Having four children, if there's anything I know about, it's
toys. When my oldest daughter was born, I absolutely couldn't
wait for her to get bigger. Know why? Legos.
I so wanted to play Legos, but being, you know, a "grown-up", I figured
they were off-limits to me unless I had the handy excuse of playing
with them with my kid. So when she got big enough, she got not only the
Legos, but also Tinkertoys and Lincoln Logs. And I was so happy.
Turns out I'm not the only one who thinks low-tech toys are cool. The annual Oppenheim Toy Portfolio is chock-full of low-tech, open-ended, traditional toys like unit blocks, jumbo animals, and an easel. There's an entire catalog, Back to Basics Toys, devoted to all your childhood favorites. Other faves in our house have been a wooden train set, puzzles, board games, Breyer horses, stuffed animals, and wooden vehicles.
On
a budget? Another extremely popular and much-used toy in my house
has been a collection of colored silk cloths, which can be bought blank
for next-to-nothing and easily dyed at home for a fun, creative, and eventually useful project, or they can be found in a rainbow of colors here and here.
Really on a budget? Our editor Jay Allen wrote an awesome piece
awhile back at Blogging Baby, and his absolute #1 toy was (and I can
attest to the popularity of these) an empty cardboard box. You
can turn that (free! cheap!) box into a house, a vehicle, a
puppet theater, a castle, you name it! Or rather, your children
will. All you need is to wield the knife for them.
Don't want the children underfoot all day? Send them
outside with a couple of old stumps they can roll around and a 2x4 or
two, and a wagon. Be sure there are some rocks and sticks out there too. They'll know what to do with them.
