Did you resolve to participate more?

Active Participation has always been a challenge to me. I'm a generally quiet person, I was a quiet kid, I was a quiet student. In college I had to force myself to participate - I still have my notebooks where I would mark the top of the page with a check mark each time I participated in class.

As a general rule, I tend to avoid talking politics. Admittedly I really don't have a good handle of what my state is even up to. I don't watch CSPAN, I don't pay attention to the propositions or local votes. But I've read about the "Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act" on many blogs that I respect and this one bothers me enough to post about it.

If you are a crafter of anything that children might use this needs your attention. This act is a good idea in theory, but in reality is going to impact millions of crafters, etsy people, thrift stores and so on. I started an etsy shop last fall and in order to comply with the rules I'm going to have to remove my rattles and washcloths (or market them as Art or for adults only). Ridiculous.

I'm going to refer you to the other blogs that word it better than I can, and I encourage you to write you senators / representatives. The sites have form letters already set up - you can email or print them out and send them (while I am trying to use less paper, I do think this is important enough to send a letter. It's worth the $0.41. really.) Please, please, please.

*Heads Up: CPSIA vs Crafters from the chum
*CPSIA from Dyeabolical Yarns blog **This is the one through which I linked to the letters I'm sending out. Easy as pie.
*Save Handmade! - also has a form letter to use.
*DragonMadKnitter - read the example about the Judy's Baby Binkies.

Remember how good we all felt back in November when we got out there to vote, and participate, and when we won? We were all part of something exciting? Let's do it again.