The only things I never run short on at my house are to-do’s, from picking up the dry cleaning to dropping a kid off at soccer or dance. If, like me, your life is a crazy carousel of errands and appointments (and really, what mom’s life isn’t?), you’re going to love this Happeez whiteboard from Mayfair Lane.

Oh, I know, you’ve seen dry-erase boards before — so have I. But usually, behind every great board is a not-so-great backing: they generally either have magnets (which won’t work on stainless-steel fridges and non-metal surfaces) or they’ve got an adhesive that leaves gummy goo behind once the board is removed. I don’t know what kind of magic Flubber is used on the Happeez board, but it sticks just about anywhere, and comes off without a trace. I’ve been using mine to write down our family’s schedule each day for our babysitter...and who knows, if my kids slack off on their chores, I may make them a list and stick it right on their bathroom mirror, hee hee! ($18, available at mayfairlane.com and retailers nationwide and in Canada)

As a parent, most of us can’t help but feel a little sick when we hear about an accident involving children. And so it is with the tragic death of Mike Tyson’s 4-year-old daughter Exodus yesterday. No one is exactly sure what happened, but she somehow got her head stuck in a treadmill cord loop, which ended up strangling her. She passed away after several days on life support.

You can’t live your life in fear, but can you can educate yourself on potential dangers around your home. Today, read these three pieces on household safety, sweep your house for hazards – and then give your kids a big hug.

Malcolm Rands, also known as Eco Man, sets us straight on the chemicals in our cleaning products. Rands owns Ecostore, a company that uses completely non-toxic, plant-based ingredients. What you must know about keeping your house eco-friendly and safe:

Chemicals in Cleaning Products Can Be More Dangerous Than Pesticides and Fungicides in Foods I was living in an eco-village in New Zealand, (a community that uses sustainable agriculture and natural resources to enrich the ecosystem) and started selling Ecostore, bio-degradable cleaning products with plant based ingredients. In an eco-village, each member of the community is responsible for their own waste water, so I got started looking at the ingredients of our dish washing liquid, the laundry detergent, the shampoo, the body products, all the stuff that in the end go down the sink and into the water system, and I was outraged. The chemicals in those products are actually worse than the pesticides and fungicides we'd been fighting against in the eco-village. There have never been any restrictions for cleaning products, you never have to say what's in them. They say, "Well you're not drinking the stuff, what's the problem?" But when people start using natural products, they say, "I don't sneeze anymore. I had this rash for ages and it's finally gone away. My eczema seems to be clearing up." That was unexpected. We were just trying to save the planet, you know.

5 more ways your house makes you sick

So a friend told me this story: The other afternoon, she was giving her son, who is two and a half, some naked time on their back porch. They live in a townhouse development, so the porch is off a second-floor living room.

Out of nowhere, the front doorbell rings. When she goes to get it, it’s a couple of cops, who proceed to tell her that she’s not allowed to have her kid running around without any clothes on; it’s indecent exposure, and she needs to get some clothes on her kid.

Umm, okay.

A couple extenuating circumstances: She lives in a development with some pretty tenant strict rules, and I don’t know if these were rent-a-cops or real cops, who should be out catching murderers and stuff. All I know is, she’s the kind of gal that believes strongly that a little nudity is good for a kid’s soul, and boy was she peeved.

It did start me thinking: When is it really time to wrap up the naked-baby stuff, and keep our kids’ privates, you know, private? At outdoor events, I’ll still lay my two-year-old down on the grass and whip off a wet diaper -- where am I supposed to go, the port-o-potty? -- but it does feel a little self-conscious. And looking at it from the other side: In middle school, I had a friend whose parents, being European, had taken a naked portrait of her every year until she was about 9 and were still displaying them in the hallway. At 13, believe me, she was no longer amused.

Yeah, me neither. I actually hate laundry a lot: It always feels like a colossal waste of time, even when it really isn't (like when I look in the underwear drawer and see only the hot-pink polka-dotted busted-elastic pair that I should have thrown out but it's a good thing I didn't because then what would I wear under my ratty jeans while doing laundry?).

So, imagine my surprise when Purex announced a new product that actually made the prospect of doing laundry slightly less annoying. Instead of a big, heavy, messy bottle of detergent, all you have to do is stick one of these little sheets into the machine. It's got soap magically encased in the thin little sheet. (Okay, it isn't magic, but it's some amazing technological breakthrough I can't even begin to explain.) And then—get this!—you just move it right along with the clothes into the dryer, and it becomes a dryer sheet. 

I will admit: I never used to use fabric softener or anti-static sheets, but it's sort of fun to be the kind of person who can get it together to do that now. My clothes definitely got clean, but my husband had to resist the temptation to add traditional liquid detergent to make sure the wash got good and sudsy. If you're not dealing with a change-o-phobe, try these out (they're greener, too: Less plastic waste in the environment!).