Green VINYL placemats from CHINA!! and other daily dilemmas in Modern Parenting

My mom is moving and offerred me a bunch of vinyl placemats which I happily absorbed--good for art and messy meals=perfect. Plus they are a cool lime green. Anyway, let me explain why these hand-me-downs have become a metaphor for my entire mom-life. If you are already nodding your head and clucking your tongue, this needs no further explanation as you, too, parent young children and have become acutely aware of what VINYL plus CHINA (!!!) equals...LEAD.

Or the potential of lead. Or the potential that the lead therein is over the scientifically allowable quota that if somehow ingested by my children will poison them and they will die. Or something like that. It seems like an obvious decision. Toss them out (the placemats, not the children) or give them to charity so that less fortunate moms can potentially poison their children??? Morally dubious, and furthermore I want the placemats. They are highly practical and by keeping them I can rebel in some small way against this paranoia I am faced with a least a dozen times a day. I am angry. It is enough of a struggle to keep my children relatively clean, fed and safe but now my day consists of many many dilemmas such as:

SUNSCREEN?- Yes! Until last month when we found out that not only is most of it ineffective, but also toxic for children unless you get the $30 all-natural brand that is currently backordered and who-knows-when it will become availible. Plus, I hate to waste a precious drop of that $4 bottle I've been using for three years and this is the kind they use at preschool anyway. Yes, might as well use the safe stuff, but I don't have it anyway. I should really print out that list of non-toxic ones for next time I have time to browse around at the sunscreen. I have oodles of time for that. I pay my sitter $10 an hour.

INSECT REPELLANT? Yes! Or actually, see above.

SIPPY CUPS? Yes! Well I don't know. Had to throw out the baby bottles already after months of trying to ignore this whole APB or PBS (No, PBS GOOD, VERY VERY GOOD) or BMPs. I finally succumbed to the whole not heating up tupperware debate. So, what I ask you is the convenience of tupperware these days? My neighbor is phasing all of hers out. I know she would probably tell me to throw out my placemats. I know deep down in my heart that probably all plastic --many many of my kids toys included-- are full of these MPBMPSss or lead from CHINA.

Leaving my sleeping toddler in the car for 4 minutes while I frantically run in to pick up my 4-year-old from preschool? Of course not. Never not even once on a temperate day when I am sure he is properly ventilated, except for three times this week. If someone breaks in my car and steals him or hotwires the car with him in it will be ALL MY FAULT for LIFE. Doesn't matter that I was raised with "you guys stay in the car" as a regularly scheduled part of any errands. Remember the "way back"?? The best seats in your friend's station wagon were NO SEATS or the extra fancy version with a double seat facing backwards??? Well, your kids now have to be tethered into that car, cozy in their cushioned straight jackets. If for some reason you couldn't get them out in an emergency I'm sure there would be a whole new requisite cautionary lesson for us all-powerful Moms to adopt. You really can't car pool nowadays if you don't have a minivan (too many car seats) and you can't even throw your awesome niece in the front seat--oh I finally can because she's 12 and so insightfully pointed out that in 4 years she'll be able to DRIVE the car, so its about time she can ride shotgun.

JUICE? 100%? Of course right? No more than 6 oz bad for teeth too much sugar linked to obesity etc. AT LEAST water it down, so your kids won't drink it and you can throw it out. But that brings me to

TAP WATER? Flouride vital for growing teeth. Potential traces of maganese and pharmaceuticals not so good however. Bottled water? See plastics above.

MEAT? Protein is very important. But hormones? Will my boys sprout pubic hair at 7? Oh, that's only from milk and they drink rice milk that cost me $4 a half gallon because of our dairy intolerance issues.
All the things I feed my kids are on the high-risk of choking sheet: Peanut butter, grapes, carrots, popcorn, hotdogs (can you believe I feed my kids HOTDOGS??????)

There are just a few tiny exmples of my daily schizoid inner-dialogue. I know, I know. This is my job. I chose to have kids in this scary scary world. We know so much more and have so many more tools now-a-days. Parents are inundated with these warnings and the take away for me is that good parenting equals 100% vigilance. If you take one little calculated risk- like going to the bathroom--tragedy very well may befall you and you should have known never ever never to tempt fate by using a VINYL placemat from CHINA.

Postscript: Last week, while tiptoing back from triple-checking to see that she indeed had the emergency brake on while leaving her sleeping 19-month-old in the car, the author was busted by a kind-if-somewhat-shocked-and-disappointed preschool teacher. Turns out that state licensing forbids leaving infants alone on their property. All concerned readers may now exhale and rest assured that the author will take advantage of teacher escorting preschooler to car if toddler is sleeping. Now if only there were grocery store escorts...