Makin Mud Pies!! ????

Added: Grandma T~ succinct and very well put! Kudos!

Hi D.,

I looked at the toy you were asking about. I'm familiar with having play kitchens outside, so I'll tell you what I've observed:

While the blurb suggests that this toy is great for social development, you might find kids arguing over the single mixer and and single sink. It looks as though there is room for only one child to stand/use the toy.

Also-- using mud way up there is going to be a mess all over kiddo, because they are bringing mud up to chest-height. You get the picture...

My suggestion would be to save yourself the $45 and to go to the dollar store. Pick up real, cheap kitchen items; wide mesh strainers, colanders, wide funnel, spoons and scoops, even pie pans/cake forms. If you have a patch in the backyard where there's already dirt, take a bucket of water or hose over there and make mud down on the ground. If you don't want dirt patches everywhere, Home Depot has some cheap washed sand that makes great mud. The bags are about $3-4 each. You can just find a corner of your yard and open a couple bags on the ground--voila!

As a preschool teacher, too, my observation has been that the more open-ended the play area, the better the children can use their imagination and create an extended playtime. You can literally set a plastic placemat on a cardboard box and call it an oven. Then kids can make that box what *they* need it to be for their own imaginative play.

And MaryAnn Kohl has a great book called "Mudworks" which has loads of ideas for creative, natural outdoors play. Have fun!

Let us not complicate mudpie making by buying things.
Trust me, you've got plenty of utensils already in the kitchen that will serve the purpose for the making of the gourmet mudpie.

A toy for making mudpies?
What WILL they think of next?

Kids have been making mudpies since the dawn of time and never needed a special toy for it.

Just my opinion.

We have it! I got it on sale for $30. My kids really loved it when we first got it. And because I hate having mud tracked into the house, I only let them use it for water! LOL!

The water pump feature is great! I think it's the best thing about this toy. We've had it for two years now, and it still works. As long as you don't get it clogged with mud, it will last you a while. (When I read the reviews, some of the reviewers complained about the pump not working.)

I must say that after two years, a lot of the pieces are missing, and my older kids tend to gravitate toward the water table more than the mud pie maker. But now my 16 month-old likes it. It is the perfect height for him. I would say that oveall, it was a good purchase.