The best toys of 2015! Our buying team’s top picks from Toy Fair

The bustle and excitement of Toy Fair may be over for us, but the fun on the consumer side is just beginning: over the next few months, you’ll see all of these terrific new toys popping up on toy store shelves! Our top selections from the show are handpicked to cater to the families that love Magic Beans, chosen to encourage the essential creative play that truly makes childhood magical.

Many of these toys come from longtime favorite brands, and most of our selections fit into the same familiar categories that we’ve been selling from day one, because they’ll never stop being both entertaining and important to your child’s development: wooden toys, craft sets, toddler toys, and so on. Some of the toys listed here involve cool new technology, but every one that enters the digital realm also includes a hands-on real world element as well.

The one thing these toys have in common, though, is that your kids are going to LOVE them!

Eli’s picks

Kent Displays Boogie Board Play n’ Trace

Think of a Magnadoodle, but using the same technology as a Boogie Board LCD tablet: toddlers can put the translucent screen over a favorite book, picture, or object, and trace.

Fat Brain Toys Neck of the Woods Game

It’s a balance game plus Tetris plus logic: build the tallest giraffe to pick “leaves” off the top of a tree! Roll the dice and start building, but don’t build your giraffe too high or it might collapse. This reminds me of Jenga and of Zimbbos by Blue Orange, both perennial favorites.

Paulinda Modeling Dough

This is a very unique and versatile play dough. It’s not too soft, so you can really make intricate designs, and it hardens if you let it dry, so you can create permanent art. However, if you let it harden and change your mind, you can just put it back in water and start the fun all over again!

Tomy Jumbo Jamboree 

Tomy had some really great toddler toys this year! This was one of my favorites: the Jumbo Jamboree is an elephant on wheels with five detachable musical instruments built in. When you push the elephant along, all the instruments play at once! It’s an elephant, a vehicle, and a musical instrument, all in one.

Mindware Zany Chain

This was a creative concept I’ve never seen before: you get a simple metal chain necklace and a card with challenges, and you have to illustrate a challenge word using the chain. Then, your opponents have to guess what the word was.

LEGO Star Wars Tall Darth Vader and Luke Skywalker

You can see it at the top of this blog post: build 12” action figures of Darth Vader and Luke out of LEGOs! The finished models are designed to hold together for playtime, too.

Jill’s picks

Crazy Aaron’s Made By Me Thinking Putty Kit

Crazy Aaron’s putty is terrific – you get a ton of it in a cute, handy tin, and it never dries out. And now, you can make your own custom color! It comes with primary colors and special-effects colors to combine, plus customizable tins to store your custom putty in.

Play Visions Sands Alive! Neon Frenzy Glow in the Dark Sand 

Same texture and feel as the original, but now it glows in the dark!  It takes only seconds of UV exposure to get the glow going, and it comes with super cool glasses that you can wear in the dark to keep the sand glowing and the fun going. Watch our demo videos here!

Micro Kickboard Mini2Go

Bring your possessions (or a plush pal) along for the ride with a seat that contains storage! The Mini2Go converts to a regular Mini scooter when your little one is done with the seat, so it will last for a while.

Skip Hop Zoo Travel Placemat  

This silicone mat folds up to contain messes, coordinates with the rest of the Zoo collection, and is great for travel. A must-have for a Mom of a 15 month old!

HaPe Crane wooden toy

Every little boy’s dream! This giant, colorful wooden crane is durable and has many moving parts. Buy the coordinating trucks to have your own construction site!

Kendra’s picks

Blue Orange Thumbs Up! Game

This game is a fast paced game full of focus and strategy: the goal is to quickly place colored rings on your thumb to match the pattern on a challenge card. You can adjust the game to make it as easy or as hard as you like for you and your children.

Hexbug Aquabot Jellyfish and Seahorse

These new underwater creatures are loads of fun for boys and girls. They’re whimsical and make great substitutes for real pets!

Makey Makey 

An innovative, educational, and extremely fun filled way to learn how to create circuits in order to make endless inventions, utilizing things like fruits, play-doh, your own computer, and of course, your noggin!

Wooky Entertainment iLoom

Coming out Fall 2015! Put your iPad into the loom, and follow along to create countless different designs. You can even learn how to write your name within a stitch!

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