Kinetic sand

[Bomblesofbimbledon]

My 3 year old adores kinetic sand. We have a little sand table in the living room and he'll play with it for ages quite happily with all his little diggers and shells we've collected from the beach. He can play with it for nearly an hour- absolute godsend!

Someone said to me today that they'd never touch the stuff as it's so dangerous. I know it's non toxic but have read that it wouldn't be good for a child to eat as it's sticky and claggy. I imagine they'd have to eat quite an amount to cause problems. My son has never put it anywhere near his mouth. The implication was that they wouldn't allow a child of any age near it and that it's incredibly dangerous.

Is there something else that makes it dangerous that I'm missing?

It’s dangerous if ingested. Your son doesn’t eat it so absolutely fine. Were you talking about how much your son loves it? Did she want to shit on your parade, do you think? Never heard a parent say that about kinetic sand. Odd.

I didn't think there was an issue either as he's no interest in putting it near his mouth. I don't know her reasoning as I didn't continue the conversation. The message was clear that it was as dangerous as a bag of glass shards so I stopped talking about it. I had just been saying I was struggling to find the plain sand coloured kind rather than the blue/pink/green ones.

Wow, no I’ve never heard that. My two loved it as well (long ago, teens now).

Was she mixing it up with something else maybe? Did she literally compare it to glass shards or is that just your way of conveying how risky she made it sound? (I don’t mean that in a “challenging your narrative” way, just not sure I understood correctly)

Well obviously it's not meant to be eaten. But it's not dangerous otherwise. You're meant to wash your hands after touching it.

If she ever mentions it again, just ask for the proof. I’m all about safety for my kids but some parents hear something through the grapevine and share it like it’s a fact. I’ve just googled it, some Reddit thread discussions but no news stories about kids getting all cut up from kinetic sand. Probably because it’s never happened. Hope little man continues to enjoy his sand tray.

Kinetic sand is the best invention EVER!!! Hopefully she means if a child ingests it (which is the case for so many things)

Her reaction was like I was allowing him to play with something dreadful. Like it was uranium. Made me feel like even residue on his hands was bad but I know that it's non toxic. Just wondered if I was missing something as I've never heard anyone react that way about it.

That's how I feel about it too! It's been one of our best purchases, the sand table is one of his most played with toys

It's not good to swallow other toys either tbf. Your friend is being a drama llama!

There is no way it would me on sale in the uk as a kids toy if it was toxic. There are many regulations to meet by manufacturers.

And kinetic sand is sand and oil or silicone or something like that. It's fine.

So she owns a shop and sells children's toys. She said she'd never ever sell it, which was why I second-guessed myself. I just steered the conversation elsewhere and left it at that.

God! I bet her toy shop is fun 🙄

That malleable foam stuff looks way more dodgy than kinetic sand ever could!

She's nuts. By the way you can get the and coloured sand in the beach style sets. My son has a lovely one.

Thanks my mum found some in her local supermarket and is picking it up for us. The bags of sand on their own are only £10 in tesco apparently

Don't think I've seen this. I remember "magic sand" being advertised in the early 2000s which was like kinetic sand but only worked under water and was dry out of the water. Only found out recently how new kinetic sand is

This stuff @Bomblesofbimbledon