When To Teach A Child To Ride A Bike

A question we get often from our customers: When should we teach a child to ride? How young is to young to learn to ride a bike? Are the Skuuts and Kiddimoto Balance Bikes too big for my child? Well, because my background is also in physical education, I studied child development, coordination, muscle development and I feel I'm pretty good at answering this question. First both of the bikes are made of natural lacquered wood and the Kiddimoto comes in a wide range of vivid colours. Both of the wooden balance bikes are for children ages 2-5, they provide excellent indoor and outdoor fun and development of large muscle skills and good coordination through riding.
There are major benefits of the bikes that include: Balance, Co-Ordination and movement development, learning through play, physical fitness, steering and independence! These bikes aren't just cool toys, they're a child's first bike that last forever! Children kick off the ground as if running, thus pushing or "skuut-ing" themselves and the bike forward. Unlike the Skuut, the Kiddimoto comes in different designs and colors.

Greens The New Black

Trying to find toys that are good for Mother Earth? Celebrate Earth Day as a Green, Safe, Smart company who is committed to furthering environmental awareness. Take a look at some of these great Eco-Friendly toys by Plan.

The Recycle Game: New! This set includes a dice, a playmat, 4 recycled bins, 4 figures and 16 pieces of recyclable waste tokens. Made from recycled cardboard and soy ink. The person with no waste chips left is the winner!

The Parking Garage: With three floors elevator tower, attendants, booth, figure car and car wash! Children learn while playing, filling up the car, driving it down the ramp, parents can ask questions to help the child finish the story. A Platinum Award Winner! Mini Vehicles: The are environmentally-friendly and produced to stimulate a child's imagination, fine motor skills and hand-eye coordination through play. The mini Fire Engine has won the Parents Choice Award! Eco Town: Specially designed to help educate Children about the importance of Eco-living. Children will have a great time building, playing and planning an entire town that runs on clean, renewable energy!
25% off Entire Order! Coupon Code: Earth

Earth Day & Green Label

Earth Day is right around the corner and we're busy doing our part. Today we'd like to introduce you to one of our favorite brand of shirts. Green Label! Every T-Shirt sends a message, they are 100% certified organic super soft ring spun cotton, artificially printed without the use of PVC's or other harsh chemicals, and they are also made in the good ol' USA. And when they say they are super soft, I'm telling you now they are! I love their logo: Respect Labor, Respect the Planet, Respect Yourself! For this weekend we're giving away a Green Label Shirt to a few lucky winners. All you have to do is tell us your favorite one! You have to follow us on Twitter and Facebook and leave us a message. That easy!

Operation Spring Time!

The core fundamentals of Kaloo are safety, playfulness, and attention to detail. Kaloo meets the highest standards of safety by testing for toxicity and color fastness for all dyes even the ink on the label. The unique faces on all the Kaloo animals and dolls are computer embroidered for additional safety and piece of mind. The vast majority of all Kaloo are machine washable and machine dryable. The Kaloo plumes are made with the softest fabric you've ever touched. They include delicate cushy holes for babies to intertwine their little fingers in. Any little baby would love to cuddle up with one of these little Kaloo Plumes. We appreciate our fans, our twitter followers and all the toy lovers who continually shop with us and play our Friday Funday Giveaway! To be eligible for the giveaway you must take this time to spread the word and follow us on Twitter, and leave us a message on our Facebook Fan Page! We can't wait to pick our Winners' tonight!

What's In Your Easter Basket?

Here Comes Peter Cottontail......

Happy Operation Spring Time! It's our Friday Funday Giveaway! We're so excited about sharing our Rubbabu with you this week and know your little one will love playing with these squishy, foamy vehicles! Great Easter Basket Goodie!

