Barbie? Three year olds?

I usually buy gifts through the year for Birthday and Christmas and was wondering when did your child actually starting to play with Barbie.

And what else did you buy your three year old? I am thinking of Baby Alive as she love her baby dolls but on the other side I dont know if it is worth the price.

I think Barbie would be more 4yrs+, just judging by my 4yo. And not quite at the stage of wanting to dress dolls as far as I can tell - at 3yrs. Baby dolls are great but nearly any cute and cuddly baby doll usually will do. At 3yo children start getting into littlier things, fiddlier things to play with. Hannah has been into the Fisher Price "Little People" since about 3yo. Umm what else did Hannah get at 3yo - a tea set, puzzles with the letters of the alphabet, early puzzles to fit pieces into each other (no more than 60 pieces and that's with help). She also got into glue and glitter (I bought some sprinkling, not pouring, glitter from Whitcoulls, not too expensive) and washable feltpens! Hope that gives you a few steps in the right direction...

Hehe Hannah is 27 Dec - that's why she got so much when she turned 3!

You can get "My First Barbie" for under 4yr old's they are bigger and easier to dress etc.

Tea set is a good idea
Nyah loved her vacuum cleaner too.
What about a highchair for her dolly's?

Ayja plays with Paris's barbies, she especially loves putting them in the barbie car and driving them about.

She also loves anything pretend play, instead of baby alive (which is terrible looking, very fake and means you are constantly cleaning up drink and wet nappy mess) try looking for the fisher-price little mommy dolls, they are wonderful, soft bodied, very hard wearing and not too pricey either, My girls have a couple as they have been given as pressies. Ayja got her own one for xmas, and a little highchair and bed and omg she loves it. She will spend hours playing with her dollys and feeding them putting to bed.

little kitchens/food playsets/teasets are also good, they begin to start mimicking real life in their playing around 2 - 3 yrs old.

Ayja has had all that from and early age since she takes after her sister, so her pressies for her upcoming birthday consist of a barbie of her own, some polly pocket stuff (again since she loves her sisters) and one of those little real-baby lambs since she's gone on and on at me.


Mr potato heads are great for this age too,
colouring books for them to start learning drawing (although will probably mostly just do little scribbles on each page),
books,
a dolls house (again in with the pretend play)
dressups, like fairy wings builders hats, imaginary play stuff

and yep my little pony.. Ayja is very into that, again since everyone bought them for her sister when she turned 3. She very much takes after her sister

one thing paris got lots of though up till about 3, was little people.. which they still haul out and set up and play with.

Jake LOVES LOVES LOVES mr potato head. I have bought them for any 2 plus bdays we go to now.

Hannah has two barbies. My mum got her one for her 3rd birthday. She loves her! (I however am not so impressed. haha)

But yeah, a tea set is great. Hannah plays for hours with it in the bath... drinking bathwater

BTW why is everyone so against Barbie? Just curious.

Aaah I see. See I had a Barbie when I was five and had an eating disorder. Quite severe. But not once did I actually think I want to look like Barbie. I prefer her to the Bratz dolls again.

Quite weird how we all as moms think different hey? I think it is actually quite great that we all do think differently.

Urgh those Bratz dolls are awful They dress like hookers!