Maude turned 13 yesterday. Thirteen! To celebrate, we made her breakfast in bed. And immediately following that, she opened a Facebook account. : )
We had a small party in the afternoon that featured a berry tarte from our favorite bakery in Alençon, and a few gifts. We’ll host a party for her friends in a couple of weeks. (We’re working on the party plans now. We think we’ll go with a “spa” theme. I’ll be sure to share details.)
One of her gifts was a Kaleidograph. It’s such a cool toy! There are no rules, no winners, no strategy. You just combine cards to get different patterns. Doesn’t sound very fancy, I know. But it is shockingly satisfying to play around with. It’s the sort of toy I like to keep in the living room, on display, ready to be picked up by any guest or family member, because it’s appealing to people of all ages. It’s also the sort of toy I like to keep stocked in my gift stash. You can find them on Amazon
My Dad had a thing for “grown-up toys” — the kind of objects that appeal to adults as much as kids — and I’ve found that I like to keep them around as well. Do you have any toys like that in your house? Is there an especially good one you’d recommend?
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Woohoo, happy birthday to Maude! And thanks for mentioning that cool toy, I imagine that would be something to bring on a road trip – if you aren’t driving of course. :)
My parents always kept a collection bent nail mind-twisters around. Here’s an example: http://www.amazon.com/Twisted-Puzzle-Bundle-Identical-Puzzles/dp/B00507I2OE
They also had bigger mind-twisters of the same type. One in particular that I remember involved horse shoes and chains, with a closed iron ring along the chain. Solving the puzzle involved a complicated series of maneuvers to get the iron ring out of the puzzle. Interestingly, one day, a young neighbor with severe dyslexia stopped by. He saw the horseshoe puzzle, picked it up, and solved the (very complicated) puzzle in a flash. It was my first introduction to the how brain differences allow people to “see” things differently.
I, too, have things like that laying around. Currently, my family and guests are enjoying playing with the Zolo, a Mr. Potato Head for grown ups that was in all the art museums in the late 1980s. (http://zolo.com/index.php/toys/zolo/zolo5)
I have a few Zolo sets and I love them so much that I rarely share them with my kids. On our coffee table, however, is Shut the Box and it gets played constantly. http://www.amazon.com/Front-Porch-Classics-Shut-Bookshelf/dp/B0007UDXSE/ref=pd_sim_t_3
Hope she had a great one! Our son is turning 13 in May and he´s also planning on getting a FB account…
Happy birthday to Maude!
I think the “grown-up toys” around here are mostly musical instruments and the karaoke machine. Fun for all ages!
We currently have a kaleidoscope and a Rubik’s cube out for play by any and all.
I like books with pages of different heads, bodies, legs that you can flip around with – creating different characters. but this toy looks fun. :) and happy 13th! i remember thats the age your sure your a teen
I bought my husband one of these for Christmas: http://www.thinkgeek.com/electronics/aa64/ (out of stock now) and everyone loves it!
Happy Birthday, Maude! Welcome to Facebook!
Happy Birthday Maude!
We keep a collection of rubik’s cubes in our family room. There are a few regular 3×3′s and a 4×4 as well as a 360. We all like to play with Perplexus too so we have a few of those in different levels. Grandpa got a Perplexus from us for Christmas!
Maude, darling is a teen-ager! How marvelous! Got great reports from Kristen and her BYU friends. They LOVED their visit.
We love you!
Happy Birthday Maude! That is one awesome gift! Love it.
Happy birthday to Maude!
Happy Birthday Maude!!
Warning :: terrible site ahead BUT the toy is so worth it!
http://www.ankerstein.org/
Richters Anker-Steinbaukasten are an amazing architectural building block set from Germany made out of quartz and linseed oil. This was the first thing I purchased when I got my first “adult” post-college paycheck. I put the set on my desk and made tons of friends in the office. They are amazing to play with, touch, feel, smell… and they have a very devoted following. The plans that come with the set are fun to figure out (no step by step instructions like legos, only a three dimensional rendering) and I absolutely treasure my set… so much that I haven’t let me kids play with _quite_ yet…
;-)
Fun toy!! Happy happy birthday to Maude!!
Keva Blocks http://www.amazon.com/KEVA-400-Piece-Building-Blocks/dp/B001ENM3WU/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1330968689&sr=8-2
It’s amazing what a good, light, precision-cut block can build. They are amazing and so different than the average toy store block!
We love magformers for kids and adults alike.
https://glammatoys.com/item/47224
That’s what I was going to say. We have magformers in the family room and adults and kids play with them every time they come over. I bought ours last year when QVC did Christmas in July for a steal!
