Toys

Playing games and puzzles is a great way to encourage children to learn colours. There's a great mixture out there and these ones are some of our favourites. We have had many hours of fun play time with these even if we don't strictly stick to the rules which can be hard with a three year old. For us, numbers have always been a strong point of learning and from a young age. However, colours we have certainly struggled with and any questions until recently (aged three) he has just ignored and got on with something else. So we had to break that trend by adding a bit of fun into the equation! Some puzzles and games. For his third birthday we had a cunning plan,...

Looking for toddler gifts under £10? Look no further. Most of us know a toddler in our family and at some point during the year, you may need to think about getting a small gift for them. However, if you are a parent of a toddler, you will soon come to realise that there is quite often a selection of invites held to the fridge by magnets acting as a reminder of just how many gifts you need to buy! If this sound familiar, you will probably be in need of find finding some low costs gifts that won't leave you without food for the month! Although, you probably thought that getting a good quality toddler gift for under £10 would be difficult. You couldn't been...

Brio... not much further introduction is necessary. Here we look at the 10 must have brio trains for any child's toy collection. There is so much imaginative play that can children can have with Brio, it really is incredible. And whether you have enough to make a small track or an entire village, it will still bring you hours of fun. Not to mention the competitive element between parents over who can make the coolest track - I probably have to say I would lose that one! Over the past few years, Brio have introduced many new trains to the collection and have introduced some electric trains too. You have the traditional battery powered trains but there are also trains that you can charge via...

There's not much better for the soul than spending the day at the beach. One of our personal favourites to visit is West Wittering in West Sussex. This beach is one of the most beautiful where if you catch the tides wight, you can have a lovely walk from the West to the East and back again. As with any beach you are going to visit, the best time of day to go is earl in the morning, around 08:00 and then when it gets too busy, you can simply pack your things up and go. If you have little ones, this is great as you can be back on the road in time for their all important nap and you still have the afternoon...

If you are looking for a way to help with a child's imagination, sticker books, albeit simple, can be great fun for young children. Some of the widely known brands such as the Usbourne Sticker Books, cover a wide range of topics that children love and can also help towards developing a child's speech as you race through the back of the book looking for the pictures that go with the scene. It also helps children understand the purpose of different tasks. One example that we certainly noted was on the farm book, he was soon able to understand all of the different tools and machinery that went on a farm. Of course, not always perfect as he still calls a tractor trailer a trolley!...

There is nothing I enjoy more than seeing my son having some imaginary play with some wooden toys. We started buying him wooden toys when he was a baby as you just can't help having some classics around the house. Even when he goes to visit his Grandparents, out come the wooden toys that we played with as kids and he loves them. Of course the toys get more sophisticated as they get older but the toddler toys are just great for getting their minds going. These are some of the toys that we have and they are just great, not to mention that they last forever. 1. Wooden Fruit Set One of the first toys that we bought was the wooden fruit set Melissa & Doug...