Toy Tips

It seems that my house has been taken over by toys! And its a good thing - toys are what keep the boys busy all day. Emerson and Finlay are too little to go to school, but their toys are great learning tools. Ricky and I don't have a ton of money to spend on the latest and greatest toys, but the boys haven't been deprived. Here are some tips on how to build your toy collection on a budget.

• Raid your kitchen cabinets: Some of the best toys are in your kitchen. Children love to bang on unused pots and bowls. Metal bowls make great drums. You can use plastic serving spoons for drum sticks. Give your children different size plastic or metal bowls to play with. The bowls can be used as musical instruments, places to put other toys, or even hats.

• Evaluate boxes, plastic jars, etc before throwing them away: Some of the best toys come from empty cereal boxes, cracker boxes, empty water bottles, and empty jelly jars. Plastic jars make great bath toys. Kids love to pour water out. Kids also like to carry around old cereal boxes.
• Let your kids have your old phone books: Kids love turning the pages (and sometimes tearing). It gives them practice looking at "big kid" books without ripping the pages of your favorite children's stories.
• Cut fabric pieces from old clothes and blankets before you throw them away: Teach your children about different textures by cutting squares of fabric from clothing and blankets your are discarding. Put the fabric pieces in a box your children can play with. They have fun feeling the different textures and taking the pieces out of the box and putting them back in.
• Make bean bags and/or snakes: Cut squares from old fabric. Sew three sides and part of the fourth side, fill with rice, stitch up the hole, and you have a bean bag. You can cut the arm off an old sweater to make a snake. Just sew on some eyes and a tongue, fill with rice or dried beans, and then stitch the opening closed.
• Join the Toys 'R Us birthday club: Go to the toys 'r us web site and sign your child up for the birthday club and they'll get a $3 gift certificate in the mail before their b-day. Our boys used their money to buy these fun rubber balls and a Dr. Seuss board book.

• Make your own toy "boxes": Homemade toy boxes make clean-up more fun. Just take an old box (we like the boxes Sam's Club wipes come in) and cover it with contact paper. We just used an old roll left over from a project. We have four boxes like this for the boys to keep their toys in.
  
  

• Take advantage of freebies: Kids love cheap toys. They don't expensive gadgets. Finlay got these little toys from a Toys 'r Us Easter egg hunt. Watch the news paper and neighborhood bulletins and bring your children to the fun events in the areas.
  

• When you do buy toys, but ones that have multiple uses and can grow along with the child. For example, if you buy nesting cups they can use them to build towers, hold small toys, nest inside of each other, etc. If you buy toys that are very age specific they will only last a short time. However, if you buy something like a ball or blocks the children can adjust the way they play with the toys as they grow.