totmama

Fred & Friends has some of the coolest, innovative and down right silly stuff I have found for my little ones. We found the Log On game at our local Therapy store, and fell in love with the retro, cheekiness of it all. Since then I have found only bit here and there, like the Yellow Pages Boost at Land of Nod. I finally got around to checking out the Fred & Friends site, and I feel like I have struck gold. I’m not sure all of the items are available online, but they sure are a lot of fun. Check them out if you have a few minutes to kill.

I am probably a bit too optimistic, but I see these and just imagine my son spending hours creating cool modern card structures. The reality is, he’d probably build them, crash them to bits with his “mighty mega monster trucks”, then stick them into the DVD player! I’d like to stay in denial, so I’m putting them on the birthday wish list. Well, maybe there’s hope for my daughter?? ::sigh:: Eames House of Cards

Being a graphic designer “in my past life” makes it very hard for me to do some things that most folks wouldn’t think twice about. What do I mean by this, you ask? Well, for one, I can never look at type or letters without analyzing them. I was taught to ask myself “Are they the right size, font, are they spaced properly, do they send the right message? etc…” You get the picture. So when I had kids, I realized I am constantly confronted with some of my biggest dilemmas when it comes to their room decor, clothing and keepsake choices. What tripped me up this time? It’s something kinda simple: hanging letters in my kid’s rooms. I know it seems silly. My friends just look at Pottery Barn Kids and say “that’s cute”. I just can’t bring myself to do it so simply. After trying for months to decide if I wanted lower case, sans serif, serif fonts, or to custom order some funky display type, I found these cool letters on sale at CompanyKids.com. I liked them “enough” to allow them in my presence, and figured the price was right to get my kid’s names for their walls. (Of course I seemed to ignore the the word GIANT in the description, so I am lucky my kids have short names!) The letters started showing up, and they were HUGE! Slowly, boxes trickled in to my foyer until I had all eight. Then it hit me… how should they be hung? How would I go about KERNING the space between the letters so it wouldn’t bug me that they were up there, wrongly spaced, and staring at me? AAAhhh! I was just cringing at the idea of all 200 nail holes I’d have to fill in after I finished spacing it perfectly. Also, since I am totally horrific at anything involving hammers, I was sure I would end up with divorce papers once I finished nudging my hubby to the right or moving him to the left to get the letters just right. (Here’s where I ignored it ENTIRELY for about 5 weeks!) I was stumped! I was going to HAVE to let it go. (Breathe in!!! Let it go!!!) Well, I am happy to say it has been done. I finally got my hubby to put the letters up, and I am not sure if I can “let it go” yet. I am trying. No divorce papers, and no nail holes… but I do stare at them all day! I just hope it doesn’t get so bad that I have to just take them down. (Don’t tell my hubby!)

Okay! Why is it that my son will do ABSOLUTELY ANYTHING to go to a toy store and buy something new to play with, yet he has the most fun when he is just imagining and playing with simple things. A shoe box top, a plastic bottle, a piece of yarn, you name it, just add markers and he is having fun for hours. The folks over at Fridge Box have harnessed this and totally got it right. They create really cool Fridge Box play sets that help your kids bring out the fun that comes from making it your own. With eco-friendly milk based paint and cool, colorful stickers, you’ll be sure to have fun too. Simple honest play! Hopefully it will become the next home revolution. Simple can be a good thing!

These pillows are my answer to having “educational items” around the playroom! It’s not a bad thing to know your ABCs, especially if they’re designed by Alejandro Paul! Now if i could just teach my kids the difference between Frutiger, Stone Sans and Optima!

Candy-coated Cushions

Boon Inc. is a powerhouse, making items that are truly forcing the child product industry to rethink how it does things. After creating their Frog Pod and Potty Bench, they have continued to bring us one great new item after another. (I’m in LOVE with the Boon Squirt Feeding Spoon!) I visited their site to check out the suction cup option and replacement strip for my Frog Pod, when I saw that they have now moved on to infant clothing! Boon Layette has arrived at Babies R Us, and I have to say I am loving it too. Take a gander!! The features of this collection are oh-so-cleaver, with a snap on bib/bodysuit combo, a drool patch, and one piece coveralls that have no fasteners or snaps. So very cool!

I have been amazed by the cool stuff coming from collaborations between some of the indie kid design houses and larger companies lately. From the ultra cute Dwell Studio for Target line, to the hip Skip Hop for Babies R Us nursery bedding, we’ve been getting a dose of color that has finally strayed from the traditional.

The high-end clothing designers at Tea Collection worked with shoe designers Morgan & Milo to create these super cute shoes for boys and girls. I love the Libby Skimmer in pink suede and the Avery Boys Sneaker in blue twill.

Sure, maybe Thomas only creates new episodes after they’ve got the toy molds for the new characters and scenarios already complete, but Roary the Racing Car seems poised to have even more toy-tie-in potential than the venerable little blue engine.

What’s Roary, you ask? It’s a show that doesn’t seem to have hit the US yet, but was produced in cooperation with Nickelodeon UK, so no doubt it’ll find its way to our shores soon enough. It looks like Bob the Builder meets Postman Pat, stylistically, with some fairly cheesy computer-generated smoke, etc. effects added on top. The main character is Roary, a little red race car with parallels to Thomas’ personality, but don’t worry, there’s lots of other types of vehicles (scooter, Mini, Formula 1, pickup, helicopter…) for each personality type to latch onto and demand the corresponding toy for

If the eventual toys sing the annoying theme song that sounds like a bad clean version of ‘Danny Boy’, I’m removing the batteries from them… while they’re still in the stores…

Yes, you can have it all… I have loved Tord Boontje’s stuff ever since I encountered his greeting card collection in Amsterdam. After doing some amazing things for Target’s seasonal collection in 2006 holiday, you can find his ethereal designs everywhere in the US. Here are just a couple of his lovely lighting and curtain designs I would want in my dream nursery! It really is wonderful stuff. The Midsummer pendant light makes me giddy. I can see two of them hanging over the Sussex low credenza used as toy storage in my fantasy nursery.