Best toys for 18 month old?

[magimedi]

My PFGC lives abroad & as we'll be driving to see them in October, I want to take presents with me to avoid sky high postage.

I'd love some ideas for what 18month olds like best.

Budget of about £40 - 50 .

They live in a flat, no garden & somewhere where it is cold & snowy in winter so not much use getting outside stuff.

Quite happy to get 3/4 things of lesser value ....... doesn't have to be one big thing.

We live in a similar climate, youngest DC 18 months too. Current favorite toys in our house:

Any bath toys
Chunky cars
Balls - spongy, wooden, rubber
Mini wooden postbox and letters
Shape sorter cube
Books which make noises

Clothes are always appreciated at this age as lots of crawling and toddling.

Have a great trip!

We also live somewhere cold and snowy, a little sledge the kid can be strapped into got loads of use at that age.
As did a rocking elk, books that make sounds, and a toy tractor with animals that made noises.

Aqua doodle, happyland toys, mega blocks, musical instruments (although noise might make them hate you lol)

You can get something more suited for 2 so they grow into it so to speak.

Watermill bath toy.

Love the aqua doodle - do you need more than one pen for it??

Sorry, posted too soon & meant to say MANY THANKS for all the ideas.

Keep 'em coming!

No, the pen is just a think that holds the water on the nib for longer, it's the water that does the work.

It's basically some white cloth over coloured cloth so when the white gets wet the colour shows through. The tools are just to draw with but you can wet your finger and do the same or do handprints of foot prints. They fade as it drys.

Kind of mean that the nib of the pen is just cloth that soaks up water so it lasts longer than on your finger but you still need to keep dipping it. You can use paint brushes etc or just household stuff.

When I was a kid you had colouring books you paint water on to (we used cotton buds) and the colour comes through. It's a similar thing x

Toy tea set at that age is still getting lots of use two years later - we have a lovely tin one in a mini suitcase from M&S.

At that age DD loved her tea set and her play fruit and vegetables (Ikea do great and inexpensive ones); bath toys (again Ikea have some nice ones, as do Munchkin); any soft toys (Ikea do some lovely soft toy animals for hardly anything which she still plays with now aged 3); a play train; jigsaws; megabloks/starter Duplo like the number train or creative animals; soft large bouncing balls; if they have space, an indoor ride-on like a Toddlebike or an Ikea pop-up den and tunnel.

DS is 17 months, and loves:
Vtech toot toot toys - has the house, hospital and garage. He loves them, but they can get annoying, particularly the cars!
Matchbox cars and shooter - like this but we just shoot them down a longer straight track and a bit of a hill. He really, really loves this!
Anything involving locks/keys such as this
Spinning cogs and gears like these

Other than these, he likes to empty my kitchen cupboards and will spend ages playing the salad spinner and salad tongs. Strange child...

Yes to the wooden postbox and letters (John Lewis and ELC both do nice versions). DS got one for his first birthday and still plays with it regularly at 2.5.

Other toys he loved at that age and still plays with now are his tea set, his shopping basket with groceries and his play cleaning set. Pretty much anything role playing, in fact.

Thank you all.

Many years ago my DS wrecked my salad spinner by sending toy dinosaurs for a whirl in it!

Toy buggy - DD2's favourite thing at 17mo and DD1 3.9 plays with it too. And it folds up if they are short on space.

The Melissa & Doug velcro & wooden veg and cupcakes have also been surprisingly successful long term toys.

Yes Yes to toy tea sets and food (velcro sets which they can chop), for both girld and boys, we have had many hours of fun playing picnics and cafes, still fo now st aged 5

Happyland toys are great for this age group, and have some longevity (I was at work today, and noticed when I came home and tidied up () that 4 year old dd had got her Happyland zoo set out to play with with the 8 and 5 year old kids of dh's friend who were over!)
The big sets have most play value, in my opinion - the zoo set I just mentioned, for example, is perfect, and I think would come in within your budget. ELC often have deals on some of the sets.

Agree with Happyland - has lots of value. Tea sets also good - Emma Bridgewater does a pretty melamine one although more expensive but lasts til they are quite old. Melissa and Doug wooden fruit and veg boxes (do pretend cooking and shops) and also their wooden saucepans. Think they also do a wooden hob set which is smaller than oven. If they are into trains Thomas Take n Go. Also Duplo lasts a long time. They do a nice train set with numbers or letters. Personally I would love you if the toys had no noise. At this age they like figures to hold or mine did - like the Happyland. Old fashioned numbered boxes that stack (JoJoMaman Bebe always have them) - last for years. A garage for cars (ELC used to do a wooden one that mine loved and wasn't too large). None of those are too large if they are in a flat.