Toy of the Week: Finger Puppet Fun
June 7, 2008 by Jennifer
Planet Happy Kids has all kinds of great earth-friendly toys, accessories, and projects for your happy kid. This company is super in-depth which makes them a winner. On each product page they list “What We Love About This Company” so you get a nice snapshot of how come a specific item is worth buying. It may be organic, creative, or Fair Trade, but whatever it is, Planet Happy Kids fills you in. I love that.
I like the Fair Trade Alpaca Wool Finger Puppets. Super cute, simple, and fun, these little animals won’t cost you an arm and a leg. You can have a triple shot for under $30.
They have lots of adorable animals, so it was hard to choose favorites. I picked three I like, and you can go here to see the rest, and also to see these puppets up close. I choose Monkey, Snake, and Tiger.
Cute; and so many more adorable finger puppets are available. You can also check out the Planet Happy Kids blog.
Those finger puppets look exactly like the ones we sold at the fair trade shop I managed, only ours weren’t alpaca. What’s the purpose of using a fine fiber like alpaca to make finger puppets vs. regular wool? The price $8.95 is seriously high. I wonder what percentage of that the women who make the puppets actually get vs. how much $$ the US dealer gets. I ask questions like these because, as I was managing the shop I worked for, I witnessed an increase in prices that I didn’t agree with because I knew what the merchandise had cost to acquire and because the store was raising prices beyond what was reasonable for its loyal customers. To me, it seemed hardly fair to anyone.
Katherine,
Alpaca hair has many benefits over wool. The most important one may be that it’s naturally hypoallergenic! I’m allergic to wool as are many people.
I’ll see what I can find and maybe do a whole alpaca post : )
PS– I also meant to say that alpaca are only trimmed once a year, so one alpaca may only produce enough material for one sweater. That may be one of the reasons for the expense. Yet, alpaca hair is supposed to be more durable than wool and very, very soft.
I love alpaca. They have wonderful temperments. I didn’t know that their fiber is hypoallergenic, though. That’s good to know.
By the way, my boys love their finger puppets. They make great take-along distractions. We have a penguin, a tiger, an alpaca, a squirrel, and a firefighter. For Christmas one year my three-year-old son picked out fingerpuppets for my husband’s mom and sister to use as chapstick covers– classic three-year-old thinking! He got Susu a queen and Aunt Annie a bulldog.