$$$ v. PVC Pipe
I don’t have dollar amount but I’m certain me and the Mrs. have spent well into the thousands of dollars on toys for Junior. But Saturday night, she and I were piddling in the garage (making a stand alone target stand, if you must know) when we started playing a game. We’d take two small pieces of PVC pipe and set them at the top of the driveway and release them. They’d roll down the driveway. We were racing PVC pipe. When then go to the bottom of the driveway to retrieve the pipe and do it again. We did this for about two hours. $1.50 worth of PVC pipe was more entertaining than all of our toys.
April 17th, 2006 at 10:43 am
Everyone knows the toy isn’t as fun as the box it came in!
April 17th, 2006 at 12:44 pm
If I could tell you of the hours of enjoyment my Jr got from a box we used to carry stuff home from Costco. That box got played with (and in) until it fell apart. Actually, it was repaired several times with duct tape.
April 17th, 2006 at 1:14 pm
Bugs and dirt are big low cost winners in the summer. Yeah, boxes are fun too 🙂
April 17th, 2006 at 3:43 pm
the ubiquitous freezer/washer/dryer box, a steak knife or scissors with supervision, some tape, construction paper, saran wrap, etc. and I was occupied for *weeks* on end.
Later on when my “tastes” grew more discerning I had several cheap sets of construx and legos.
And honestly every so often I still get the urge to whip out the blocks.
April 17th, 2006 at 4:50 pm
My wife, who works at the local hospital, was overjoyed when they got a new machine in the lab (she works in the lab). Not because the new machine was going to make her life easier, but because it came in a GIANT honkin’ box. She had to put both seats down in the Durango to get it home.
The kids, naturally, *LOVED* it. It has been a spaceship, a pirate ship, a house, a submarine, a fort, and several dozen other things.
Mind you, it’s located in the toy room, amongst the net worth of several third world nations’ worth of toys, gee-gaws, and doo-dads…