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JANE IN VIRGINIA ASKS:
My daughter is asking for face paint for her Hello Kitty Halloween costume this year: full white face with a yellow nose. I have tried to convince her a homemade cloth mask or knit kitty hat is the way to go. But she will not be deterred. Where do I find kid-safe, nontoxic face paint?
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MOM DETECTIVE ANSWERS:
Jane, my heart goes out to you! What a bittersweet moment when kids graduate from knit kitty hats to wanting the real stuff. I’ve been through it twice, and it still hurts.
You’re right to try to avoid face paint as it can be full of all sorts of nasty stuff: heavy metals including lead, arsenic, fragrance, and carcinogens like benzene, and even asbestos. The kind of novelty face paint specifically sold to children for Halloween sometimes claims to be “nontoxic” or hypoallergenic. Unfortunately, these are marketing claims that don’t require any sort of back up or legal oversight. Many of these products suggest testing on a small patch of skin before using. This is because they can irritate skin and cause rashes.
Thankfully, you and your kitty have plenty of safer options available.
“It’s just one night…”
The way I see it, you have multiple routes, including accepting that Halloween is just one night and whatever you use is probably fine for such a short period. This would be a reasonable enough assumption.
But I really hope you don’t go this route and here’s why:
- Any cosmetic product on lips will be ingested as she gobbles Halloween candy. Ingredients in makeup can and do enter the body through the skin, but eating heavy metals and more is a direct exposure.
- We vote with our dollars, and consumer demand increases product supply. If you buy the bad stuff for just one night, it signals to manufacturers that they should keep making it.
- It’s wasteful to buy makeup for one night and then toss it in the landfill.
DIY
If you don’t want to buy any makeup at all, there are many ways to make your own face paint, especially for a white cat look. It’s easy (even if you’re not crafty), and some of the ingredients, like cornstarch, are even safe to eat. A quick internet search will yield many recipes, plus TikTok and YouTube tutorials. You’ll need some combination of cornstarch, flour, lotion, and water. Give it a trial run before Halloween; last minute DIY face paint that doesn’t work can be a childhood disaster. For her nose, some say (safer!) yellow eyeshadow in vaseline or natural food dye in the DIY white paint work.
Not up to making a concoction? Some say cold cream straight from a jar does the trick. There are cold creams on the market that score low on safer cosmetics databases like the Environmental Working Group’s Skin Deep.
Safer face paint
I hope DIY works for you and your daughter, but I’m also sort of hoping it doesn’t. Don’t take this the wrong way. It’s because the process of finding and purchasing “good” white and yellow makeup with your child can be the start of a critical conversation about safer products in general. Maybe your daughter won’t be into makeup when she gets older. But now’s a great time to lay a foundation for better self-care. You can talk about unsafe ingredients in conventional soap, cream, shampoo, conditioner, toothpaste, lip balm, mascara—the list goes on—as you locate a yellow eyeliner for her nose. And you can talk about why it’s important to try to find products that don’t contain synthetic fragrance (these formulas are government protected trade secrets full of unknown and potentially harmful ingredients) as well as other additives that don’t harm the environment, aquatic life, or her growing body.
Basically, a request for Halloween face paint could wind up being the perfect opener for a valuable discussion about wellness, conscious consumerism, and healthy living. The issue of toxic chemicals in consumer products are not limited to face paint.
To find better white and yellow face paint, I would again rely on the sort of safer products databases that rank cold creams. There are also third-party certifications to look out for, like MADE SAFE, EcoCert, and Natrue. All these vary in what they deem safe, and some are more strict than others. Keep in mind that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) does not define or regulate the term “organic” as it applies to cosmetics, body care, or personal care products. It’s just for agricultural products, some of which make their way into cosmetics as ingredients.
Toxic costumes and candy
I know you asked about face paint, but I can’t help but mention other potentially harmful items to consider while celebrating Halloween, notably costumes and candy. When I was in second grade, I wanted to be a tomato for Halloween. My wonderful and not-at-all-creative mom put me in red tights and a red turtleneck and stuck a piece of green felt in my hair. I didn’t look like a tomato in the least, but I felt like one. To me, that’s the essence of Halloween. But the holiday has changed so much. Did you see that Saturday Night Live mocked the Halloween retailers that pop up for six weeks a year to sell plastic junk that eventually will “be in a dumpster” on their 50th anniversary season opener? They also called out “wigs that give you a rash” and “single-use fog machines.” We all know this garbage is bad for us!
So this is my plea to parents and caregivers: let’s go back to the tomato costumes pulled from our closets and stop purchasing poorly made, highly flammable plastic costumes that may contain toxic flame retardants and will inevitably wind up in the landfill. If your kid has their heart set on something like that, see what’s being given away in local Buy Nothing groups or join a costume swap.
Similarly, we all know the candy being handed out—individually wrapped in plastic for safety—isn’t healthy. Some of it may contain lead, a neurotoxin, and artificial food dyes that have been linked to behavioral problems, allergic reactions, and even cancer. My kids like to say I “ruined” Halloween for them by swapping the conventional candy they received trick-or-treating for Mom Detective-approved USDA organic chocolate, lollipops, and various gummy things. Poor things (I am rolling my eyes as I type), but I wasn’t willing to give them the “It’s just one night” treatment.
Jane, if you think you should be able to buy novelty face paint, trendy costumes, and candy without needing to think about neurotoxins and cancer-causing chemicals, I agree! Join Moms Clean Air Force to demand our elected officials enact the strictest possible regulations on consumer products so kids can trick-or-treat without fear of anything other than spooky good fun. And Happy Halloween.