Rubbabu Micro Vehicles are made from natural rubber foam so they're soft and squishy! They're also tough enough to survive years of play. Kids ages two and up can squeeze and roll these unique handmade vehicles. Each vehicle has soft wheels is covered in colourful non-toxic flocking for extra softness. Rubbabu Micro Vehicles facilitate tactile development while helping to develop hand eye coordination. Toddlers will love how a Rubbabu Vehicle feels in their hands. Not only are these vehicles child friendly, they're also 100% biodegradable making them earth friendly too! Squeeze them, Roll them! The soft foam is made from the natural sap of rubber trees. Perfect for your little one who isn't ready for the die-cast, plastic or wooden models

Make sure you're a fan on Facebook or follow us on Twitter to find out who wins Friday night at 9:00 EST.

Fridays R Fundays!

Operation Spring Is In Full Force!!

Sun the sun is shinning, the buds on the trees are trying to bloom, the kids are wanting to go out and ride their bikes or play in the sand! At Gifted Imaginations we are so excited about "new beginnings", and to show our appreciation tomorrow we are going to give away a few Groovy Girls and Boys! That's right Boys too! ONE lucky winner will receive a RSVP Groovy Girl! You just have to show us some love! Tweet Us, stop by our Fan Page on facebook, Get a new mommy to sign up for our newsletter! Send us those birthdays!!!!

Room It Up!

room it up

I love this brand! We met them at Toy Fair and I must say their products make me feel I'm just miles from the beach that I love so much! Lunch Totes, Messenger Bags and Overnight Bags! These are just a few of the new products we've picked up for 2010 that we really love. More room it up gear to follow soon! Take advantage of our March Madness Sale and receive 25% off all orders and free shipping over $65.

National Arts & Crafts Month!

March is National Crafts Month!

What a better way to introduce you child to arts and crafts. For those who craft already what a great reason to teach your child. If you're just not sure what kind of project to start on well we're here to help. Crafting can reduce stress, bring families together and you learn new skills too. Check around your town at some of the local art supplies stores they might be running a special for the month. However, here at Gifted Imaginations one of our favorites is ALEX, they have such a wonderful line of arts and crafts. These are just a few of the Arts and Crafts from ALEX Toys, we're just spreading the love!

FUN FRIDAY GIVEAWAY!

LIFE IS GOOD & SPRING HAS SPRUNG!

Follow us on Twitter or Facebook and play Fun Friday with us today! Earn a chance to win a Fun Spring Life Is Good Tee by joining our newsletter, being a fan, or following us on twitter! How will we know who to pick?? Good question, you need to leave a comment, let us know your having a Fun Friday with Gifted Imaginations! Who knows how many shirts we'll send out! Its Spring and we're spreading the sun! I'd like to think of this as Operation Sunshine!

AUTOMOBLOX!

What Are They? Cars? Building Blocks? Race Cars?

If you've never played with an Automoblox, then you and your child are missing out! The only problem we have with Automoblox is keeping them in stock! So what are they? Well, first Automoblox believes that we live in a world where toys are a disposable commodity, giving our children a harmful message and feel that it is better to have one GREAT toy rather than 10 cheap ones. They are designed as an heirloom toy from the beginning by anticipating the bond between the child and the toy to be so great that they would wish to save them forever! You can take them apart, put them together, roll them, race them allowing limitless joy, imagination, and creativity. You must read the story of the Automoblox, it started out as a high school project! http://www.core77.com/reactor/02.05_automoblox.asp We just love the story at Gifted Imaginations, children feel so proud when they put them back together, they can race them, and the collection of Automoblox grows every year. Automoblox are made from German beech wood and non-toxic materials.

Toy Innovation Picks HaPe International For Award!

World Stage for Toy Awards

An independant jury has selected HaPe as one of the one of the International Toy Awards out of 189 companies! Organico Blocks by HaPe won the category for Creativity + Design!

The classic building blocks come in a strong red, light and dark blue tones, fresh green, bright orange, printed with different patterns on the faces! I can't wait to get these!

It's March & Spring Is Near!

