Sand + Water = Mud?

The current favorite toy in our house is a cardboard box with holes cut out for doors and windows that Finn decorated herself.

But other than that, a close second is Finn’s sand and water table. It’s winter, and it’s cold outside, so we keep it in our pantry, and the water part is firmly closed up (believe me, unless this is outside, you don’t want both sides open at the same time!).

I researched sand and water tables far more than was actually necessary (were things quiet at work? I can’t remember), and found there a lot of things to consider when making this not-so important purchase:

- height (if you have a short child like mine, you’ll have to be careful – 18” v. 19.5” can be a big difference)

- ability to close off the sand portion and the water portion separately (don’t discount this feature unless you like a big mess)

- ease in lifting off the cover so that when your child is screaming “SAND!” at the top of her lungs, you can stop the hysteria before it starts

- size (if you have a huge yard and you have no desire to ever bring the thing inside, then go ahead and get the mega model)

- stability (lots of tables received poor customer ratings due to a tendency to collapse; yikes)

- cool toys (the model we bought has a scoop, shovel, rake, boat, sifter/sprinkler, two funnels, two spinning mills and a waterfall connector)

- drain plugs for easy emptying

- detachable legs for storage

I-Play is a favorite company of mine, mostly because they have settled on a fun, yet not-primary color pallette. But also because their sand and water table has allowed me to cook dinner because Finn is happily occupied pouring sand all over the kitchen floor. Yes, we keep her sand table in the kitchen during these winter months, and yes, there is sand all over the floor. It’s sort of fun and beachy.

We keep the water lid on (until we move it outside this summer) because the only time I let Finn play with both the sand and water together, the ensuing mess was less like play and more like a chemistry experiment. Actually we keep the sand lid on, too, except when we decide that it’s time to play, and the cover comes off and on easily.

The table is very stable, with legs that splay out a little for extra safety, the toys are really fun (Finn and I are very into the funnel and sifter).

It’s even sort of cool looking, although I was a little disappointed that the colors on the box are a lot more attractive than the actual product. Did they change their design? Are there different dye-lots? Not sure. But even the more muted colors of the sand and water table we own are far more acceptable than the 1980’s color scheme model (yellow and turqouise?!) or the many primary color tables (red, yellow, blue, blah) or (gasp!) the National Park Service picnic bench meets Land of the Lost molded plastic giant sand and water table (picture included here, because it’s worth seeing).

This entry was posted on Tuesday, December 26th, 2006 at 10:54 pm and is filed under general, playing. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.