The Nursery Project

Homemade Playhouse for Peanut, Means We'd Be Moving to the New House Soon

Peanut is in the age where she loves small corners, claustrophobic closets, playing tent under the blanket... you get the idea. Today I built her a new playhouse on one of the walls of the kitchen. It was an instant hit with her. When I cover the whole thing with a sheet and she's totally enclosed in it, she loved it even more.

That playhouse originated from our 'For sale' corrugated plastic sign that we stuck on the outer window for less than a week before somebody actually made an offer on the house just yesterday. It's not legally sold yet, but we took the offer and tore the sign down again. While it was sitting on the kitchen doing nothing, I came up with the idea.

The corrugated plastic board looks sturdy enough, and it came with quite strong double tape on each ends so that I can stick them to the floor to make sure it will withstand Peanut's wiggling inside (I've checked, it's not too strong that it won't come off without any mark on the floor). If she still likes it by next week, I might take it to the new house, paint windows and roof on the outside to make it like a proper play house.

Too bad I couldn't make better pictures, since our camera is broken again. Thanks to Little Miss Peanut, who reached for it from the tabletop, and sent it crashing down on the floor. I had to take these with my cellphone.

Just in case you're wondering, 'Te Koop' means 'For Sale' in Dutch.

My Little Girl Doesn't Have To Be a Rockstar, As Long As She Rocks!

Another cool toy from Plantoys!

I said to hubby the other day that I'm going to buy Peanut a real drum set for her 13th birthday. Lo and behold, I found a smaller play drum that might as well be her Christmas present this year. Children always have play guitar, play xylophone, play piano, but I rarely saw a play percussion set, if ever there was one.

It's not that I want to mold her into a musician (or into anything for that matter, as long as what she wants to do is NOT being a princess). She doesn't have to be a musician,as long as she rocks!

This is even better than the baby piano I found a couple of month back.

Other arrays of Plantoys I featured previously. Did you know that Plantoys made their toys from rubberwood of over 25 years in age, at a time when its sap-producing days are done? In doing so, they are recycling wood which would otherwise be burnt away.

Available at Babystyle, for $50.

Nino Conillo: Peanut's First Boardgame?

We are a family that loves board games. During our games, my husband and I always musing about how fun it would be when Peanut can finally join us on the table, playing a game or two and start working those strategic skills early. Well, maybe it won't be too long before she can start playing this very simple board game from Selecta Spielzeug (the Germans churn out the best boardgames out there in the last 15-20 years).

Nino Conillo is a charmingly simple boardgame for toddlers. There is a burrow and 20 little rabbits. It's raining, the burrow is flooding and you have to save all the bunnies.

Very simple theme any of the smallest children can relate to.

In order to save the bunnies, you have to roll a dice with colours on the faces, and whatever colour comes out, you put a bunny in front of a door with the same colour. When you roll a colour of a doorway which already has a bunny standing before it, you can take it safely out of the burrow. Player with most bunnies saved won.

Very simple rule of playing and winning, is a hallmark of every great game, that's why I love the game. It doesn't involve any strategic thinking yet, only colour recognising and maybe simple counting at the end to determine the winner. The box said 3 years and up, but I suspect that's because the bunnies are rather small, not because they need to be 3 years old to be smart enough to play this.

Actually, I'm not sure at what age they will start to name colours. Or taking a defeat without throwing tantrums... (Oh, the latter will take years after puberty to develop).

Surrealism Also Comes in Small Packages: Zolo Playsculpture

Zolo looks so fun, I like to call it the Crazy Lego. They come in thingamabobs of shapes and patterns, and connect together with pegs-and-hole system (even the pegs are colourful!). I love the idea of a playsculptures, if children can pretend play to be doctors, builders and chemist, why not sculptors?

Zolo comes in several ranges, made either from plastic or wood. The playschooler range was made with larger pegs. When your child is no longer interested in them (if that's possible), you can take over, give the sculptor in you your best shot, and put them up as decoration on the child's room shelves.

Zolo Playsculpture official website.

Kikolina and Her Travelling Little Egg

I know it's too late for egg hunts, but I still think Kikolina is in time to be a cool spring toy. I love the fresh greens and yellow, and the little bell in the middle that 'tings' as the ball passes by. Simple concept, eye-pleasing design, and a good sense of humour with the cracked egg.

Made from wood, by Selecta Spielzeug, a German toy company famous in Europe for their good quality wooden toy.

€49.99 from the brand's official site.

