade in small batches(which makes them sometimes different from batch to batch), what's in them? Do you still use it? Will you still use it? Are you willing to make it yourself so that you guaranteed KNOW what's in it?

I have a friend that read labels, and was under the heading of, "If I can't pronounce it, I'm not gonna eat it". Ordinarily, it's fine, but sometimes it's ridiculous. Case in point. She read a common ingredient in children's cereal, "pyridoxine hydrochloride". She found it in TONS of foods, and decided to not eat anything with it inside. I told her she'd be very unhealthy in a very short time. When she asked me why, I told her it's crude name was.....wait for it...

Vitamin B6.

Lots of healthy, good for you things have chemical names, due to scientists that have broken them down to their chemical scientific compounds. Truth in advertising means they put what's in it, and often use the scientific names. Vitamins have long, often hard-to-pronounce names(they often don't post that they are vitamins. They are not required to do that.)

Now I'm all for natural and eco-friendly, but sometimes we need to research and do smart shopping, and just plain think with the common sense our Mama's raised us with. Remember, these guys are the new Snake oil salesman--it's their JOB to make you so good and truly scared you want to buy some new-fangled products. The only TRULY NATURAL body care products are the ones YOU MAKE IN YOUR OWN KITCHEN.

Less is more, I always say.

Agree, or disagree, as always, it's...

Just my 2cp.

I used to love the ewg site, but I have learned to not trust it. I also wouldn't trust large corporations who claim to be natural but won't provide a complete ingredient list. That's one reason I won't touch Melaleuca with a ten foot pole. They are definitely not as safe as they claim.

My favorite personal products are:
California Baby
Aubrey Organics
anything handmade that uses pure, and truly safe ingredients- I buy only handmade, organic soaps and they really aren't that expensive
For make up- look on etsy.com I bought mineral make up from Overall Beauty and the products are fabulous and not all that expensive. Ava Anderson Cosmetics and Poofy's Organics are also amazing sources for bath and body products.

Cleaning products: Either make your own or check out BioKleen or Better Life. They are FABULOUS and safe!
I use Charlie's Soap for my laundry and it's the best I have found. I can't believe how clean and fresh our clothes are!

Do your research and definitely don't buy into "one stop shop" stores. It's cheaper and safer to shop around. Trust me, I've been down this road before. :)

Walgreens is selling a new brand called Ology

My favorite kids shampoo is the Peter Rabbit shampoo and body wash. They only sell it at Whole Foods, but you can get a large bottle for about $10. While Whole Foods is expensive for many things I find that for high quality products (or those made without lots of harmful chemicals) I get more for my money there than at other stores.

Burt's Bees Shampoo