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Worst Toys Ever

9K views 125 replies 78 participants last post by  Artichokie 
#1 ·
Now that the kids have had a chance to play with some of their toys, I figured parents would have had the chance to determine which toys were unsafe, totally lame or just not worth the hype. This actually was brought on by our dd opening the Glitter Lava they got and attempting to play with this gooey stuff. It's AWFUL. It's a complete MESS. It does NOT wash away! Ugh! I'm cringing thinking I may be unclogging the bathroom drain at some point in the future from the bits of it that escaped down there.

What tops your list?
 
#27 ·
Quote:

Originally Posted by bandgeek View Post
Transformers. "Mom I need help transforming this!" "I don't know how to do it either baby." "But MOM, you HAVE to, I CAN'T!" "I'm not lying kiddo, I really don't know how" *child throws himself on the floor and proceeds to cry hysterically*

Luckily I found that out months ago and he didn't receive and transformers from me for xmas (his dad got him some but they stay at HIS house).

And I'm not lying. I really can't figure out those freaking things.

Too funny! I remember my DS had a Transformer and I was sitting at the library trying to transform it. I finally figured it out and I got all excited. I'm sure the other parents there thought I was crazy.


The thing I don't get about Transformers is they seem to be super popular with preschoolers. Why don't they make easy to transform ones? (Although maybe they do, DS doesn't seem to like them anymore so I haven't looked at them recently.)
 
#28 ·
Quote:

Originally Posted by ~Boudicca~ View Post
And Zhu zhu pets. Irritating and will be forgotten in about 3 days.
We love the hamsters here! DD wraps hers up in a blanket and carries it around half the time. I kinda think they're cute


Quote:

Originally Posted by KirstenMary View Post
Can I ask you where you got your colors? We can only find them on Amazon, and they are pretty expensive. I am thinking of making a trip to Michael's, but with three kiddos and snowy weather (and it's a loooooong trip), I am a tad hesitant.
I found 3 pks of it at Walmart. Runs about $8 each, not cheap, but they have it by the PlayDoh section.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Hoopin' Mama View Post

Do you kids still play Lite Brite?? Is that a good toy.

May moonsand never enter my home.
DD is 5 and has one of the flat travel light brites. She's just now getting to where she can play with it (the tray for the pegs is hard to flip. My half brother and his wife gave it to her when she was THREE! Their son turns 3 next year, wanna guess what he's getting for Christmas?
) DS is 7 and has been asking for one recently. I have my old box one that works great so I'm going to dig it out for him.
 
#30 ·
Quote:

Originally Posted by lindberg99 View Post
Too funny! I remember my DS had a Transformer and I was sitting at the library trying to transform it. I finally figured it out and I got all excited. I'm sure the other parents there thought I was crazy.


The thing I don't get about Transformers is they seem to be super popular with preschoolers. Why don't they make easy to transform ones? (Although maybe they do, DS doesn't seem to like them anymore so I haven't looked at them recently.)
Transformers come in different skill levels and they come with instructions.

However, in my house, DH is in charge of Transformers.
 
#31 ·
Quote:

Originally Posted by Caneel View Post
DH and I had the same conversation over and over and over again. No, I don't think an electric train set is a good idea.

Why? Because our DS is not developmentally ready to play with it.

So what, why can't I get him one? Because I don't want to deal with the frustration, crying and breakage, that is way.

What does DH go out and buy? The smallest, most fragile, most breakable electric train set and track ever manufactured.

After 15+ hours of continous screams of "mommy, fix my trains!!!!" DS finally broke a tiny piece off the track and it is totally broken.

Is it wrong of me to be happy?
We got DS1 his first train set when he was 2.5. We got the wooden kind. It's the kind that fits with the Thomas stuff, same size etc, but not as expensive-- we got the generic kind from Target and IKEA. It's great! Nothing has ever broken, and he and now his little brother, also, love playing with it!
 
#32 ·
Quote:

Originally Posted by Polliwog View Post
I gave my kids Zhu Zhu pets on Christmas Eve. They LOVE them. One is missing and they are heartbrokenly trying to find it under furniture. We don't have the tunnels or anything but the hamsters are adorable.
I wish my daughter had a longer memory. Did they find it yet?

I must say though the Zhu zhu pet beats the hell out of the real hamster we used to have, which died in the fall. I'm not sorry to see her gone
 
#34 ·
Quote:

Originally Posted by bandgeek View Post
Transformers. "Mom I need help transforming this!" "I don't know how to do it either baby." "But MOM, you HAVE to, I CAN'T!" "I'm not lying kiddo, I really don't know how" *child throws himself on the floor and proceeds to cry hysterically*

Luckily I found that out months ago and he didn't receive and transformers from me for xmas (his dad got him some but they stay at HIS house).