Tried and Tested: Brio Toddler Wobbler in Black

We shortlisted Brio's Toddler Wobbler for Peanut's birthday present a while back. Even though it's almost a full month after her birthday, we finally got it for her just this week. It's not that she hasn't got enough new toys for her birthday, but this black edition of the Toddler Wobbler was not very easy to find. Netherland doesn't have a Brio official retailer, and most online shops that offer the black Toddler Wobbler that ships to the Netherlands was out of stock. If I'd been willing to take the next best thing, which was in red and yellow, we'd probably have got it last month already. We found this one at Brio-shop.de, and looks like it's their last stock as well. I checked the site again today and it's no longer listed. Pheww...

As she is more keen to learn to walk lately, she loves dragging her highchair (or any chair light enough for her) across the house, as her walking aid. After tons of books and building blocks she's got to play with, I think the kid needs something to exercise those budding gross motoric skills as well, which we, guilty as geeky parents, forgot sometimes. I really like the look of the sleek black Wobbler. It has adjustable brake, so for Peanut who can't really walk yet, we can set the wheels to roll half-braked to make it easier for her to control. As she gets better at balancing herself, they can be loosen for faster actions. It can be difficult to maneuvre, as none of the wheels swivels, and that would be my only complain about it.

Baby Grand Black Piano

The Baby Grand Black Piano was something I was considering for Peanut's birthday, but quickly dismissed for space hoarding. I don't have any ambition to push her to a particular musical instrument (being tone-deaf myself), but I would just adore this sleek black miniature grand piano in my little girl's room.

The solid Wood Baby Grand Piano is a scaled down version of the real thing, with 30 keys and a 2 1/2 octave span. Includes a color coded key chart to learn notes and melodies.

The girl on the pink one gives a pretty good idea of its size (not that I'm ever going to buy a pink piano).

It's $135 from Pokkadots.

Retro Room Aquarium: Training Fish Included

There will come a time when Peanut asks for a pet. While having a pet is a good way to learn responsibility, I'm sure most of children's first pet died within the first month (speaking out of experience).

If bikes can have training wheels, why can't there be a training pet? I'm not talking about the robot puppies, but a fully decorated aquarium complete with a plastic fish. When a child is finally ready to embrace the responsibility of an animal's life and death, simply replace the dummy fish for real fish (or leave it behind for companion).

Retro Room Aquarium, $20 from the aptly named Wishing Fish.

Käthe Kruse Waldorf Dolls

Some people confuse our toy philosophy of not giving Peanut fairies, unicorns, pink toy hoover and mop set or Disney princesses with us never letting her playing with anything girly at all. That is absolutely not true. It's not that we're going to limit her with a toy diet of trucks and tool sets, but it's not very easy to get to the other side of stereotypical when it comes to girl's toys, especially dolls.

That's why I love the Käthe Kruse Waldorf dolls. Käthe Kruse Doll Studio is the oldest German doll company that is still existing and working in the traditional way, which is by hand. Known for their collectible live looking dolls, the Waldorf is a collection of soft fabric dolls which may be more suitable to toddlers (to be honest, I always think that realistic looking dolls are a bit creepy).

This one to the left is the Angel Nature. Unlike any other angelic dolls, I love this one's flaming red hair and play clothes instead of the usual whites. She looks rather like a New Age-y kind of angel, but a fun one indeed! Another example is the It's Me Red dolls, a tomboyish looking character you might not find represented everyday as a girly doll. Käthe Kruse also sells separate doll clothing for most of their doll range.

Käthe Kruse Waldorf collection is about $30 - $50 a piece (except for special collections) at Moolka.
Käthe Kruse official website with listing of retailers from around the world.

All The Way from Thailand: PlanToys

The xylophone I got Peanut was from PlanToys, a Thai based toy company. I checked out the rest of their products via their website, and was absolutely smitten with their range of wooden toys. These are wooden toys that look anything but old-fashioned. Too bad the PlanToys webshop doesn't do international shipping (and their prices only listed in Thai Baht), and there seems to be no retailer that carries all of their products. But if you Google the name of the product you're interested in, they'll come up in various shops around the world.

Pictured above:

1. Balancing Cactus, a balancing game for 1-4 players. Put additional branches without toppling it down. Looks gorgeous doing nothing on the shelves as well.

2. Tree House. I just love it. I do realise my child might prefer a more housy kind of doll house when she gets to that point, but the Tree House is just the coolest looking doll house I've seen so far (even boys might want to play with it).

3. It might look a bit lonely standing on its own, but City Station is part of the PlanCity range. Instead of the quintessential boyish railroad set, little girls might relate better to a city playset with roads (and cars) instead. PlanCity range comes with a variety of buildings from Hamburger Drive-Through and Ice Cream Kiosk to Pier and Airport.

4. The answer to all my problems: Tori is a collapsible rocking horse. If I could find one before Peanut's birthday (without delivery costing the same as the horse, if not worse), I'm getting it.