Thursday, August 27, 2009

Toys

I have a confession to make - while commenting on Art's post on toys, I proudly claimed to have kept plastics at bay. However, that bubble burst as soon as I looked into Pattu's room. More plastic than I had imagined - lots of Funskool toys - gifted and bought, a kitchen set - gifted and she likes it a lot, lego blocks, some bats and balls, and a few others. About 40% of her toys are plastic. Revelation!

What struck me was not just the amount of plastic toys that we had, but the fact that I consider myself to be educated, quite conscious towards environment and averse to plastic and I have so much plastic at home. I wonder what a home that is not averse to plastic must look like.

I personally like the wooden toys - of course if the finish is not good, it can be dangerous. I do have some from Ringo, Vanilla Place, Cane & Bamboo and exhibitions. I especially love the wooden choppu set that I have.

Another favourite is the stuffed cloth puppets - I had a witch and a clown - the clown survived and the witch died (she was more popular with the kids and suffered more wear and tear therefore :) ). I like the monoact with these puppets - Pattu likes it too and joins in sometimes. My childhood favourite is the 'thalayatti bommai' that thanjavur is famous for.

Pattu seems to have these seasonal preferences - for some time she would just be obsessed with one kind of activity and dump it completely once she has had enough of it and moves to the next obsession. Anyways, this topic has been an eye opener and I have vowed to be more and more conscious about the plastic invasion.

4 comments:

suchismita said...

Nice introspective post. We should all look at plastics in our life.
I found that the toys i got for the kids were more to my taste than theirs... they loved spoons, pots, pans, boxes etc...

apu said...

I seriously wonder how parents keep plastics at bay. That's what seems to be the most easily available. Most wood etc only seem to be stocked at specialty stores/exhibitions etc. It's a pity mainstream stores don't seem to encourage our traditionals toys and crafts.

Swati said...

wow..kuddos ..thats a nice way to do little for environment !

Uma said...

Suchi, yeah, I do taht whenever I buy them, but there's little you can do to control what others bring..

Apu - difficult. most of the leading toy brands have only plastic toys... but there are some good Indian brands available in select stores

Swati - thanks :)