And I'm not lying. I really can't figure out those freaking things.

My son is over transformers now (thank goodness) but a few years ago I played stupid. My motto was "Mommy does not know how to transform them - ask Daddy!"


I have to say all of the toys we got this year have been wonderful! He got magic and spy kits that have a zillion tiny pieces, but he's been pretty good about keeping up with them. We just have to use them on a table so the dog does not run off with and chew pieces.
 
#35 ·
Quote:

Originally Posted by lindberg99 View Post
Also, Shoots and Ladders, just because I hate it when I get all the way to the top and hit one of those long shoots and go back to the beginning!

I hate that damn game. First of all the board is too "busy", too many designs, too many chances to "lose". HATE IT. I donated ours, but really felt I should throw it away and save some other poor mom the trouble.

Quote:

Originally Posted by AllyRae View Post
LOL...I totally disagree with moonsand. We just keep it in a long flat tote and use it on the kitchen floor. I love it and bought the kids another 8 bowls of it for Christmas. LOL!!

Now, pixos, I hate. My 6 year old was so looking forward to them and they don't work well at all for us.
I had fun with the Pixos, damn shame the kids couldn't do them!

Quote:

Originally Posted by Polliwog View Post
I gave my kids Zhu Zhu pets on Christmas Eve. They LOVE them. One is missing and they are heartbrokenly trying to find it under furniture. We don't have the tunnels or anything but the hamsters are adorable.
Dd loves her hamster. Our new puppy however, likes the hamster wayyyy more. She attacks that little thing every time it hits the ground.
 
#36 ·
Quote:

Originally Posted by bandgeek View Post
Transformers. "Mom I need help transforming this!" "I don't know how to do it either baby." "But MOM, you HAVE to, I CAN'T!" "I'm not lying kiddo, I really don't know how" *child throws himself on the floor and proceeds to cry hysterically*

Luckily I found that out months ago and he didn't receive and transformers from me for xmas (his dad got him some but they stay at HIS house).

And I'm not lying. I really can't figure out those freaking things.


I feel your pain, insert craptastic trains for transformers and you have my Christmas Day.

Quote:

Originally Posted by LionTigerBear View Post
We got DS1 his first train set when he was 2.5. We got the wooden kind. It's the kind that fits with the Thomas stuff, same size etc, but not as expensive-- we got the generic kind from Target and IKEA. It's great! Nothing has ever broken, and he and now his little brother, also, love playing with it!
And this is what is so frustrating about the "Train Thing" with DH. DS has been into his wooden trains since at least 2 yo. Loves them, can set up all sorts of scenarios, plays creatively and so on.

I kept saying to DH over and over, "lets get him more track, set up the track around the tree and get him a battery Thomas or whatever so he can use his track, his trains and he can play with it" I have no problem with DS crawling around under the tree.

But no, DH had to bring home that Nightmare in a Box. He kept blaming the frustration in the brand, that if he only would have gotten the Lionel train he (read
H) wanted, there wouldn't have been any problems.

This is all total b.s. because the size of the train was the problem, it was simply too small with too many tiny wheels on tiny axles. If I breathed wrong, it slipped off the track.

At one point, I just put my head down on the floor to gather my patience and DS said "mommy, don't be sad, I will be good with my trains" It was heartbreaking because he wasn't doing anything wrong, he wanted to play with the trains like his wooden ones.
 
#37 ·
Rocky the Robot Truck

I'm really hoping this thing breaks soon! It's loud and incredibly irritating. My 4yo has already lost interest in it, and my 2yo is beginning to lose interest. No redeeming value to this thing whatsoever.

Elmo Live Encore

Also loud and irritating! My kids weren't impressed at all. It seems to be designed to appeal to adults more than little kids.

This was, apparently, the Christmas of Loud Annoying Junky Robotic Toys at our house. As far as the other toys mentioned -

Moon Sand - 4yo adores it, will sit and play with it for hours without making too much of a mess. Unfortunately little brother is also fascinated with it, but prefers to dump fistfulls of the stuff on the floor and track it through the rest of the house. So Moon Sand has been retired here.

Chutes and Ladders - wtf? Why is this a classic kids' game? The board is so poorly designed. Even I forget which way to go sometimes (left or right) if I'm not paying attention to the numbers, the chutes and ladders aren't really clearly defined, and I need to direct DS way too much when we play. I heart Candyland, though.

Transformers - I can't figure them out either.
That's strictly a Daddy thing now; they're like Rubik's cubes to me.
 
#41 ·
Rocky the Robot Truck

I'm really hoping this thing breaks soon! It's loud and incredibly irritating. My 4yo has already lost interest in it, and my 2yo is beginning to lose interest. No redeeming value to this thing whatsoever.

