Good toys for 1-2 year old?

DD is 14 months and I'd like to buy her some new toys...bigger, funner, more interactive toys for the curious little toddler she now is. What toys do you love for your toddler? I'd love some bigger suggestions as well as smaller ones. She's moving right out of her interest in baby toys. We recently got her a wooden cart with lots of toy fruits and veggies (we play 'going to the market' lol), and she loves that...unpacking, repacking, choosing what she wants to take and toddling around with it, so I can see a kitchen for Xmas for her. Also want to get her a baby doll a bit before bub arrives, so she has a baby to care for as well.

So, what are your toddlers (or your!) faves? Both gender recommendations please :)

DS2 getting toy kitchen at christmas

Tea set
Cash register
Wooden blocks
Mega blocks
Little bike (you know the plastic $20 ones that scoot around on)
Books
Chalk board
Bounce and spin zebra

Oooh wooden blocks! So going on my shopping list! How funny is it that I have a toddler and have no idea what to get for her? :lol: What's the zebra?

Blocks, lego/duplo, wooden jigsaws and peg puzzles, those wire things you feed blocks along, playdough and finger paints were all very popular here. Neither of my girls got into dolls until much later. Also those water and sand tables were great

Everybody mentions the water and sand tables! If I google that term will it come up with what they actually are? They sound cool but I have no idea.

ETA sand and water table looks epic!

They are so cool PZ. The girls had a Thomas one and they loved it. They were asking the other day if we still have it for Miss A.

Those plastic cubbies are good fun too

Sent you PM with links.

The zebra you can get in sales for $40 - $45.
The spinny things $20

Play doh is also fun

Water play tables are awesome fun!! all sort of different ones out there! We don't have sand one as I don't want the mess LOL

Tunnels and pop up tents!

I have such a big list already. Have split it into an Xmas wish list lol. So many things I didn't consider, that made me think of other things. I'm so looking forward to setting up the outdoor area with a cubby and table, a sail etc.

So many things that are so cool and fun and I go ti shops and want a million things!! But need to be realistic LOL

Cardboard. Seriously. There are some awesome thing she can do without the need for toys. I wish I had my time over my kids would have the basics and we'd so make everything else.

Activity it up baby. Things like water tables and chalk boards are great. A sand pit. A baby swing. A paintbrush to paint water on concrete and wood. These are the things they love. The plastic loses its interest soooo quickly!

Have you seen the kitchens made out of recycled furniture! I wish I had know about these when my babies were little!

And check out idea for kitchenware sets for kids. And a train set! Even the wooden idea ones. Grls like trains too!

My 19 mth old and almost 3yr old favourite toys are their toy kitchen and their fisher price talking tea set.

hats, scarves, towels to make capes or tents, pram/trolley, drawers, bags. dd loves to put things in and out. pockets

torch, things with wheels, balls, tunnel, tent, play telephone, instruments.

dd is only really getting in to puzzles now, before they were just fun to dump everwhere.

DD3 (nearly 17 months) likes playing with dolls - but that could be the influence of her older sisters.

She also likes playing in our toy kitchen, lego, anything with wheels that she can push - even garbage bins.

We had the bounce & spin zebra - DD2 liked it for a bit then it got put aside and sold on e-bay :(

Wooden jigsaws, crayons, cash register (no matter what age they love it), play-doh, fisher price pig money box - our girls still play with theirs and they love counting along with it.
Dress Ups (as per HotI, hat's scarves etc)

This age group they are really getting into make-believe and copying parents etc. A big hit with our girl are bags. Little backpacks, handbags. all kinds of dressups. tutus, crowns, hats, headbands, necklaces.

Your saucepans.
The contents of your tupperware cupboard.

:rofl: I was going to say saucepans and tupperware too. I had a drawer in my kitchen that the kids could play i while I cooked, it contained all those little bits and pieces you pick up at tupperware parties and some wooden spoons etc. It was their most favourite place to play.

Absolutely! Youve got pretend play. Musical instruments and all sorts of awesome. Just hide the sieve.

Tupperware plus various shapes of pasta was pretty popular here for a long time, not sure what age they stop putting things in their mouth though as DD1 never did that... she is a little odd. Or Tupperware + pegs. Any combination of containers and little items pretty much. It was around that age that I bought a cheap hangbag and wallet from an op shop and made up just some cardboard cards in the wallet and some pretend keys and things like that, that would keep her entertained for so long and was really good to take places out with us.

