Several of you have asked questions about stuff we have in pictures or that I’ve blogged about so I thought I’d just make my answer a blog entry.

The marvelous wonderful perfect tea set is from Pottery Barn Kids. Its metal coated on the outside and inside with enamel. Unfortunately I looked for a link and could not find out. It is possible they no longer carry it. I remember calling to see if I could buy it locally just last month and our local store said they no longer carried it so I guess they don’t sell it anymore. Keep your eye peeled though, they  might come out with a different version in the near future. They seem to do that a lot. You can also get it on ebay, I saw a few listings. The retail price was like $89 I think.

Meanwhile there are other tin and metal tea sets for a LOT cheaper that PBK. But they are not coated on the inside of the cups and they aren’t as nice or complete. But they are just fine. I really went back and forth for weeks about whether or not to just go with the $20 tea set or to sell my kidney for the PBK version and I ended up going for broke for the heirloom quality version. But you can check amazon and local boutique toy and clothing stores for the cheaper tin versions.

Melissa asked about the “green chair thingy” in our photos. That would be the Bilibo. Isn’t it awesome? At first I saw that thing in a catalog and thought it was the most absurd idea ever. Then it grew on me and I just HAD to have it. Grandma bought it for the kids and I think she was as unsure as I was originally. But it has been a GIGANTIC hit. I think the tea set and the Bilibo are the two things under our tree that have had consistent daily use (well except the boys’ laptops and that awful addicting Guitar Hero I can’t seem to stop playing - but that’s a blog post in itself!). EVERYONE loves the Bilibo. Dalton wishes they made a huge teen/adult size! Teegan uses it every day, Addison uses it constantly. It is everything and nothing. Addy sits in it like a little chair, rocks in it, turns it over and stands on it and jumps off, puts it on her head like a hat. Teegan (who is 10, incidentally) sits in it and spins and spins. They slide around our tile on it. You can use it in water, on snow, for a baby bed. You name it. It is an open-ended toy if ever there was one. It is the plastic version of the Cardboard box, I think. I can not say enough great things about the Bilibo. If you decide to get one, make sure you don’t accidentally get the Bilibo Mini. It looks the same in pictures but is just teeny-tiny. I’m not sure what a kid would do with it - it probably has appeal of its own. But its not the same.

Ok one more little bit I can’t remember if I shared then I’m done waxing consumerist! The Children’s Place, a store I used to love but have grown to more or less find uncommentworthy, has won my love again. They have expanded a select few stores to include a shoe store. And the shoes? Oh the shoes. They are so so so very very cute. I mean adorable cuteness! They have awesome boots, great skater shoes for my boys (even in brown! I have a thing for brown skater shoes), adorable casual shoes in great colors. And it seems like TCP is always having a sale so they are often really cheap but seem very well made.  You can see the shoes on the TCP website but it doesn’t do them justice and often the stores carry older or newer versions not yet shown. If you happen to live in an area that has a TCP with a shoe store (you can tell by checking the locations on the website - it will say below the location whether it was expanded to include a shoe store) and you are in need of shoes, check it out. You will not be disappointed!

This entry was posted on Friday, January 4th, 2008 at 1:29 pm and is filed under Things I Love. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.