Firing children’s imagination with wooden toys from George Home
I’ve always been partial to wooden toys. They tend to be more classic, reminders of back to my youth, and last longer than plastic toys. Right from N being a baby, we’ve tended towards wood for toys, including his first ride on truck and tricycle through to his wooden railway which he’s just got out again ready for more wintry weather when he’s less likely to go outdoors to play.
We were given the opportunity to check out some of George Homes’ wooden toy range and really get into imaginative play as part of their #WhatWoodYouPlay campaign. N is quite interested in the planets and the moon, so the wooden rocket was on our list to try out.
My poor old Phillips screwdriver just wouldn’t screw it together tight enough, so after buying a new ratchet screwdriver, I put the rocket together in under 10 minutes, while N scrabbled around to remove all the play pieces from the packaging. The first thing we noticed was how big the rocket is. When N kneels down, it’s about his height. It’s a 360 degree design so there’s plenty of room around it for several children to play at once. Perfect for when he’s got friends to play.
The only downside we’ve found is that the top cone part of the rocket doesn’t fit into the slots very well, which means it knocks out of place quite easily. N has however used it as a mini rocket on its own, flying it through the sky.
Otherwise, the rocket’s gone down well with N, and even the OH hasn’t referred to it as tat, which he usually does when N gets new toys!
The rocket has several platforms, and is brightly coloured. It’s not too heavy for N to move it around, although he does get a bit impatient expecting to be able to carry it without all the pieces falling off which obviously isn’t going to work.
There are lots of old fashioned space pieces included in the set: 2 spacemen with moveable legs so you can make them sit down, space buggies, signals, consoles and more. These can be played with on or off the rocket.
While the rocket is aimed at age 3+, I think N will have a couple of years of play left in it. He’s already had his string of planet decorations off the shelf so he can put them around where his wooden rocket is currently standing, so I think it will create a lot of educational talking points.
N’s already used some of his other toys to join up with his space play. He’s been flying out his rescue helicopter to it and landing there, and the spacemen have been swimming in the ocean. Because they’re learning about sea creatures at the moment, he’s been talking about the water and where the water goes back into the sky to then go in clouds and fall as rain again (I’m big on talking about the weather and he’s a bit obsessed with watching the weather forecast).
It’s great that toys can really spark an interest in so many other external factors and N can see how the links between weather, earth, sea and sky all come together. It’s one of the reasons we love wooden toys so much – they can mix and match and combine with other wooden toys. Much easier to use different sets together because they blend so well compared with plastic.
Are you a fan of wooden toys? What do your children enjoy playing with?
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Disclosure: We were sent the rocket toy for the purpose of this post, all words and opinions are my own.
Great review hunny my two would absolutely love this so much. I love wooden toys too they seem to always last longer. Thank you so much for linking up to Share With Me I hope to see you again tomorrow for another round of #sharewithme
We love wooden toys too. They last so much better than their plastic counter parts. This rocket looks like so much fun! Too bad the top doesn’t stay on, but very clever to use it as an independent rocket that can shoot up! x
He’s not one to let a problem like that phase him. Thanks for stopping by Becky.
I have seen proper wooden toys like these in a long time are they coming back into fashion now? I always thought they possessed a higher quality than today’s products.
They’ve been around and back in fashion since at least my son was born nearly 5 years ago. They do last a lot longer and look nicer than plastic
We love wooden toys and I really like the Asda range we actually got the shop last year for Christmas and its one of Monkey’s favourites. I really like the look of the rocket as its different to the other wooden toys on the market x
I do think the supermarkets do good wooden ranges nowadays – there’s so much more choice.
We have some wooden toys from Asda and we love them! They’re great quality and do get the imagination going 🙂 xx
Yes, I’m really impressed with the quality of supermarket wooden toys. They’re great as well because they work so well together when combined in play.
We are definitely fans of wooden toys over here. I much prefer them. There is just something about wooden toys isn’t there! I actually saw this particular rocket in my local asda the other day I think Archie would love this. A potential Christmas or birth day present for him. I looks like lots of fun x
I totally agree. They look so much better quality than plastic and last through generations of children.
Love wooden toys, you can be guaranteed they will last. Your sons creativity is great, and that’s what is so important to develop at his age. He will spend so many hours to come dreaming up incredible stories for all the characters of his space rocket. Enjoy the down time 😉
Here’s hoping he does use it for what it is, rather than to dump other toys on! That’s what I used to use my Sindy house for – a book shelf!
I’m a big fan of wooden toys and this rocket looks brilliant. We have several wooden jigsaws and I bought a wooden toy train track for Xmas.
You can’t beat a train track because you can just keep adding to it.
oh this looks amazing. i am a huge fan of wooden toys. they always last well and lots of fun
We have this to review too. It looks a lovely set and I think we’ll be getting it out on Friday as I think it’s going to rain and we shall need some serious entertainment. Sounds like we can rely on it for that.
Definitely perfect winter weather toy. N doesn’t have many toys left because he didn’t really need more than the essentials and with summer he’s mostly outdoors, but this will be good going into winter again.
I very nearly bought this the other day before deciding that the kids really don’t need any more toys BUT it’s so different to other wooden toys I’ve seen and Little Man loves rockets! Amazing! x
It’s a bargain too if you’re going to get 2 children’s worth of play out of it!