My son is 9 this Christmas. For the last few years he’s been asking for the typical things most boys his age ask for, video games, Nerf guns, jerseys. This year is so different and his dad and I could not be happier! He has asked for Erector sets. Yea, like what kids played with YEARS ago! He’s asking for books and a magic 8 ball, stars for his ceiling and a lava lamp. What generation was this kid born in???
Bailey was bored one day during the weekend. It was cold outside and he was sick of playing the same games and watching the same cartoons! He asked if he could open just one present. I fall for this every year! I figured he’ll have plenty to open and thought one of the smaller Erector sets would keep him entertained. So yea we caved in and let him open one. He opened the Erector set and got so excited to start working on it. Jason set him up with his own “work station.” The kid was in heaven! It took him all weekend but he got it done!
He did get a little frustrated a few times but this is thee best thing for him! He’s a very energitic child that needs constant motion going on. With this he had to concentrate and focus. It was challenging at times but in the end he was so proud of himself for doing this all by himself.
As soon as he was done, he took pictures of his master piece and then took it apart. There are different styles of motorcycles you can make from this one kit. He quickly starting working on the next one. Now I can’t wait for him to see the other sets he gets to put together.
It was so refreshing to see his enthusiasm and self-pride from building something rather than beating the next level in some video game. I wonder if other kids are going back to the basics, going old school. I for one am loving it and hope it continues!
Us Girls..Our Views 
Josh is “old school”, too… he’s asked for two Lego sets and a toy chainsaw for Christmas. I just love the Legos for him – Like Bailey, he’s a whirlwind of energy – always moving. But when he starts building something, the creativity just flows, and he’s in his corner for an hour, building his own little world. It’s awesome.
Go Bailey! That motorcycle is cool! Merry Christmas, too!
I love that he likes these toys. Jason and Toby did too. They loved these and lego’s and those Lincoln logs. They also had these little red plastic block type things that were really small that they made towns and stuff with. I can’t remember what they were called. Anything they could build with. Of course we didn’t have the video games or satellite or cable tv to compete with their playing.
I really think is some cases, those were the good old days.
I can’t tell you how many boxes of legos we lost around here and we had an OLD SCHOOL erector set..you know the real old ones from what the 60’s? I would have to look it up. The kids played with that thing until they lost every piece to it there was. ….we lost stuff because the kids didn’t stop their imaginations with whatever the thing was..that thing then became something else and yeah you see that pattern. We didn’t own a game system until last year when the then 21 year old bought guitar hero with a playstation2 (I think).
my son asked for used books off ebay cuz he is researching stuff..right now it’s ancient religions.
dd listens to a lot of music so hers was cd’s.
I cherish the memories of my kids and all the crazy stuff we had going on. J is now 18 and I think he was still building front room forts at 15. LOL!
“front room forts”!!!!! LOL!!! Mine did that until very old too!!!! Christopher will build a little one in my living room and say “grandma, can you find me” like I can’t see him there!!! I love it.
as much as it would drive the OCD into overload I would give just about anything to have one of those forts in here now. 😦
LOL do you have to pretend like you can’t see him?
Oh sure. I pretend I can’t find him. I talk to myself saying “I wonder where Christopher is” and I go from room to room talking to myself until he finally pops up and says “I’m right here grandma” and he laughs. I hate the thought that he’s the last little one. He’s still so genuine.
you can come here and borrow Josh anytime….
who can I borrow? Send them down here! 😦 I miss the little ones.
That is so great that he’s so happy with them and with himself! It’s really a good feeling to see your child struggle and succeed and understand that hard work can be fun. I can’t wait for Christmas day!
I can’t wait either…so far it’s been one of the best holiday seasons. 🙂 Everyone is happy and healthy.
My kids are too little to play with most of those “old time” toys (um, those were my times . . . ), but I hear you on the need for challenge in their young lives. Today my tots decided to use part of their naptime to wreck their room. When they got up, I informed them that they weren’t coming out of the room until they cleaned it up. They were overwhelmed at first. One went back to bed and the other just stood there and cried. (She’s got a bad cold today.) Well, I stood my ground and magic amaze-o, the room was spic and span pretty quickly. I was actually impressed how my younger daughter was able to reorganize the bookshelves to make everything fit (after acting like “this is never gonna happen” for the first 10 minutes). Bring on the challenges – I strongly believe it gives them a mental advantage.
Yesterday I was Christmas shopping and I had to find a toy for a 2-year-old. I couldn’t believe how every single toy with any level of potential mechanical or imaginitive complexity (including duplo blocks, “my first choo choo,” ABC wooden puzzles, etc.) stated that it was for ages 3+. Now, that wouldn’t stop me from buying it for my own 2-year-olds, but for someone else’s, I’d rather not go blatantly agains the safety label. Finally I found an electronic toy that was both educational and “safe.” But aren’t kids missing something if electronic toys are the only ones that invite planning, analysis, creativity, achievement?
Nikki, this sounds absolutely WONDERFUL. I love it. You’ve got one awesome kid there – as I’m sure you know :D! I think video games are good and can be challenging as well, but I remember putting together Lego sets and the like when I was a kid and the satisfaction was always immense. It’s a really good way for kids to feel accomplished, working through these sort of manual games.
I actually have nothing against video games. In fact I think that is one great contibuting factor for my son having such great hand-eye cordination. Monitoring what they play is important though.
u know I had my gasket blown once when we attended my moms church. My daughter was like maybe 2 at the time. ..anyhow her favorite things to play with were old cool whip containers and the lids and wooden spoons. She also would make towers out of different sized containers. After we had been going for awhile I took a tote bag of the containers in with me and offered them to the little class she as in. OMG — they REFUSED ..said that the toys had to be educational and have fisher price or playskool marked on them. WTF?
sorry…I wasn’t really done but hit some button trying to type in the dark.
Mind you..we had alot of educational toys around..but come on …. what is more educational than a child taking something as simple as containers and doing something with them? Needless to say daughter was out of that class shortly after that.
OMG I miss my kids being little. SIGH! Christmas blues are about to set in.
opening a cupboard and letting them go to town with the pots and pans and plastic bowls was one of Baileys favorite things to do….and now with the lil ones I care for..they love it! It’s called an imagination. 🙂 Some people!
I.know.right! I felt so sorry for the kids in that class..and I knew my kid would find something else to bang on (like other kids heads) if she only got to play with puzzles and stuff ..that’s why she ended up out of that class and sitting in the pew with us. Funny how she adapted to that too.
our homeschool advisor person and I met today and we talked about how kids are not even allowed to be kids anymore. The majority of them and their parents are convinced beating the latest video game is constructive and brilliant..uh no it’s not.
That’s AWESOME Nikki! I love seeing kids play with toys like this instead of video games for sure. It’s MUCH more rewarding if you ask me. I wish more kids would play with toys like this. We are trying to keep Logan off the video games as long as we can. LOL
Just a thought…..he may really like putting models together as well! Have you given him a model to put together? I bet he and Jason would have a lot of fun putting one together. 😀
I have thought of that. My brother was always putting car models together. I’m not done shopping..we’ll just say that! 😉
does nick like building front room forts? ohhh you know what one of our other fun things to do was..we would set the hot wheels tracks up off the top of the couch down over the coffee table and into the kitchen and have hot wheel races (ok this was also our way of modifying our hot wheels for the real hot wheels races we went to one saturday a month at one of the churches. WAY FUN!
I love how proud he looks of his motorcycle!
Awesome! How long before you get him a working full scale model?