Toys my children played

Posted by noemi in Parenting Tips, Parents & Children | 4 comments

TweetI never realized the value my children placed on their toys until Marielle interviewed me for her research paper on “Toys and Games I played with” for her Psychology course.

She said “Thank God mom for the girly and not so girly toys”.

I chose their [tag]toys[/tag] wisely because we didn’t have substantial income when the kids were younger. My husband was still at Law School when the 2 girls were born. I bought toys that nurtured their imagination and creativity. Whether it was toys classified for boys or for girls, I chose it for its educational value.

Lauren and Marielle loved Lego blocks. They had lots and lots of [tag]LEGO[/tag] blocks. They had the larger DUPLO blocks when they were toddlers. At that time. Lego was sold in disassembled bricks, so they were free to create any figures their young minds could imagine. Even until the age of 9, they spent all afternoon ignoring their Barbie dolls and instead built fortresses, houses, schools and whatnot. No wonder, I gave the Barbie Dolls away to my younger nieces. It was gathering dust.

At the age of 5 or 6, I bought Polly Pockets during a trip to Hongkong’s Toys-R-US. Polly Pockets were cute tiny boxes that fit in my girl’s tiny pockets. Inside contained a miniature house with a miniature doll slightly larger than a nail. Each house was unique. I bought 7 of those and the girls created a little village. But I noticed the entire population of the village was female. Until Max moved into the neighborhood.

Mighty Max shared the same concept with Polly, pocket-sized and tiny, except that instead of pianists and dressmakers, Max was an adventurous young boy who always had to free himself from the clutches of mummies and zombies. So instead of a normal house or bathroom, Mighty Max was contained in a dungeon, a mad scientist lab or an Egyptian tomb. Instead of a pet cat or dog, he had the undead chasing after him. Max had many possible things going on for him: he could get stuck in a trap, locked in a jail cell, trapped to the other end of the wall, find secret pathways leading to treasure – basically, he led a more exciting life than Polly.

When Marielle was in nursery, she told her girl classmate about all the adventures she had with her Legos.

“Yuck!” she frowned. “Diba pang-lalaki lang yun?” (Isn’t that for boys?)

My girls never looked at it that way at all. Today whenever they pass by a toy store, or when they visit their younger cousins, they can’t help noticing that little girls today don’t play Lego. As a child it didn’t matter to them if the games they played were masculine or feminine, as long as it provided hours and hours of fun and creativity.

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