Perfect Toy

This article describing the stick being honored by the National Toy Hall of Fame made me think of what I have always considered the perfect toy. A cardboard box. When I first saw the article, I thought "How could they pick a stick over a box?". Then after further reading, found that the cardboard box had already been inducted in 2005.

One of my fondest memories from my childhood was when my best friend Ron and I dug an old water heater box out of a trash can. We cut the ends off and discovered that we could get inside and by crawling forward on our hands and knees create what we called a tank but in reality was more like a boy-sized hamster ball. We took great joy in running over our friends. Jumping out of the sides of our tank with our guns (which were probably sticks) and shooting down any unsuspecting enemy soldiers. We were playing in my landlords huge back yard which she never seemed to mind sharing with the neighborhood kids. Her sprinklers were the type that shoot big streams of water with that wonderful chhik-chhik sound and they were on a timer. We were in the middle of the yard when they came on and in our young minds we were under attack as our cardboard tank was hit from all sides. We ran that box around the yard screaming every time a jet of water blasted us until finally the cardboard dissolved around us and we had to make a run for safety where we found Mable and Clarence (my landlords) laughing hysterically. They fed us lemonade and cookies and told us that was the most entertaining thing they had seen in months.

I loved Mable and Clarence. I loved that box. I love that memory. Give your kid a big empty box and some markers and watch what happens.

Maybe something magical.

[Related Post: Mr. McGroovy's Box Rivets]

[via Make]
[Image: Captured from http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2008/11/stick_receives_high_honor.html?CMP=OTC-0D6B48984890]

Make your own toys

I made one of these spool tanks when I was in Cub Scouts way back before they ever put a man on the moon. I believe it was one of the first things I ever built. It was fun to play with. It taught me some things about simple machines. I used a real knife to carve the notches in the spool and didn't cut off my thumb!

Mechanical Toys is a site that has directions for making a spool tank, a rubber band gun and a bunch of other cool toys. There are photos and diagrams for building most of the projects mentioned (some have a coming soon message). There are also links to other mechanical toy sites.

Now if I can only find a wooden spool in the junk box in my garage.

[Image captured from Mechanical Toys Page: http://users.bigpond.net.au/mechtoys/index.html]

Bing Bang Boing

Saw this video on Boing Boing about a 70s era toy and wondered how I could not have any memory of it. Granted I was off to college at the time but still.....seems like it's something I would have bought for a nephew or at least snuck off to the toy store to investigate.

It reminds me of the Chaos Toy that came out several years ago which is essentially a kit of various components that allows you to build Rube Goldberg type machines. I had one that I used in my 6th grade tech class. I also have one in storage that my wife asks me every year if we can donate to somebody.

I reply, "No. A thousand times NO. No one will appreciate that toy like me. Perhaps I could be buried with it? Or even better, at my eulogy, set it up to bounce gumballs into my open casket."

I am thinking more and more that most of the mechanisms in a toy like the Chaos Toy or the Bing Bang Boing can be reproduced out of simple materials. Wouldn't it be more fun to construct your own home made kinetic machine? I think so.

After doing a quick search, I found this guy that agrees with me who built a Bing Bang Boing for his kids.




[Image created by Al Gunn to represent the perfect funeral set up for a geeky technology teacher. Better than a Millenium Falcon shaped coffin!]