boys vs. girls

Because girls are weak.

The cheapo plastic toys that they will play with maybe twice are always like this: trucks for boys, dolls for girls. Fake weapons for boys, miniature cooking set for girls. Okay so I grew up in hippie-liberal Oakland California but this stuff still makes me want to hurl.

What were my favorite toys? When I was really little, my play xylophone, blocks, TinkerToys, and the Sit-n-Spin, where I could make myself dizzy. The latter are probably illegal now. My bike, of course, when I was a little older (it was a BIG deal when I went from the clattery hand-me-down to my OWN Huffy.) Board games, even though when I played Monopoly with my best friend it always ended up in a fight. The little wooden propellers that would spin up in the air, even though I always broke them. A magic book - I could amaze my friends and family! And MORE books: books about boys who were child detectives. Books about girls who were actually fairies and could kiss their own elbows and fly. Books about boys who had friendships with wild animals. Books about girls who were detectives (or spies - remember Harriet?) Nonfiction books about animal behavior and fiction books about animals who acted human. No guns except the water kind in hot weather, and no Barbies. Stuffed animals, yes.

I think it's harder to find decent toys for kids now only because the store aisles are crammed with the cheap and easy, boy and girl, blue or pink. And unfortunately a lot of people buy it because it's there. But the good stuff is still out there too. Hang in there.

-Human, female

be careful or i'll come after you with my mighty chainsa...i mean, blowdryer.

its amazing how pervasive the junk is, but there are some great places for good, quality toys. we have a local store called peapods (www.peapods.com) which has lots of natural toys, blocks, pretend play, etc (we got ella's wooden xylophone there!). musical instruments are such a wonderful 'toy'. we just gave the girls smal djembe drums after ella's school concert. its amazing how long they will both sit and play. this year we did most of our xmas shopping through a catalog company called magic cabin (www.magiccabin.com). some things are overpriced, but they really do have some wonderful, basic toys. the girls are getting a set of scales (for play store and learning about volume), a wooden cash register (to play store and practice math), ring toss, board games, etc. they have a sit-n-spin and love it...and also have a trampoline with a handle which they use constantly. the also LOVE their toy brooms, not just for cleaning, but for playing quiditch . play silks are also a simple thing that gets LOTS of use - as dresses, capes, bags, slings, picnic blankets, hide-outs, etc. my girls are knee deep in books and are on a first name basis with the librarians. thank goodness for that. as with food, you can overdo it with the good stuff too, so we try not to overindulge with toys, especially since they are most entertained by a patch of mud, some sticks, or a nice puddle. can't wait to see what they do with the snow.

Someone on this site should market a "Lil' tri guy's play leg-shaving kit."

I was always partial to lawn darts. They are hard to find now that the government banned them. But to a ten year old adrenaline junkie there was no better high then throwing the lawn dart in the air and trying not to get hit when it comes back down to earth. It was almost better than building a bike ramp. I always check for them at garage sales.

I just had a horrible flashback to when you jump on the trampoline and over or under shoot and end up in the "spring" area. If your lucky you just hit the bar surrounding the tramp, if your unlucky the springs close on your skin.....owww. Damn trampolines, its almost enought to make me get rid of mine in the apartment.

LAWN DARTS were the best!  I also enjoyed tetherball, and that game Jokari with the ball on the long elastic cord attached to the end of  a weight filled with sand...it was always fun to hit the ball really hard and try to avoid getting smacked in the face on the rebound!

Or the one in my bedroom.

I'd much rather land on the springs, ours was an older one, before they sold them with mats to cover the metal of the bar--almost broke my back on a backflip, hit the bar dead square in my back, parents called and ambulance b/c I couldn't move....ohh, the good ol days.

Its comforting to know that there are other people in this world that sleep on a trampoline.

Uuuuhhhh....ok, sure! Yes, sleep.

Post of the day. Nominated.

And as for the rest of you people, I don't know how ANY of you survived childhood. All I did was play football and wrestle with the boys and climb a lot of trees. And spend all summer trying to swim the length of the pool underwater on one breath, until I could do it -- then work on seeing how far I could come back in that same breath. And race down the hill where I lived on skates (or bikes, either way was good) slamming into our neighbor's garage door to stop. (Why they never complained about the line of bike tire marks along the front of their garage I'll never know; saints, I guess!) And break each of my arms once attempting feats of athleticism. And try to keep up with my aunts and 11-year-old sister swimming in crashing waves in Hawaii when they called me "Chicken of the Sea" for first balking at that prospect -- when I was 5. But nothing DANGEROUS!!! Sheesh.

These things are way cool. I was once the goalie on a lawn darts team. The only thing better was a BB gun. "You'll shoot your eye out!"

When do I get my ham and plaque?

crazy sh** we used to do as a kid:

Do you remember those three-man slingshots? They had surgical tubing, and pouch, and you could take waterballoons as projectices (yes... only waterballoons) and launch them a good 100m. We became really good at aiming... need I say more?

We discovered that you can jump higher on your trampoline when you soak it with water... the sad thing is it gets slippery.

We had a mini trampoline in the basement, with a buch of couch pillows as crash pads. We played this game where we stack the pillows, and try to jump over them into the remaining pillows. We were so good we could jump over pretty much all the pillows, leaving two of them to crash our fall.

"granted, its doesn't say 'boys' chainsaw', but the implication is there. "
Only in your head, huh? Did your son bite the corner off a cracker to give it an L shape so it could be a gun? I think they are born with it...

"and why should a toy hair dryer be a girl thing?"
duh! because it's pink! If they wanted it to be for boys they would make it a more manly color. And put a chainsaw in it. ;-)

Loved the lil' tri guy leg shaving idea...