We received a Find It game for Christmas and the entire family was obsessed with it. There are many different kinds:
http://www.finditgames.com/
Equally addicting is the Perplexus maze game. Our four year old frustrated everyone by being better at it than the adults!
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B002NPBT50/ref=asc_df_B002NPBT501924708?smid=ATVPDKIKX0DER&tag=hyprod-20&linkCode=asn&creative=395093&creativeASIN=B002NPBT50
Happy birthday! Since no one’s mentioned anything like this yet, I’ll throw in my favorite toy-for-all-ages: Rory’s Story Cubes!!! Here’s a link to find out more about them: http://www.storycubes.com/
I have a set that always out on the kitchen table – a LOT of fun!
I am NOT ready for the day my daughter gets a FB account, God help me. Love the Kaleidograph toy.
I never grew up with a “family” toy, but I love the idea!
My 6 year old son is amazing with the mind-bender type puzzles, so I have to check out some of the links above.
Happy Birthday, Maude! You are a teenager now!
Happy Birthday Maude! At our house everyone loves the magnetic Bucky Balls and Bucky Cubes. They are amazingly fun to play with for all ages.
I tried the amazon link but it didn’t find the Kaleidograph toy. I then googled the name, cut and pasted so no misspellings, and only some kind of computer software came up. I would love to find it. Any other names or links for it?
Oh! I just saw the link earlier in the article and it does work and OH MY you can play online!!!! Super Cool! Thanks for sharing!
I got my husband a set of Buckyballs for Valentine’s Day, and we all–even the toddler–love playing with them.
Happy Birthday to Maude. :)
Happy Birthday, Maude! Our PlasmaCar, stomp rocket, and the “brain quest” series of cards are much loved by all around these parts.
The Kaleidograph won an Oppenheim Toy Portfolio GOLD Award! http://www.toyportfolio.com/SingleProduct.php?ProductID=6930
We love our Kaleidograph, too!
I adore all of these things! My dad just bought us all a different brain teaser hands-on puzzle as stocking stuffers from http://www.bitsandpieces.com – it was amazing how long we sat and solved (or didn’t) these things. We range in age from teens to fifties too:) Great fun! I love a good logic or visual teaser as well:) Always offering these to my students. I love the Kaleidograph – want!!!
You know that Discovery Toys game where you have a set of cards that tells you how to set up little cars on a grid and you have to move them around to get the red car out? I think it’s called Rush Hour or Traffic Jam or something like that. We had one on our coffee table in college and EVERYONE would play it when they came over. Such a great game for all ages.
I second the Perplexus series- we have all three levels at our house. It engrosses most people who visit.
We are teaching our 7- and 9-year-old chess. A chess set could make a great all-ages toy.
Sniff….the kaleidograph doesn’t ship to Canada from Amazon. I’ll try other sources!
Wow love this! I could imagine playing with this for hours! xx
We love our magnetic Yikerz game, its addictive for all ages. Our 6 yr old often wins out over adult competitors foolish enough to underestimate the skill involved!
Happy birthday!
We have a set of magnetic sticks and marbles that can be used to build geometric shapes. Everyone loves to play with them. There is also a sturdy set of tangrams that hangs out on the coffee table and gets played with a lot.
Thanks for the birthday wishes for Maude! She loved reading them. And thank you also for all the fun game ideas. Awesome!!
I always loved Colorforms (“It’s Colorforms fun!”). I saw them a while back reissued but don’t know where. Today I bought Bananagrams at Target. They were on clearance. I’ve heard it is an addictive game and can’t wait to play after dinner tonight or just keep it in my purse for when we go out with the boyz.
I got my boys one of these wooden marble trees and everyone who comes over – regardless of age just gets addicted – such a soothing sound – here is a video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dASQ6alSTGE
We also love storycubes. thanks for such an inspiring blog.
Pinned it! It’s on my daughter’s wish list!
Happy Birthday to all the birthday Blairs this week! The Kaleidograph looks great and I love Ben Blair’s watch! And the colourful banners – so pretty!
A ‘toy’ one of ours got for a Christmas a while ago that has been a hit for anyone young or old to play with, is a Bauhaus design wooden spinning top with interchangeable colour wheels. We got it at MOMA, but I can’t see it available there anymore. Think you’d like it Gabrielle, with your graphic designer’s mind : ) Found it here:
http://www.nova68.com/Merchant2/merchant.mvc?Screen=PROD&Product_Code=naefbauhaus9718
Interested to hear that Maude got to open a Facebook account, my eldest daughter will be 13 this year too……..