The paintbrush with water outside was one of her most favourite things though, especially on really hot days when it would disappear really quickly.

I also second IKEA - we have that little wooden kitchen and it is really sturdy which is why we got it, all the plastic ones seemed like they would break with a boisterous toddler. Don't forget to get her a cloth to wash up with, that was DD1's favourite part lol. We also have two large tubs filled with their train tracks! Both of those are still popular with the 3yr old so interest has lasted for ages. The other good thing about the IKEA train set is the small pieces from KMart fit too so you can supplement it and there are some other wooden sets around that also fit (we got a huge compilation from Toys R Us that fits perfect with it). Duplo is popular here too but that was closer to 2. Wooden blocks are better at that age because they are more free form so easier while developing fine motor skills.

Puzzles have always been big here. Dress ups. Balls of varying sizes and weights are a good idea as those sort of skills are important for co-ordination. Little bike/trike. Oh and yes, definitely a tea set... loved pouring and pouring and pouring so best outside with water here!

Rather than buying, I'd recommend you join your local toy library. A years membership will be cheaper than buying 2-3 toys. I buy a few bigger quality pieces that involve open ended imaginative play (which is a bit old for 14 months) but otherwise I rarely buy toys. We have 'new' toys in the house every fortnight which means the kids never bored with toys they've already played with and mastered. Toy libraries are also great for the environment as they encourage recycling and generally have more expensive and educational toys that aren't found in Target etc.

At that age, anything that involves posting something, shape sorters or putting balls into something is great for their development.

You can find your local toy library here - http://www.toylibraries.org.au/locations.php

DS will be 20 months old at Christmas and he is getting a Thomas tent, a trike (I'm thinking the one that has the handle to push them that later comes off and they can peddle it themselves), a Duplo set (farm), playdoh.

I'm also now adding to his list a paintbrush because I love the idea of painting water onto the bricks on our back patio and a torch - I never would have thought a torch but I think that is a great gift item.

Have a look for a bilibo. My boys have been using theirs for about 5 years.

Awesome as!! Thanks guys! I have a list that rivals my arm now :lol:

Toys libraries are awesome, we were members of our local one before we moved, but we don't have a car and now being pregnant I think I'd find it too hard to try and transport more than books and dolls etc home and back again.

We have a dress up box, I started it when I was pregnant with DD. it's awesome. The best pieces are crazy 80's ties I collected from op shops. At the moment she just likes sorting them though. We totally do pots and pans, and most of our tupperware lives in the bathroom because they make awesome bath toys. We're also constricting a fort out of all the boxes we have from moving (yep, still unpacking!). I think DD's favourite toy right now are the silicone oven mits that look like puppies :) She goes 'woob woob woob' every time she sees them, and only Puppy can feed her breakfast at the moment :rofl:

Thanks for all the awesome suggestions, some things I didn't even think of, but seem obvious now (like chalkboard!).

PZ, all my kids love their "Ball Popper". They absolutely love putting the balls in the machine and then waiting for the to come flying out the top :)

Also a big hit is:
Hard Cardboard Books - if can get ones they have buttons to push that play music that's even better
Little People Cars and Figurines - These are really good for toddlers as they are large enough for little people but not too big so they can't pick them up
Any Musical Instrument
Tins or containers and blocks - DD loves building towers with the blocks and the twins love knocking them down and then putting them into containers and taking them out again
And at the moment in our lounge room we have our own ball pit (our is huge to cater for 3 kids at once) but you can get small inexpensive ones for 1 baby
Play tunnels

They have lots more toys but that seems to be the favourites at the moment and the twins are 15mths so at the same stage as Miss I.

Plain old washing pegs. MIL gavevdd1 some for her birthday one year and she loves playing with them

Play dough accessories, you can get big tubs with cutters and rolling pins.

If you have concrete outside the big fat pieces of chalk are great, I got a box of crayolla ones do under $4 for over 20 of them

Forgot to add - Balloons and Bubbles are also hours of entertainment :)

A baby?


