This Haba non-toxic wood Triangle toy is great for teething.
Once upon a time, in a land far far away (La La Land), I believed that all my baby would need for entertainment was a good old-fashioned ball, some classic books, and a dolly. Riiight. Before 6 weeks old, she couldn’t care less about toys, but that changed quickly. Pretty soon I was carrying a diaper bag pocket full of little cloth and wood and plastic toys everywhere we went. And the toys at home kept piling up, too, even though I could have sworn I was a minimalist.
But, I only paid for a few of those toys, for two reasons.
1) Other people love to buy your baby toys, and
2) I found quite a few toys for free online. I’ll tell you how.
Number one you can’t do much about except to broadcast that you prefer toys to be machine washable or BPA-free, whatever your bottom line is (I feel bad about it but I have thrown out about a half-dozen toys that I truly didn’t want in my home and couldn’t in good conscience give to another baby either).
Number two is loads of fun, though. Here is how to get your baby cool, eco-friendly toys, TOTALLY FREE or as close as makes no difference (and makes the salespeople in your local boutique run and hide when they see you coming). 
A Plan Toys Oval Xylophone is just one great toy you can score for free online.
First of all, toy giveaways* are super fun to enter online, because often the prize is a gift certificate to an eco-friendly online toy store. You get to pick your prize, which means the perfect toy every time. When I was pregnant I entered a lot of these giveaways, and I won a hand-painted miniature toy set, a Plan Toys pounding bench, a nursery rhyme book, and several teething toys. I’m still trying to win a wooden play kitchen, but that’s a big prize and a popular giveaway, so the odds are low. Once I found a whole bunch of giveaways for gift certificates to the same eco-friendly online baby boutique at the same time. I entered all of them (you know you’ve done it too, you giveaway-crazy readers 
) and actually won two of them within two weeks of each other. I combined the gift certificates and used a free shipping holiday promotion at the same time, and got $75 worth of free stuff. I would never pay that much for toys new, so it was a real treat.
I’ve told you before about how I accumulated $185 worth of free baby stuff from an online baby boutique for writing product reviews on products of theirs I had tried when they offered $5 for each review written within a certain time limit. Included in my loot was a Plan Toys wooden xylophone, a miniature kaleidoscope, a play food wooden fruit set, and a play food set of pots and pans. Some of these toys were a little too advanced for my girl at the time, and the only other options were baby toys that were too young for her, so I just put them in a box in the closet and voila: my Christmas shopping is half done! I found out about this promo from a mommy blog I follow, so that’s just one more reason to subscribe to your favorite blogs and not miss a great post….
… Continue reading in Ecofrugal Baby: How To Save 70% Off Baby’s First Year, now available in paperback ($19.96) and as an e-book ($5.99). Purchase a copy for yourself and your favorite new parent today. Ecofrugal Baby makes an awesome shower gift or Christmas present for a pregnant friend!
