Go Fly A Kite.

We live in a city that gets quite a lot of wind and one day when I was sitting in our backyard, I remembered how much fun I used to have with my grandfather flying kites. So, the next day we took our kids to the store and purchased one kite for each of them. My eldest child chose the kite that resembles the Red Baron’s Tri-Plane while my younger choose something more appropriate for his age, SpongeBob. Needless to say, we all had a great time flying the kites over the next few weeks until the weather turned. Both kids are really looking forward to flying them again once it warms up some more.
What we particularly like about these kites are the fact that they are nylon and fiberglass construction. These aren’t the plastic/wood frame kites that I used to play with as a child and would subsequently get torn and broken. These are durable and come with everything you need to go right out and have a good time.

Play-Doh Duffel Bag.

I cringed when we thought about getting my kids some Play-Doh given what a mess I thought it would make. Boy was I surprised at how easy it is to clean-up and how much fun they had using it. We originally purchased the duffel bag (comes with 5 containers of Play-Doh and multiple tools for squeezing, cutting, rolling, etc…) and have subsequently added the activity play mat and more Play-Doh.
We sit at our kitchen table and the mess usually stays there. With a simple wash rag, all of the little bits that are left over are easily swept away and into the garbage. But most important, the kids love it. The really enjoy making all kinds of items, some of our favorites include; volcanoes, canoes, snakes, caterpillars, dinosaurs, cars and images of our family. Those family ones usually don’t bear much of a resemblance (except for the dog).

Gazillion Bubbles Typhoon Bubble Machine.

Little kids (and even some bigger ones) love bubbles. All too often, it is harder for little kids to actually blow bubbles with those little wands that come with most bubble containers. This toy relieved that problem for my children. Just load up the reservoir with the bubble solution that comes with the toy, turn on the switch and go. It creates an enormous amount of different colored bubbles that your kids will love to chase and pop on their own.
A few recommendations to help you get the most out of this toy. It is powered by a whopping 8 AA batteries, unless you order the AC adapter. I highly recommend ordering an adapter or investing in some rechargeable batteries. In addition, I also recommend getting an additional bottle of the bubbles. If your kids enjoy playing with it as much as mine did, the 32 oz that come with it won’t last long. Other bubble brands work, you just won’t get the pretty colors that come with the Gazillion bubbles brand of solution.

Vtech V.Smile TV Learning System.

We debated a long time about whether or not to buy our kids a video game system. In the end, we decided to go ahead and purchase a system as long as it met certain criteria; it had to be educational, fun for the kids, relatively inexpensive and have some longevity to it. After comparing Leapfrog, V smile and some other products, we decided on V smile.
V smile has some advantages that the other systems did not. First, it allows multiple players (if second joystick is purchased). Second, they had a wide variety of games that were based on characters my kids were familiar with and like (Dora, Bob the Builder, Wiggles, Scooby-Doo, SpongeBob, Toy Story, Spiderman, etc…). But the most important thing was that every single game is educational or has learning as the central theme. That and the lower price sold us on V tech.
We and more importantly our kids have not been disappointed in the V smile system. It is constantly in use and the games have a lot of replayability. Definitely worth the money we spent on this.