toys for a 2 year old boy

[mckenzie]

It's my son's second birthday and we'd like to buy him a few new toys. What have other children loved playing with at this age? He's perhaps a quite typical boy in that he loves Bob the Builder, anything with wheels etc, his train set.

One of the main reasons I'm looking to pick all your brains is that I want to find somehting that he likes so much that he wont want to have the TV on so much. I'm starting to get worried that although his speech is very good, his favourite words are 'want something on please' followed by a list of all the programmes on Cbeebies! I do limit his watching time a bit but I'd love for him to have some toys that he is just so into that he doesn't want the TV.

Can you help please? Any ideas?

thanks in advance

i saw an entire zoo in woolworths that looked brilliant with big chunky animals,jeeps,etc and at a really good price too

My 2 y.o got a mega blocks R.C vehicle from an aunt - loves it. His granny bought him a hobby horse with ears that make a clip clop sound when you squeeze them - likes that too. Cheapest best was an ordinary hoola hoop. Hope this helps.

Another vote for the woolworths zoo/safari set. We got ds that for his 2nd birthday and he barely played with anything else. Even now he carries his animals everywhere. Woolies also do a farm set in the same style which also looks good.

thanks guys. I'll be off to Woolies first thing tomorrow.

A brief warning, mckenzie - the box does say 3+ but I had a really good look at everything in there and I couldn't see anything that would be a problem for a 2 year old. The animals are lovely and big and chunky (unlike some of the other plastic animals I've seen which have been a bit small) and nothing looked like it could be a choking hazard. Manufacturer being overcautious I suspect.

Ds had quite a few toys that were supposedly 3+ which he adores - I don't know if that bothers you or not, but thought I'd give you the heads up!

I think the 3+ is a legal thing. The manufacturers have to comply with a whole different set of european and national regs if they say the toy is suitable for under 3`s.

I feel very odd, seem to be the only voice not urging you to buy the zoo - will check it out when I`m next in big W.

hehe mjhen... the hobby horse sounds cool too Just wondering if I can justify getting ds one when I'm really really bad at blowing the budget and getting him random toys for no reason whatsoever as it is! Went to the supermarket today to pick up some wipes and ended up buying him an emergency vehicles set... sigh I'm hopeless...

thanks for the warning GeorginaA but like you I'm quite relaxed about the age category thing.

wooden railway track and a fisher price garage ( Mother of 3 boys) oh abd books about diggers

Would definitely recommend some kind of play set. Fisher Price Little People/Play family is great because the sets are compatible. They have a farm, wildlife Park and have recently introduced a Noah's Ark which is really sweet.

Ds had a town set (old style)and garage to which we have added a school bus, aeroplane and school set (not all available in UK I fear). He is now 5 and still plays with it a lot and now dd (nearly 2) has the house and stables.

Also would your ds be ready for a sort of construction toy, like Brio Builder (you can get a tool box with bits to make models out of chunky wooden meccano-style pieces) or a themed Lego set.

Another hit, if you have space, is a sand pit/ water play set with diggers and boats. Our sand pit is used well into autumn too as it is in a covered area.

hth

I am a big fan of Plan City that is made by part of brio. I think the website is plantoys.com. Plan City can be built bit by bit and is made of wood and looks great. My 4 and 2o month DSs love it. We are building bit by bit - the table (fab) was £90, the multi storey garage £45, the fire station £20, the petrol station £20. You can use metal cars with it. They loved it before we got the table, but now I can't keep them away. We have it in the lounge and it doesn't feel like we are surrounded by toys because it looks nice and the table has a drawer to put the cars in at bedtime. I really recommend it as you can probably tell and thinks it's a good price. I did shop around for a similar sized table and found one in Ikea for £80 but no drawer and no 'lip' to stop cars rolling off. John Lewis have it on their website and Daisy and Tom do it too. HTH.