Well I don't know about you but Gifted Imaginations is ready for Spring! Currently, I'm in Montana at Big Sky ready to go hit the slopes but wanted to touch base with you guys and let you know that our newsletter will be going out this week and we will feature most of our new products that you haven't seen! I love them people! If your little one is in PreK or K, then you'll love our Preschool Line of DVD Site Words that won many awards at Toy Fair, actually voted best DVD series by our Home School Moms'. We love our skuut but I gotta tell you the colors of the new bikes we're getting in you'll love! If you love P'kolino then you'll love all the new furniture we have in! Check out the new Chalk Board Table with Easy clean up!

If you love super savings, then I hope you're following us on Twitter & Facebook! I can promise you that this spring season will bring lots of special sells for our loyal followers and mommy bloggers! Have a great day!

Cool Giveaway at Birmingham Mommy!

If you like Citiblocs then you'll love this contest! Check out BirminghamMommy's blog at www.twitter.com/BirminghamMommy

The Bilibo!

ROCK IT, SPIN IT, SLIDE ON IT, HIDE IN IT!

This is our Toy Pick today! It's an award winning imagination stimulation toy developed by the Swiss. It's the new kind of toy, the shells leave room for the child's imagination and is open for a wide range of interpretations. Indoors and outdoors, in a sand pit, on the beach, in the pool or playing in the snow! This toy provides hours of fun! The soft round shape colours stimulate the senses and the child's innate curiosity. When growing older, children will discover new ways of using the shells. Rocking and spinning are hours of great fun and help develop motor skills and the child's sense of balance.

I Love Cloud B

When we were at the Toy Fair I fell in love with these products! I wish my boys were small enough for me to share these wonderful products with them. In a nut shell they are comforting vibrations or a gentle heartbeat that naturally provides a sense of security to your little one. They are made using Eco-friendly natural soy. The Polar Cuddle Club includes a storybook to learn about polar bears and their endangered habitat.

Toy Fair 2010 NYC

So I thought I would share with you my experience of Toy Fair and share some cool pictures with you! First we get there Sunday morning and plan out our attack. These guys shared with us our plan of attack to - the parade of clowns!

So let me just dive in and share with you some of our new and exciting lines we're carrying this year! Cloud B....I cant say enough about they. They're launching a new line of aromatherapy plush pillows to complement its popular Sleep Sheep. Their whole line of products are designed to sooth the senses in order to help children sleep better and easier. Twilight Turtle projects a complete starry night sky onto the walls and ceiling of any room. Choose from three soothing color options – blue, green, and amber – to create magical, tranquil environments that are ideal for helping children of all ages ease into a restful sleep. Also a favorite it the Gentle Giraffe! Check them out we should be getting them in stock soon!

Of course we can't leave out Citiblocs, our new favorite which I promise you'll have hours of imaginative fun with your little one. Responding to calls for color - citiblocs is unveiling new colors sets and packaging this month and expanding the self named line wood plank construction toys it launched last year. New skyline packaged sets will be available in three different color variations: Hot, Cool and Natural.

HABA, highlights from Haba's 2010 lineup include new Eco-friendly plush baby and toddler toys and a collection of wooden playthings. Haba's latest line of wooden toys features bright colors, smooth edges and whimsical designs. It includes a spiral topped rattle, a smiling crocodile and an animal trio. Other new products include the glow-in-the-dark fireflies mobile, a Discoverers Meadow Play Mat, Pacifier Cuddly, Soft Fabric Cubes, Shopping Cart with more foodstuffs!

Finally - my last to favorites. Douglas! Plush toy maker Douglas Co. looks to grow its plush, infant gift and baby toy collects in 2010! The Douglas Baby cuddle toy brand gift ensemble debuts 5 new styles this winter: Orange Dog (which I loved!!!), Hot Pink Horse and Green Frog (I love!! getting this for my boys!). The blankies, animal towels and teething ring filled with natural wooden balls were sooo pretty!!!!

ROOM IT UP!!! Check out their lines - it speaks for themselves!! I love them and the girls will love them also! We'll be carrying the Lunchbox in 5 other fun funky colors and patterns, the Diaper Bag, and the Backpack (large enough for your 1st, 2nd grader!

OK Peeps! That's enough for now! Hope you enjoyed some of the new things we'll be getting in soon!