To ask for Birthday present suggestions for a 3yr old?

[Loopydoop]

I need to buy something great for my BFFs son, he will be 3. She would rather I not buy anything too big due to lack of space.
What's the best thing someone has bought for your dc? What's your 3yr olds favourite thing to play with?
Thank you in advance for any help.

Dressing up hats?
A nice book?
Disney life gift subscription?
Chocolate?
Take him out for the afternoon?
A nice jumper?

(All things I have bought/requested for DCs 3rd Birthday next week!)

magnatiles if you have £100!

Budget?

Lego starter set, easel with storage for craft supplies, take him out for the day/weekend so give her a break!

My second son’s just had his third birthday and he’s been very pleased with:

• a Skye helicopter (Paw Patrol)
• Mr Men brainbox game
• VTech kids camera
• Hey Duggee t-shirt

He’s very commercialised, obvs 😂

He already had stuff like a scooter and loads of outdoor stuff inherited from his older brother, but I buy a lot of that kind of stuff for other kids birthdays - plastic cones for games, bean bags, watering cans, little gardening set, kids gardening gloves etc.

If you’re looking for something a bit less standard then the US band called They Might be Giants have a fantastic series of kids CDs - Here Come the 123s/ the ABCs/Science. God I love those CDs.

Also jigsaws are v popular in our house - Djeco do nice ones and I find the 30-40 piece ones are good for this age.

If you fancy books then the You Choose series by Nick Sharratt is a good call at this age.

I made DD an ‘adventure bag’ for her 3rd birthday. Camouflage child’s rucksack containing magnifying glass, binoculars, bug box, torch, compass, measuring tape, whistle, ‘i spy nature’ spotter book, mini colouring pencils and notebook. Got most stuff off Amazon. Cost about £30 in total. She loves it and encourages her to go out for walks.

I bought my niece an iPad mini for her 3rd bday. It was only 80 quid. Not sure if thats in your range though.

Love that, Singing! Mine do love those little bug-hunter sets, and magnifying glasses - they fight I’ve rthose for ages!

What’s your budget?

Kids of this age like crap (unless it’s just my strange child). Today her favourite thing was a bit of wood

It also depends who you are trying to appeal to? When DD turned 3 I preferred practical stuff such as clothes and book but her favourite was probably the £10 hobby horse or the baby doll. I would say that boys of this age that I know typically love trains and cars so something along those lines

My DS3 loves toy cars (hotwheels and matchbox and toot toot cars). He also loves his “my first scaletrix” and arts and crafts stuff and books.
Might be worth just buying him a cheap wee thing, and then taking him out somewhere for the afternoon. Kids love getting taken out!

Sorry to go all eco warrior but please consider buying wood over plastic toys and also think about the packaging.

DS got a fab wooden car transporter for his birthday that he loves and he also adores his wooden car par with cars and his train set.

Some of this plastic shit just breaks and goes in the bin and it's a waste if your time and money spent buying it and there's usually a melt down in our house when glue can't fix it and it's just not worth it.

A yearly pass for somewhere.. lo will likely be free so around 30 quid for a pass for your bff to zoo/aquarium etc...

If she's short of space I would get him an "experience" rather than an item. Take him to a theme park for the day, or a farm, the beach or bowling or something.
If you have a high budget you could even get him/ the mum an annual pass for a lick attraction.
If your budget doesn't stretch that far then I always go for books. Sticker books especially are popular with that age.

Sorry forgot to mention budget probably about £40.
We do take him out fairly often and have him for an over night most school holidays.
We have previously bought him a balance bike (and helmet),a wooden pirate ship, a wooden garage/car park thing, a toy truck/ car storage thing among other things like clothes, pjs, books etc.
My kids LOVE to give him their old stuff (wooden train set, toy cars, books, teddies etc etc) He also has many older cousins so gets hand me downs from everyone.
He loves Bing and Peppa. I don't want to buy anything annoying for BFF (remembering exbil buying my ds a mini drum kit or the large amount of play-doh someone gave him).
Thank you for all suggestions, will go and have a google

If you are going for books, I can highly recommend the 'You Choose' books - hours of fun and really engages their imaginations so you have lovely chats about what kind of house they would like to live in and who they want to be friends with etc. We also love Hug Machine - a firm favourite that we buy for all our friends' kids now as it always goes down so well.

Yeah a locals pass somewhere nice is a good plan!

We did my grandson a craft box with loads of bits in eg, Googley eyes, pipe cleaners, glue, material, scissors, paints, etc. He loved it and it was all kept in the box,(like a toolbox) so was easy to use.