Christmas Present Ideas - Top Toys for 3 to 5 Year Old Kids

Now your little girl can have an 18-inch doll (like Our Generation or American Girl dolls) of her favorite Disney Princess! Available are Cinderella, Ariel, Aurora (Sleeping Beauty), Belle, and Tiana. They are touted to be slightly high-end dolls and could very well become collectibles.

The owner of these dolls gets invited to become a Princess Royal family member, which entitles them to a birthday card and a magazine. Parents can also purchase a matching dress of the gown their doll is wearing for their child – fun!

When I first saw these toys I wondered what it was all about because they sure seemed to be very popular with kids. The line includes 6 toy guitars, 6 drum sets, and an amplifier. The guitars are less than an inch thick, the drums just over an inch thick and the amp is made of cardboard – they all are flat.

The guitars come with three songs built-in. There are no strings, so you just strum the chords that are drawn on the surface of the instrument to play it. A touch of the fingers is all that’s needed to play the drum sets. These instruments also have a karaoke feature and can be used for simply making freestyle music. It’s a cool concept!

These cute plush characters, rated for ages 3 and up, sing when you push their bellies. If you have more than one, their voices will even harmonize when you push their tummies all together. Their voices are somewhat unusual and kids can squeeze their bellies in different rhythms to change how they sing.

Each one comes with a few popular kids songs and they have 3 modes – sing, chatter, and harmonize.

What makes these adorable, too, is that when they sing or chatter, their mouth moves almost like a real mouth and they have a realistic looking tongue in there, too!  Click on one of them to the right and watch a video of them in action.

Looking for a portable toy for your child that includes learning in addition to games? Look no further – the LeapFrog Leapster Explorer includes e-books, videos, games, and flash cards that help educate kids in reading, math, and science.

There’s an application called Pet Pad, where kids can create a pet and earn tokens for feeding, entertaining, and giving their pet a bath. It comes already with twelve games, eighteen apps, a touch screen, and 512 MB of memory.

You can even purchase a camera accessory that turns the Explorer into a camera and video recorder as well. Recommended age is four and up.

Like a Kindle for Kids! Bundle it with the Leapster Explorer, and your kid can have the two hottest educational toys this year! The V Reader has a large collection of great books that engage kids. Kids watch, read, and learn. It even includes a story dictionary that defines words in a way that kids can understand.

When the screen is touched, reading games can be played. Reading comprehension, vocabulary, word building and phonics are just a few of the skills that kids can build with the V Reader.

Stories can be downloaded from VTech’s website, in addition to purchasing additional stories. A sturdy carrying case is also available and great for taking it on-the-go!

For the creative kid that loves to use his or her hands and build - these sets contain pieces that look like wood, but are really just foam pieces, which kids can use as if they were real wood and feel like they are truly creating.

Theres also a starter tool set that has a hammer, saw, and nails – kid-safe versions, of course. There’s a project book that has easy instructions for a few different building projects.

You can build on to the starter set with the deluxe sets that have 120 pieces plus more accessories and projects.

Some say that Squinkies are the newest collectible toy craze. They are tiny little dolls that come packaged in a plastic ball, like many toys do that come out of those quarter vending machines at the super market.

They are soft and squishy and double as pencil toppers. You can also purchase play sets that resemble toy dispensers. Some of the characters available include babies, puppies, frogs, and kittens.

Kids love these and they are really affordable, too, which makes these a great gift idea for kids!

Zoobles are Spin Master’s girl version of the very popular Bakugans. Like the Bakugans, they are round sphere shapes that “pop” open, but this girl version is cute and fun. There is no game involved with these, just a lot of fun.

There are hundreds of characters and themes and there are many play sets available, too – all of which are geared toward girls.

These toys by Hasbro Playskool are engaging and creative for little ones, especially preschoolers, and are made to be used with the original Chuck My Talking Truck, which many parents of little ones are sure to already be familiar with. 

Chuck can zoom and flip through the play sets which feature lights and sounds, as well as moveable pieces.  Also included is a Tonka Chuck and Friends story book.