Tomica Tracks and Trackmaster Engines

I was introduced into the Tomica world by a Japanese friend of mine who gifted me a Tomica Plarail set which I shall be discussing in another blog. I am an avid collector of Thomas and friends playsets and engines, though in India, the variety is very less available. These are awesome to keep your kid engaged, especially with train crashes. My son loves to crash the trains than to watch them just running around the track for a long time. There are loads of youtube videos with such train crashes.

Thomas and his Friends as I can see is pretty much a recent concept here and are very expensive. May be that explains why they are less available in this part of the world where I live in. So are the Tomica rail sets, promoted by Funskool. Many kids prefer cars and Hot Wheels are famous here. But it has to wait until my son gets crazy with cars. For now, I am happy collecting trains and tracks as it is my son's favorite too!

Here is a layout that one can make with the blue Plarail tracks. Very simple to assemble, of course, my 2 year old assembles it very well with help from my brother. Shinkansen (The Japanese Bullet Train) is running on it which comes with the Tomy Tomica 85412 - Hypercity Road and Rail Crossing Set.  I will come up with more ideas for track assembly in future. Until then, here is a Youtube video of the assembly with talking Trackmaster James and Henry on it -

Digger, The Dog

Cats and Dogs, they are typical and faithful kid teaching materials!!!

I never knew of Digger until I saw him walked by a 4 year old in my family physician's premises. My son was instantly attracted to this yellow toy with floppy ears and a red cap.

I did not know what this toy was called and Google instantly educated me about this toy and now my son owns one. He loves going for an evening walk with digger running faithfully behind him.

I found that Digger has been existing since 1970's and you can see that in this age old commercial,  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j6J0a9vaAw0 . I especially like the jingle that the ad features, Digger the dog, digging he goes with you when you explore, just pull his leash and go for a walk, he's your dog for sure!" 

The search for digger made me find other variations of it, the Fisher Price Little Snoopy,  and Walk 'n Sounds Digger the Dog from Playskool with more sound variation. But then, as they say old is gold, Digger gets my vote, a beautifully designed pull along toy with sniffy, detective like look!

LEGO - The Nurse's Car

A friend of mine came to India to visit me during the February 2012 and gifted this to my son. Before telling how awesome this toy is, I should describe this...

This duplo set (Code: 5793) comes with 10 toy pieces, a car (comprising of 2 inter lockable pieces and the the blue flash light block for the car's rear), a brick with medical decor, a flower, a Nurse figure, a small medi-kit (a carry case as one might also call it). The pieces are brightly colored perfectly fit into the little hands. No dearth for imaginations. My little one was 15 months old when he got this toy. This toy with just 10 pieces kept him engaged for for hours together, even today. A best gift one could give for a kid's first birthday. 

When this toy came in we started getting him blocks and construction sets available at our local market. Our knowledge in the toy market was at a very primitive level, and the blocks at the local market were the most affordable. Firstly, that we were not aware that LEGO had already taken charge of the Indian toy market and secondly they were not affordable. I still remember we had the small blocks and construction sets available to us and we were always looking for the ones like that. My son of course would play with them all but would be tired of them since they kept falling, they wont snap strongly with each other and were made of cheap plastic materials. So FAILED ATTEMPTS to keep him engaged!!! Now name the block toy and we had it all. To add to the misery, neither imaginative figures or accessories came with them nor were they compatible with each other. We landed up only spending a lots of money on nothing. 

         

But then, one good thing such construction toys, name them, cheap or expensive, they will definitely help build the motor and imaginative skills of your ever growing and ever learning bundle of joy! Here is his first construction tower (of course not Lego but one of my experimental toys on him!)