No more plastic toys!!!

My DDs make a point of only buying 2nd hand plastic toys for their children. For presents I prefer them to tell me what and where I've to get them, or they buy it and I pay. It means the children just have no extraneous rubbish!

IMO this is a lot easier when children are very small. When older they do tend to ask for things that just don’t come in wood.
My dd partly gets around it by buying only 2nd hand, either from charity shops or FB marketplace, etc., so at least it’s not new plastic.

Gds’ Christmas present Lego was all 2nd hand, and Barbie-mad elder Gdd has a lot of them, plus much of the associated paraphernalia, but except for one which Bad Granny bought new, the whole lot were ‘pre-loved’ - and miles cheaper.

Waterstones the bookshop has a wonderful range of well priced wooden toys.

I’ve discovered Jaques of London. Beautifully packed well made wooden toys and my grandsons loved them. We’ve had dominoes, chess, backgammon and mahjong sets, amongst others, and they are gorgeous. Loads of toys and games to choose from and prices to suit all pockets.

I hate watching one of the children's TV programmes where they are unwrapping like there's not tomorrow lots of silly little plastic toys. My DDs only buys 2nd hand plastic toys for their children, never new

Bath toys can best be made from articles around the home. A colandar, or sieve, any plastic bottle with holes punched in it. No need to purchase anything special.
Cardboard boxes (provided you have somewhere to keep them, will provide children of all ages countless hours of imaginative play. My children are now in their late forties/early fifties, but still treasure photo of three of them, plus a couple of stuffed toys, in a long train made out of several boxes.

In the good weather, would purchase lining paper for walls, and put great lengths of this outside in garden, along with loads of water-based paints for them to make as much mess as they liked.

Wooden dolls house from Galts (back in the early 1970's, along with Galts wooden trikes. Children do NOT need a massive amount of toys, a few that give them the opportunity for using their own imaginations and time with adults to join in is far more important.

Why not ask your daughter if it's something the child would like?

You can get some lovely wooden toys even for babies, such as this. www.scandiborn.co.uk/collections/baby-toys-up-to-12-months/products/little-dutch-roller-rattle-in-little-goose-olive I have a similar one from my dds, which I think was a Brio version.

Melissa and Doug do lots of good wooden toys, they’re my go-to for imaginative play. Some things are fine in plastic, though, stacking cups and building blocks (especially the ones that become air-borne!?) as well as the ever-lasting Lego.

I go for intangible gifts. Music lessons, days out, that sort of thing. Children accumulate far too much clutter these days.

The Mother of my sil threw out all his Lego, there was a lot, so a massive amount of £££ has been spent replacing fir my gc to play happily with. Needless to say their Lego will be carefully kept fir future generations.

Die cast toys such as Dinky are still popular and not just with boys. Tonka toys are expensive, made of steel and indestructible. I wish I'd had those when I was a child. Thomas the Tank Engine toys are also die cast and run on wooden rails. Endless fun.

It depends at what age you give the wooden toys. They are not appropriate for babies to chew or toddlers to brain each other with which one of mine did with a wooden rattle supplied by grandmother when my back was turned.
A wooden toy is no good and far too heavy for a baby first learning to grasp and hold things. That is why we feed them and let them feed themselves with plastic spoons and not wooden ones.
Then wooden toys can be introduced but you have to convince all the relatives and never take your child into a toy shop again or they will go straight for the brightly coloured plastic tat. Advertisements encourage them to collect plastic dolls and other things for boys.
We have a lovely wooden dolls house with wooden furniture which we bought but was returned to us to play with on visits when the other relations supplied a Barbie Castle.
Leggo is the one exception as other posters have said.
Bright shiny plastic will win over wood any time if a choice is given or even seen. in a supermarket or on T.V.
As a teacher, the wooden Brio trains were pristine at the end of the term the wooden spades were unused but the plastic had to be replaced.

We still have our daughters Lego from the early 1970s it was brought out and added to by the grandchildren and has now all been packed away for future generations.
MzOops insisted on wooden only toys when the grandchildren were born and has since sold them on.

Yes I changed my gifts a couple of years ago to books mainly activity types. As I am an English Nanna to French grandchildren, this has gone down well with their Mothers.
However the horrible tax charges on
ordering from book outlets in England is challenging .

Probably apart from Lego....

Mountains of plastic toys are an abomination. Young children have far too many toys and most is never even played with.
Give them a cardboard box and they will use their imagination and play happily for hours.

I would happily ban plastic toys but my 8 yr old GS and his Dad are Lego fanatics they build the models together.

No, you are certainly not alone.
My niece refused to have any plastic toys or clothes for her babies. She started a revolution in the family and so now we all do our best to avoid plastic toys - the exception is the stacking and pouring cup set for the bath.