Tell me about calico critters

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We went to the mall today and DD1 discovered the calico critter display at a mom and pop toy store. She loved them so much, she even ran away from the Disney store to go back and play with them.

Last year Grandpa got her a M&D doll house. DD plays with her mini beenie babies and happy meal build a bears in it but completely ignores the dolls.

What sets do you recommend for an almost 3 year old? Is this an addiction that I will regret fostering? It seems so cute and they are less expensive than a lot of the little girl toys out there.

Thanks,

Christine W
mom to John (4), Katie (almost 3) and Sarah (6 months)

[brittone2]

The hard part with a child that age (my DD is the same age) is that if they end up undressing the critters, it requires some pretty impressive fine motor skills (even for an adult sometimes :ROTFLMAO: ) to get them dressed again.

DD is almost 3 and enjoys some of the ones we have already (DH had a Sylvanian family dollhouse and some animals from his own childhood that MIL kept for us :) ). I think my DD will enjoy them more as she gets older.

[egoldber]

it requires some pretty impressive fine motor skills (even for an adult sometimes ) to get them dressed again.

:yeahthat:

[Twoboos]

Yah, the pieces can be sooooooo tiny. We have a kitchen set and bedroom set - OMG, I could not believe they included hamburgers (smaller than pencil eraser) and lipstick (smaller than white tip of my very short pinky nail!).

They are really cute, but the clothes and tiny accessories make me nuts.

[traciann]

We bought a small set recently and the pieces! oh goodness I just can't handle how small they are. You could totally just do the families though if you wanted to start with that since you already have a dollhouse. I think that would work great for you. My dd actually plays more with the animals anyway since I keep the set we bought her put up unless she asks for it since we have a baby in the house.

[fivi2]

See, my girls love the teeny tiny accessories! We have been in a teeny tiny phase for quite some time and CC are great! They prefer the animals to be naked so I don't have to deal with clothes.