No More Toys

Well, yes this blog has kind of lost impetus. While I love posting up the ideas my wife and I come up with to entertain out tot, I feel there are so many other people also putting their’s up and what makes mine so special.

I suppose it is just a bit of an identity crisis really, that and work is hectic at the moment and time off is rare….i know most parents experience this, but bringing up kids and working full time is hard work.

Your life does fall into a routine of sorts – every day becomes a fairly well timed event, margin for error is minimal and god forbid you think you’ll put the washing up off for a day, because let me tell you, you will have no more time tomorrow to sort it out. So really, you just get on with it.

What “what to expect” will never tell you about co-sleeping

That at 4am when your little one is cold, you will end up bringing her into your bed. She will stretch out luxuriously between you and your wife, and you will end up on a sliver of bed so small, that a tightrope walker would think twice about crossing.

What they don’t tell you about car seats

So, my 13 month old has finally outgrow her group 0 car seat. Yeah yeah, big milestone in a parent’s life, not least because you have to splash out on a new car seat. So off you go, shopping away at all the usual stores. Here’s something they don’t tell you about car seats when you buy your all singing all dancing isofix group 0 infant carryer……….You can’t use that isofix base for the next size up car seat.

See, one of the reasons people buy isofix seats with isofix bases (apart from the touted safety enhancements) is that, in theory, if you have the isofix base, any isofix seat fits into it. Well, technically, that’s true, but only within the group. So you get a group 0 with isofix, other group 0 seats might fit in your isofix base. But now you have to move to a group 1 seat. Hey, I got an isofix base already……..O no you don’t, not for a group 1 seat.

grrrrrrrrrr. Marketing companies never give you the full picture do they? I bet a lot of parents get burned like we did.

Anyhoo….anyone want to buy a group 0 isofix base? I got one going cheap.

Cheap toys for children

My daughter is one now, and she loves to get new toys! She’ll play with the boxes and wrapping paper for hours and hours. Sometimes, she even plays with the toys. Toys you say….yes, toys, you know the brightly coloured plastic doodads that seem to come with all those really expensive boxes your kid loves.

With a one year old exploring the world around her, the most apparent thing is she has an eye for the new. Put something new in a room, no matter where, and as soon as she enters, she’ll crawl over to it without fail. I swear she has ESP. Anyway, given that kids love new things, and given that there is a limit to the number of new toys you can buy without actually going into crippling debt, or buying out the ELC, I thought I would set up this blog – cheap toys for kids. Hopefully it will be a place to share ideas….how to create toys for your kids from everyday objects, how to use the toys you have in new and interesting ways to keep your tot entertained. I’ll share some of the ideas my wife and I have come up with. If you have any of your own, feel free to share them with me and I’ll be happy to post them up on the blog!