Tower of cups (The First Years Stack'em Up Cups)

Member Name: playmate

Product:	The First Years Stack'em Up Cups
Date:	11/12/08 (195 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Great fun and also educational.

Disadvantages: Can be noisy.

My best friend has three children and all of her kids love to play with these. There has always been a version of these out for as long as I remember. They may have changed slightly but the main design and objective is still the same.

=====So what are they?=====

They are known mostly as 'stack em up cups' but I have heard of these with different names. Basically they are cups of all different sizes and colours that you can stack on top of each other or for easy storage they can be packed away inside each other, kind of like one of those Russian Dolls that you can hide inside of each other.

=====What can you do with them?=====

Stack them - this is really the main objective of the product.

Use them in the bath - this is great for playtime in the bathroom, my 'niece and nephews' like to use these in the bath, they tend to fill them with water and either pour it straight out or soak each other with the water inside them, oh yeah and the floor and me and their mum!

Put one inside the other - this is how these tend to come when they are packaged, it allows the children to learn about sizes and teaches them how to fit things in that is the right size, so if they use the wrong cup and it is too large then it won't fit.

Make a lot of noise with them - the kids love to bang these together, I made the mistake one day of pretending to sound like a horse, clip clopping with them, and now that's all we hear. Ooopsss sorry best friend that was my fault!!!

Knock them over once they are built - this is one of the favourite games that the three kids like to play together. They take turns in building the tower, they one of the gets to knock it over and so on. You always know when this is happening as all you hear is a loud crash and then a lot of giggling and laughing.

=====Where can you purchase them from?=====

When I purchased these for the children I got them from Woolworths, but I have never really seen them in there since then, and we won't anymore as they are shutting now.

The other shops that I have also seen them in are:
The Early learning centre.
Tesco and Asda.

=====Advantages=====

These cups are aimed at children that are about 1 year old. I think that this really depends on the development of the child too, as one of my friends 3 kids wasn't able to use these until he was a little older than the other two were.

We also play a game with the cups that the children get the next cup in the tower when they can tell me what colour the cup is. This is really good for them as it learns them about colours, and the kids really seem to enjoy this too.

You can also do roughly the same thing to learn them about sizes, what we normally do is I will give them the first cup, the largest one, and then they have to pick the next cup that will fit into it, the kids are also really good at this too.

This toy also allows children to interact with other kids as there are a lot of fun things that the kids seem to be able to imagine up, to do with them. So its really good if you have friends over that have kids too as they will all be playing with the same toy, and it makes it easier for the kids to bond and socialise with other children.

The thing that I really like about these is the easy of transport. You can take them anywhere even if you don't have an awful lot of room as they don't take up much space.

=====Age range=====

Children and adults of any age can play with these. The kids are all different ages, 1 year old, 4 years old, and 6 years old, and they all enjoy playing with these in their own unique ways.

=====My opinion=====

I think these cups were one of the best ideas ever thought of. It is so simple yet effective, and they will never go out of fashion. I used to have something similar when I was a child, and if I remember correctly I loved them. I really like the way that the children can learn colours and sizes while they are playing, especially from when they are so young as I feel that I gives them a better chance of understanding when they are at school if they have a bit of knowledge before hand. I think that these will be around for a very long time. I don't ever think that the classics will ever fade away.

If you are looking for something for a child, I would suggest these, they are fairly inexpensive, I think that I paid about £5 for the ones that I bought for the kids, that was about 3 years ago but the prices haven't changed that dramatically.

Summary: .