Ah yes, Rocky, sweet Rocky...
My son received one of those from fil. He played with it for an hour straight..just kept pushing the button over and over and over. I finally took it away for a little bit b/c it was driving me batty. I seriously felt like I was going over the edge very quickly! When we brought it home from fils house
I was panicking that that is all I would be hearing for hours at a time. My four year old has barely touched it again. Although suprised, I'm quite glad. That is def. a toy that will be making its way out of the house sooner, rather than later!
 
#38 ·
Quote:

Originally Posted by BellinghamCrunchie View Post
Barbie dolls. I just hate them

Me too.


DD received a black scratch pad where you scrape of the black part and the color comes through.

Cool idea but TOTALLY messy. I'm not into it. I'd much rather give her a pad of paper and a handful of crayons and let her have at it.
 
#40 ·
Quote:

Originally Posted by Caneel View Post
DH and I had the same conversation over and over and over again. No, I don't think an electric train set is a good idea.

Why? Because our DS is not developmentally ready to play with it.

So what, why can't I get him one? Because I don't want to deal with the frustration, crying and breakage, that is way.

What does DH go out and buy? The smallest, most fragile, most breakable electric train set and track ever manufactured.

After 15+ hours of continous screams of "mommy, fix my trains!!!!" DS finally broke a tiny piece off the track and it is totally broken.

Is it wrong of me to be happy?
This back and forth conversation sounds so familar. DH wants to buy toys that HE wants himself, reliving his childhood, I guess. If it's electronic, loud, with bells and whistles and lights and movement all the better.

He thinks anything that isn't (any simple toy or Waldorf style) is crap and boring. He doesn't really get the whole imagination building aspect of play.
 
#42 ·
A Fisher Price plastic airport for my animal-obsessed 19 mo old that I TOLD my bro not to get--get him animals, please!--but no. His kids liked it, so of course mine will too!
So that giant piece of plastic is sitting unloved in my LR until I get the nerve up to donate it. Overall, our toy gifts I can handle, because I bought them all. It's clothes that are totally the wrong size that have put the Yule log up my butt this year. Not to mention my toddler/preschooler don't get a lot of joy out of opening dressy matching outfits from Gymboree even if they weren't last year's sizes.
 
#43 ·
Quote:

Originally Posted by ~Boudicca~ View Post
I wish my daughter had a longer memory. Did they find it yet?

I must say though the Zhu zhu pet beats the hell out of the real hamster we used to have, which died in the fall. I'm not sorry to see her gone


The girls each got the white ZZ from our neighbor and I have one word of warning (actually, several words). Those wheels eat hair to the point where said hair needs to be, um, cut.


Don't let an active ZZ "crawl" up your child's face and near any hair whatsoever. Boo.
 
#44 ·
All the toys at our house so far this Christmas have been great! The only slightly annoying toys were the Nerf guns but I knew that going in.
The kids think it's funny to shoot me and hear me yelp. Also, we have multiple bullets missing and one of the magazines was stuck in DH's gun (yes he *needed* one for Christmas too
) for most of Christmas day. But things are o.k. with them.

The only presents that might be questionable will be opened on New Year's Day at my sister's house. She is getting DSD 12 a decorate-your-own-messenger-bag kit from Target and DSD 10 Barbie and Taffy. I actually picked them out for the girls because I know they will love them but the paint will certainly end up on something it shouldn't and as best I can tell, one of Taffy's puppies will piddle after you give it water to drink.


Other than that, "Santa" did a great job this year picking out toys that are being played with consistently and nothing's broken! I
Playmobil!
 
#45 ·
My MIL got DD a Mcdonalds drive thru toy, which is getting freecycled this weekend. She wants to play with it, but I have to draw the line! We already have a wooden play kitchen + a slew of wooden & felt foods, and I really don't want her flipping plastic burgers around wearing a Mcdonalds apron...just..no
 
#46 ·
I have to agree with others about the Transformers.Ds is OBSESSED with them,and I just can't figure them out.I have him wait until his dad comes over,or his grandfather.I have one on my desk that he broke apart out of frustration.My mom bought him a HUGE one called Devestator,it breaks up into 6 trucks.
Sure give that to an easily frustrated child on the autism spectrum.He loves it,but can't put it back together.

We
moonsand here.Even my 11yo will play with it.We have it in a sandbox that stands a little off the floor,and 8yo ds,11yo dd,and 5yo dniece will play for at least an hour when I bring it out.

We also love the zhu zhus.Don't bother with the accesories though,they really don't work very well.It's better just to let them run around.

All in all the toys they received have been great.I can't really complain.My dad bought them a Wii with games,my mom bought Wii fit and we couldn't be happier.It is so much fun!
 