The things we got the most mileage out of at that age were balloons, seriously. $2 for a bag of 50 balloons would last us for weeks. And books. Use book depository - you can get cardboard varieties of spot, "that's not my **", nursery rhyme books, etc. He also loved balls, and his wooden blocks wagon.

My kids love tupperware, sticks, dirt &" mud, water, blocks, balloons and pretty much anything they can get their hands on that isn't actually a toy - like Daddy's lanyard and keycard clip thingy (that attaches to his belt buckle), an old car phone charger (it doubled as a pretend doppler for a while), anything with a clip on it, and so on. They also like duplo/lego (but real bricks are even better :))
pain brushes are great - they can paint water on the bricks outside.

I've found most actual toys to have very short shelf lives, particularly at this age.

not to bring you over to the dark side but if you're thinking about a dollie have a look at a waldorf/steiner doll.
they are not for some people (can be very $$$) but such great quality and definitely very special for a little girl.
worth looking at as they are made with natural materials rather than plastic etc. nothing wrong with plastic (we have a lot of it too :lol:) just depends what you're in to.
i have brought one pre-loved (from the states, dragonfly hollow made) for DD's birthday that has ginger hair and brown eyes she is a little beauty and i cant wait for DD to love her.

Oh yes I agree with dragoncookie. DD2 has a 'little Jenny wren' Waldorf doll. It is beautiful.

Every day house items!!! and buy good quality wooden toys that are 'open ended' for play.

Plastic toys etc are a waste of money and kids get bored very quickly!

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Tupperware plus various shapes of pasta was pretty popular here for a long time, not sure what age they stop putting things in their mouth though as DD1 never did that... she is a little odd. Or Tupperware + pegs. Any combination of containers and little items pretty much. It was around that age that I bought a cheap hangbag and wallet from an op shop and made up just some cardboard cards in the wallet and some pretend keys and things like that, that would keep her entertained for so long and was really good to take places out with us.

The paintbrush with water outside was one of her most favourite things though, especially on really hot days when it would disappear really quickly.

I also second IKEA - we have that little wooden kitchen and it is really sturdy which is why we got it, all the plastic ones seemed like they would break with a boisterous toddler. Don't forget to get her a cloth to wash up with, that was DD1's favourite part lol. We also have two large tubs filled with their train tracks! Both of those are still popular with the 3yr old so interest has lasted for ages. The other good thing about the IKEA train set is the small pieces from KMart fit too so you can supplement it and there are some other wooden sets around that also fit (we got a huge compilation from Toys R Us that fits perfect with it). Duplo is popular here too but that was closer to 2. Wooden blocks are better at that age because they are more free form so easier while developing fine motor skills.

Puzzles have always been big here. Dress ups. Balls of varying sizes and weights are a good idea as those sort of skills are important for co-ordination. Little bike/trike. Oh and yes, definitely a tea set... loved pouring and pouring and pouring so best outside with water here!

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My 1 year old loves everything you mentioned - she isn't a fan of store bought toys at all, much prefers playing with my metal measuring cups, empty water bottles filled with different things (dried pasta, bracelets, goji berries etc), remote controllers etc. She also likes playing with pantry items - rolling spice jars, shaking vitamin bottles (I fill them with pasta if she can open it). Opening and closing things (like cupboards, DVD cases, lids and jars. Or anything that makes noise - shaking, banging. Also anything to do with water - splashing, pouring etc. I find if it's something she hasn't seen before, like a whisk, or some metal bowls etc, she will play with it for at least 5minutes or if I am lucky a lot longer. So I just go around the house looking for new things for her to investigate. Even an empty Guylian seashell packet was fun for her as it made crinkly sounds and she put dried pasta in the shell indents. Whilst she is on the potty she loves tearing off one sheet of toilet paper at a time and passing it to me.

The toys she does like are her wooden activity box and number puzzle. She still puts everything in her mouth so some of her toys don't really pique her interest yet. She also loves playing with her amber necklace. at one stage a black ribbon that was used to wrap a present was her favourite toy for a month.

Once she stops putting everything in her mouth I'll be able to show her more things - especially nature stuff like flowers, pine cones etc.

I need make a safe play wallet as she loves pulling all of the cards out of our wallets, but they aren't the cleanest things so I don't like to let her - must get on that!.