Wednesday, November 05, 2008

Won't you play with me?


Okay, so I've never done Works For Me Wednesday before, but I'm giving it a go. Lori swears it will bring scads of people to my little corner of the universe, so we'll give it a whirl. Besides, when I saw that this week's theme was toys I felt the absolute need to chime right in.


My kids are 12, nearly 10 and almost 7. We are rapidly outgrowing toys. Sometimes I feel bad that Kady isn't playing with toys like her older brother and sister did, but then I remind myself that my eternal preaching about how much I hate clutter and excess STUFF around my house may have something to do with the fact that she just doesn't play with toys. I think she might be afraid to play with them. (Kidding! She's not afraid of me in the least, just ask her.)


So here are my recommendations on toys. You know, the toys they no longer play with. (Or end sentences in prepositions with.)


Loving Family Dollhouse - Abby got one of these 12 years ago, so we are totally kickin' the dollhouse old school. Now they have the "Grand Victorian", but I think we have the Early American Right Above the Poverty Level Built in a Subdivision model. Regardless, it's "fancy" to my girls because it has stairs - to them our house would be fancy, bordering on mansion status, if we only had stairs.


The dollhouse just a few weekends ago went up into the top of Kady's closet, but as I slid it on the top shelf Kady asked, "But we can get it down on snow days, right Momma?" They just don't play with it enough anymore, not enough to merit the absolute overtaking of her room because uhm....in case you're new here, I have OCD and therefore when I get on a kick I BUY EVERYTHING THAT GOES WITH IT. We have a van, a horse-drawn carriage, a wedding archway for the bride and groom I had to have Abby so desperately wanted at age three, patio with grill, garden, treehouse, grandma, grandpa, dining room table with changeable centerpieces so even the Loving Family could celebrate Christmas in style, an entertainment center with VCR......really, I'll stop there.


For those of you who aren't compulsive, you could probably go with a lot less accessories and be fine and dandy. We've had plenty of dollhouses throughout the years, but the Loving Family was the best investment and my grandkids are gonna have a blast with it.


Rescue Heroes - Sam started playing with Rescue Heroes when he was about four and they've only been in storage for a year. He definitely outlasted the recommend age level on these guys. With clever names like Wendy Waters (firefighter), Sandy Beach (beach patrol), Billy Blazes (firefighter), Pat Pending (scientist), Jake Justice (police officer), Rocky Canyon (mountain ranger), Ariel Flyer (pilot/vet) and Roger Houston (astronaut) how could you NOT love these guys? I think what drew me to the Rescue Heroes the most was that during a time of Power Rangers who made my son into a hyperactive destroyer/karate master, the Rescue Heroes dealt out excitement without violence and there was always a positive message in every video. (Oh, did I mention that most of the characters came with a free video? Yeah, that was an awesome bonus.) And of course, my OCD went whole-hog on these as well and we, I mean my son had the Aquatic Rescue Command Center and every vehicle available. They've since gone into storage and while Paul begged, pleaded and bribed me to get rid of them, I just couldn't. I have too many memories of my little boy playing with them and hopefully someday my grandkids will oblige me by playing with them, too.


Sadly, I think the Rescue Heroes are fairly hard to find now, as my searching on the 'net has shown me today. However, eBay might be a place to look if you're interested. Don't look at my house, though - I don't share my toys. I mean, my son's toys.




Check out all of the other Works For Me posts at Shannon's site!




2 comments:

Val R said...

Great list!

Unknown said...

I agree that WFMW will bring a lot of traffic to your site. I love Wednesdays now, because I can just peruse Shannon's list and find great information and great blogs to bookmark.

Of course, that's not how I found you. Don't ask me how, because I can no longer remember. We'll chalk it up to age...yeah, that's it - age.

As far as amount of toys, my older son still has TWO rooms full of toys in this house. My 2 yo son has a corner of the school room and a small corner of his room for toys. It's extremely lopsided, but he doesn't seem to care at all! It certainly make birthdays and Christmas easier!

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