#47 ·
Quote:

Originally Posted by Caneel View Post
And this is what is so frustrating about the "Train Thing" with DH. DS has been into his wooden trains since at least 2 yo. Loves them, can set up all sorts of scenarios, plays creatively and so on.

I kept saying to DH over and over, "lets get him more track, set up the track around the tree and get him a battery Thomas or whatever so he can use his track, his trains and he can play with it" I have no problem with DS crawling around under the tree.

But no, DH had to bring home that Nightmare in a Box. He kept blaming the frustration in the brand, that if he only would have gotten the Lionel train he (read: DH) wanted, there wouldn't have been any problems.

This is all total b.s. because the size of the train was the problem, it was simply too small with too many tiny wheels on tiny axles. If I breathed wrong, it slipped off the track.

At one point, I just put my head down on the floor to gather my patience and DS said "mommy, don't be sad, I will be good with my trains" It was heartbreaking because he wasn't doing anything wrong, he wanted to play with the trains like his wooden ones.
Wow, that is soooo frustrating.
 
#48 ·
Quote:

Originally Posted by SparklingGemini View Post
DD received a black scratch pad where you scrape of the black part and the color comes through.

Cool idea but TOTALLY messy. I'm not into it. I'd much rather give her a pad of paper and a handful of crayons and let her have at it.
My kids & all their friends LOVE those, but I can't imagine giving them to an under 3!!! My DD is 10 & DS is 8, so maybe put them away for later?
 
#49 ·
Quote:
I had fun with the Pixos, damn shame the kids couldn't do them!
ITA! Lol.
Mine doesn't have enough patience to sit with me and do them yet.
He had real toy disillusionment with this one.

Quote:
Chutes and Ladders - wtf? Why is this a classic kids' game? The board is so poorly designed. Even I forget which way to go sometimes (left or right) if I'm not paying attention to the numbers, the chutes and ladders aren't really clearly defined, and I need to direct DS way too much when we play. I heart Candyland, though.
Oh, good. I thought I was just a failure at trying to teach him this one. You're right, I even found myself going, "Oops, wrong way. The numbers go up this way."
And I think I got all the way to the top about 10 times just to slide down the same silly ladder. Ugh! No wonder this is so frustrating for kids.


We enjoy Candyland much more.


The biggest hit was the monster Hot Wheels track with the big loop. Even I had some fun watching the cars go loop-de-loo, shoot off down the hall and crash into the wall!!!!

We already have over 200 cars...just shoot them off one after the other!!!! Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! Lol.
 
#50 ·
Quote:

Originally Posted by Caneel View Post

But no, DH had to bring home that Nightmare in a Box. He kept blaming the frustration in the brand, that if he only would have gotten the Lionel train he (read
H) wanted, there wouldn't have been any problems.

This is all total b.s. because the size of the train was the problem, it was simply too small with too many tiny wheels on tiny axles. If I breathed wrong, it slipped off the track.
Well, if he was talking about a Lionel O gauge versus a cheapie HO gauge, that probably wouldn't have been a problem.

The O gauge tracks and trains are a lot larger than the HO. We let the 3-year-old play with his O gauge Lionel set for the first time this Christmas, and that was fine. But I remember having problems with HO sets when I was much older, because they are so much pickier.
 
#51 ·
Quote:

Originally Posted by cschick View Post
Well, if he was talking about a Lionel O gauge versus a cheapie HO gauge, that probably wouldn't have been a problem.

The O gauge tracks and trains are a lot larger than the HO. We let the 3-year-old play with his O gauge Lionel set for the first time this Christmas, and that was fine. But I remember having problems with HO sets when I was much older, because they are so much pickier.
Based on an eye-ball guess-ta-met I would say the track was an inch or less wide. Devil's work I tell you! To get the trains on the track, I kid you not, either DH or I would need to lay on the floor with a maglite, shining the beam on the wheels to set them just so on the track and then join the cars. And then DS would bump the cord, moving the track a hair and we would need to start all over again....

I swear I have a mild PTSD from that stupid train.

I did say to DH about going to a real train store and getting a big Lionel train. A friend of the family is married to someone that works at a train store and he recommended the same thing you did.

I think DH was trying to minimize my displeasure with the line of thought that if he didn't spend too much, I couldn't get mad at him. Boy did that not work out as he expected!
 
#52 ·
Quote:

Originally Posted by That Is Nice View Post
This back and forth conversation sounds so familar. DH wants to buy toys that HE wants himself, reliving his childhood, I guess. If it's electronic, loud, with bells and whistles and lights and movement all the better.
DH tries to convince me that DS wants toys that I'm pretty sure DH really wants. He went on and on about this really expensive electronic thing that you could put into playmobil trucks to make them remote controlled. I kept explaining that DS would be more interested in taking it apart to figure out how it worked than actually playing with it (cheap old alarm clocks work fine as things to take apart.)
 
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