Love Toys, Hate Buying Them?
Why your kids need a Spark Box!
The first four years of a baby’s life are such a whirlwind for the parents: Did she eat enough? When was the last time she pooped? Does my 2-year-old really need a Chinese class? Should I be thinking about kindergarten? Already? With all this going on, it’s easy to overlook the fact that your baby’s brain is developing faster than it will at any other time in her life—and that her lifelong capacity for learning will be mostly cemented before she walks in for the first day of Kindergarten.
But shopping for babies is hard! We all know finding the right toys to stimulate our children is important but how can you tell which rattle will actually help them learn cause and effect or which stacking toy best develops their coordination? This is why I love the concept of Spark Box Toys. They take the guess work out of choosing the best toys for kids!
Spark Box Toys is a monthly subscription service that delivers four or more developmentally appropriate toys for your child aged six months to 4 years old. The toys have been hand-selected by a group of educational experts. Every box is designed to promote the development of all four developmental categories: physical, emotional, cognitive and linguistic. Spark Box Toys carries 29 brands and only 8 are found at Toys R Us (See some of the brands they work with here.)
Check out this sample box for a 2 years old. It is filled with a 10-piece mirror block set, a LeapFrog alphabet learner, creative stacking arcs and a reading/role playing activity for you and your child. All chosen by experts to match a 2 years old’s developmental skill levels.
The nice thing about Sparkbox isn’t just that they send you developmentally appropriate toys for your kids. You also get to send them back (Less clutter! Good for the Earth!) and get four new ones sent (New stimuli! New skills! No visit to the toy aisle!). Plus, as your child gets older, so do the toy selections.
Already have a certain toy or can’t stand toys that make noise? You can see the toys set to be sent in the next month’s shipment and choose to swap any of them out for another toy. When it’s time to return the toys, use the pre-paid shipping label Spark Box sends you. Or if you’re not quite done with that round of toys, you can hang on to them for a little while longer – no late fees at Spark Box!
Take this toy survey and get a developmental matrix for kids 0-4 that outlines what educational experts have deemed as proper milestones for your child. So that the next time you go to the toy store, you know what to ask for!
Be sure to take the survey listed above! It helped me with some answers I had about Baby E and what the best toy for him was. Don’t worry if it takes a little while to arrive in your email box, it took mine a little while as well.
