When it comes to toy buying are you best to go with the latest and greatest or the tried and true?
The answer is that it depends on your child's age and interests. This year's award winners from the Canadian Toy Testing Council are a great place to start.
Ages six and up:
- Perplexus, a game of running a ball through a maze.
- The Air Hogs Titan Glider, which can go upwards of 50 meters in the air.
- Dresses of the world art by number by Djeco.
Ages eight and up:
- The All-Natural Spa Lab. The kit creates spa products from ingredients that are easy to get.
- The Klutz Doodle Journal, which is filled with 75 pages of doodle ideas and activities.
- Run Wild, the card game "which lives up to its name."
Playmobil is a perennial winner. The Great Dragon Castle is just the latest in a long list of play structures that earn top marks with kisd.
Lee Richmond of Kaboodles says kids of different ages will use each product quite differently.
"It's all about the imagination, so a nine-year-old would use Playmobil very differently than a four-year-old would use it but they both use the same toy," she said.
"So you buy it when they are three or four and you can add to it and change it and they are still playing with it three or four years later."
Big sets are nice but Playmobil or Lego are toys you can start small to try out on your child.
Old classics, like the Slinky, are making a comeback too.
There are also new twists on old products. Walkie Talkies now come with talk and text options, sort of like a cell phone.
Puppets also scored high with the kids. The Sea Serpent stage puppet from Folkmanis, Inc scored top marks from the council.
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With a report from CTV British Columbia's Chris Olsen
