The Toys That Have Kept On Giving

[Sycamoretree]

Do your DC's have certain toys that have just stood the test of time, worth every penny you paid for them and become much loved and returned to favourites, long after you expected your DC(s) to have tired of them?

My DD 2.6 has played, every night, with her bath time teletubbies and house since she was about 9 months old. She hasn't watched the programme for over a year...She keeps finding new and ingenious ways to develop her play with them, and I'm just astounded by the value for money they have proved to be.

Care to share?

wooden train tracks - my 2 are now 11 and 8 and we started gathering track etc when ds1 was 1. They are still in use by the 8-yr-old. And other children who come to the house love it.

Sand pit - 11 years of outdoor joy.

Lego.

agree with most on here - lego and duplo, playmobil, tea sets and play food, BOOKS, cars and garage, sandpit, footballs, tennis balls and bat, dress ups, and also Puky Balance Bike and Mini Micro scooters - dear, but well worth it for the use we get from them.

wooden train track
garage
bricks
climbing frame in garden
Baby Annabel
simple ride on truck

bad big investments in our house - toy kitchen (except for playing with friends)
doll's house (ditto)
sandpit (drives me mad)
most BIG sylvanian things (little ones seem more accessible)

a "Busy Box" we bought in Argos when DS1 was 18 months old - he's 8.5 now and it's still going strong onto it's 3rd child - but all of them still play with it.

And I've been using the clock on one side of it to help DS1 with his telling the time

Sycamoretree, we were given that teletubbies' bath set when DS was 9mo and he still plays with it. He is 6.

Baby Annabel
Toy cooker
Wheelybug

All played with almost every day for over 2 years.

Magnetic drawing boards, ds has had his for ovedr 6 years and still plays with it often, playing together I taught him the alphabet, numbers to 10 and several shapes before he was 2.

i second the magnetic drawing board - unending joy. also ikea stacking cups mentioned earlier

also wooden blocks, a russian doll, Tomy hide and squeak eggs and a cheap shape sorter

£5 doll and £4 tesco dolls buggy, DD adores them both.

'Little' lego has been a slow burner here but now firm favourite.

Tea set and play food

Climbing frame

For DD 11 and DS 13
Lego,
pokemon/yugioh cards,
pop up tents and tunnels which came out every summer until the mice ate them
marble runs.
and dare I say it nintendo ds

Plastic play food.
Doll's pushchair
Click-clack car track (don't know the proper name)
Megablocks

we had an awful cardboard puppet theatre that used to drive us all mad by falling over all the time (from IKEA) dcs used it LOADS...now I look back and think why on earth didn't I buy or make a decent one?
so I would say, get a decent puppet theatre and LOTS of puppets!
plus, all the things mentioned, duplo, lego, brio train track, sand pit, toy cooking stuff.

Lego
ELC garage & cars
Ikea playtent (£6)
Ikea/Brio train set

Dolls pushchair, a very basic (and small -hooray!) elc cooker, Ikea stacking cups, a very very cheap pushalong trike

second ikea stacking cups (the ones with holes in so can be used for water play when grown out of stacking), sandpit and tesco train set.
probably best buy to date was a 30p from charityshop large plastic car transporter lorry thing from which ds cannot be parted. will probably go with him to university at this rate.
tennis balls (popular from babyhood when they get used as footballs through to, um, tennis playing age. also very popular with the dog . )
actually, come to think of it, the dog - ok not a toy but provides more entertainment than anything else.

Many things actually. In particular stacking cups, wooden building blocks, balls, wooden train set, Fisher Price toy piano, toy cars.

IMO the simpler the better as there's much more scope for imagination as they grow older.

I agree totally- I work in paediatrics and have been using a puppet theatre's to assist children to develop skills with social stories (when you put on a play for the kid and the theme is the skill you want them to improve on- you make a story about it. I also then give the child a turn and most of the time they copy me which embeds the moral of the story into them- I have used this to help kids develop fine and gross motor and social skills). I would recommend either a really sturdy puppet theatre (you can get ones that say they are non-tip), or either a totally portable one like this children's puppet theatre. Just a note, so puppet theatres are multi-coloured, have all these pockets etc. Be careful with this as it can be over stimulating which can inhibit their imagination and focus.

A hideous plastic walker that turns into a car with a steering wheel from the ELC. Plays really irritating music, DD has loved it and still does at 3, DS at 15 months is obsessed with it and would take it to bed if he could (not that the little bugger sleeps in bed so he may as well )

I'm keen to get the teletubbies bath house for my new baby's Christmas present having read this thread. (I know, I know she's way too young to appreciate Christmas but I still want to get her something and her brothers will like helping her open it!) Is it this one sycamoretree/othersideofthechannel?

Agree with so many of the selections on here. My boys played with their wooden train set solidly for about 5 years and both loved the cheapy argos pushchair and playmobil, esp the vehicles. In terms of things that have genuinely seen them practically from birth to the current day (they're 10 now) I'd say diecast cars and soft toys- they still love love love gathering all the duvets and blankets in the house and making nests and tents with all their teddies inside. Lego is still intermittently popular and I definitely resent the yugioh and pokemon cards less than the blasted match attax because at least when the craze comes around again, as it invariably does, the same cards can be reused as opposed to being completely obselete after one season.

Train track and marble run popular in this house. We glued down a simple train track to some MDF as there were lots of tears when DS1 was younger and DS2 would break his track up. Marble run - we got our first set from ELC, and have added to it with car boot and nearly new sale finds. We now have five sets (only buy the same brand though, the Argos/GALT one isn't compatible!). This makes it much more fun and easier for little ones to set up.

Nintendo DS - definitely worth the money for DS1 on long car journeys!

TP climbing frame - we had one in the back garden, and a couple of years ago I bought another one to go on the front garden for all the kids on the street to play on. Second hand from Ebay, split four ways between various families, it cost us £15 each. It's probably down to pennies per hour played on by now, and will be fine for years yet.

I got DS (3YO) Galt mrable run for £5 from Ebay for christmas this year so glad to see others like it

DS' fave toys are-
Dicast vehicles
ELC giant tape measure
JCB tractor/digger just a little one not the sit on one
Cosy coupe car

Trampoline... best money I've ever spent.

ELC lift-off rocket.

Set of about 10 very basic (but realistic) plastic toy sea animals for the bath .

Lego - I can't get over how great it is, such good quality, affordable, endless playing potential. One of the best inventions ever.

Hoping to get a trampoline after we move to a place with a bigger garden - I've seen how much friends' ones get used.