Sometimes our idea of the "perfect toy" and the little one's idea of fun aren't quite the same thing. Last year we obsessed over the perfect doll, and as is often the case, it turns out our daughter prefers her stuffed animals to dolls, and the biggest hit was a bag of plastic balls.
This year she can speak, which helps, but we still think we might have some better ideas of what she might like. She requested, for some reason, a blue kangaroo, but we're also planning on a dress-up station and some art supplies. We realize, some of the toys we wind up getting for her are kind of for us too...toys we find attractive or interesting. The moral is, don't spend too much time or effort on any one gift- you never really know what they'll end up loving.
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I also dedicated a lot of time to the search for the perfect doll last year for my daughter's first birthday. I ended up getting her a haba lotta doll. it fit my requirements--red hair (my daughter is a redhead), personality, and had, I thought, lots of play possibilities.
unfortunately, she has shown no interest in her and is instead crazy about her stuffed tiger and yoko doll, both from blabla. this year she is getting trixie (blabla's little redhead). hopefully she will like her more. lotta is nice, but not cuddly at all.
My dirty secret... if my kid doesn't seem interested in a toy he receives, I put it in the attic and try giving it to him again for a later occasion! It has worked great with several toys that were much more appreciated the 2nd time around and he never remembers seeing them before! (He's 2 and a half now, I wonder how long I can keep getting away with it!)
I was excited to buy my daughter a Plan Toys walker that had the cutest little woodpeckers that would peck out a trotting sound whenever she pushed it. However, I didn't have the tension set right and when she went to walk with it, she took off at an uncomfortable speed which caused her to never go near that toy again.
My neighbors very happily took it for their son which I hope they enjoy with my caveat!!
I got my daughter a plan toys dollhouse w/ furniture and family- a great craigslist find and was so excited about it. Then our old neighbors gave us their old fisher-price loving family dollhouse. She of course loves the plastic one and has moved most of the plan stuff into the tacky plastic house.
Like czg, my kids always prefer the plastic toys. The high dollar Waldorf toys I buy because they're so beautiful, sit untouched in our basement. My daughter LOVED the interactive baby last year... the one that cries & drinks. The $150 Waldorf doll sits on the bed unloved.
When my daughter was one, I got her a Fisher-Price sing and go animal train for Christmas. I loved trains as a child, and wanted to share that with her early.
Unfortunately, this was how we discovered that she was terrified of any toy that moved forward on it's own (such as remote control cars, electric train sets, etc.) It did have a mode that allowed you to turn off the movement, so you could just hear the music. She liked that, but if she accidentally moved the switch back so it would go forward, or had a friend over who moved it, we had to rush to turn it off as she wailed in terror.
On the plus side, she did enjoy the animals quite a bit.
Ah, the stories underpinning this post! Sometimes our kid likes something totally random nobody could predict, sometimes it's because she's our first kid and we don't always nail what she's ready for stage-wise. But mostly it's because we want her to have thing A when we know she'll really love thing B.
This year, wisdom is winning and thing B is what we buy. She wants a pink-and-blue sparkly backpack, I like that Skip Hop owl one...
I went "all out" and bought my nephew 2 sets of laser tag so they could play with friends. I inquired as to their popularity while visiting them over Thanksgiving: crickets. Took my other nephew to Build-A-Bear for his present and the older one, for whom I bought the laser tag, wanted one so badly! I figured he was too old for that stuff? Could have saved myself some dough (d'oh!)
I have some old toys from my childhood. A cabbage patch doll which neither kid cares for and a madame alexander huggims. Both kids love the huggims so i bought a new one as the old one was 30 and looked it! I have not bought my kids Christmas gifts or Birthday gifts because they get so much from everyone else. I wait untill the summer to buy something new for them!!!!
So true, my kids always love the plastic, battery powered, sparkly things...everything I don't love. I used to choose what I want and again, the chirping crickets. Now I choose what they want. Except video games, I'm still winning the battle to keep those out (for now)!
2 years ago my son was really into The Iron Giant movie from 10 years ago. So he wanted the robot...
needless to say, I ended up paying $80 for it from Ebay (*grumble) and my son has played with it maybe 10 times since.
Things will get easier when he stops believing in Santa and I can just reason with him for why we can't get certain things.
@robinm - great idea!
My little guy is just 5 months, so I haven't dealt with this yet, but I will keep this in mind for the future!
Almost all of our toys are wood/fair trade/waldorf/etc. They get played with ever day in a wonderful imaginative way. We get the occasional plastic gizmo that gets played with a day and then never again.
Not every child needs or wants the junky plastic toys.