LOVE IT! Thursdays: Christmas Toy

Now that the dust is settled, the tree is gone, the living room back to its normal state of chaos, and the girls have gotten major playing time in with their Christmas loot, I thought I'd share my favorite toy that they got from "Santa."

It's gotta be the Candyland Castle game by Hasbro!

Not only does this game bring back fond memories of my childhood and playing the original Candyland Game, but it really is fun and perfect for my girls' ages. Basically, the game comes with a castle where you drop in assorted colorful shape pieces. Each player is given a gingerbread man playing card and you take turns pulling the candycane lever to release one of the shapes. The first one to fill up their playing card with the matching shapes wins. It's not rocket science by any means, but it's been good for hours of fun during the past couple of weeks. And the great thing is that each child gets something different out of it depending on their age and skill level. For example, Giggles is content (and surprisingly good at!) matching the shapes to those on her playing card, while Chatterbox plays with multiple cards at once and, in addition to matching the shapes, she practices her colors and the shape names. It's also the perfect introduction on family board game etiquette; i.e., wait for your turn, sit down in one spot for longer than 15 seconds, etc. And it's something everyone on the family can play.

The only con: the box the game comes in doesn't serve as a storage box (the entire front is open), so it's hard to store the castle, cards, and shapes without ending up with them scattered all over the house. I need to find a containter of my own to store it in.

I give the Candyland Castle Game:

4 gavels: "Liked it. I would definitely recommend it."

What's your favorite toy?