Christmas Gifts for boys

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Rosamunda · Post by **Rosamunda** » Sun Dec 03, 2006 10:19 pm

Funny question... nearly everyone I know who does internet shopping (including myself) buys from UK, Germany, France. Even USA. The shipping costs are variable but local prices are sometimes higher one offsets the other.

I would suggest buying Stockmann gift vouchers (available on-line) and let them chose their own presents. Or gifts from Hobby Hall (same company) EDIT*** can't find the gift vouchers on-line. ***

http://www.stockmann.fi
http://www.hobbyhall.fi/ (you need the LAPSILLE tab)

But, as you can see those sites are in Finnish and I don't even know if you can buy from them using a foreign credit card.

Maybe Toys R Us have something (they recently opened a store in Vantaa near Helsinki), but I don't think they offer on-line shopping in Finland.

I have three boys and IMO the choice up here is VERY boring. Mine were always happy with Lego and liked making aeroplanes etc from kits (which are available for all ages) and then anything for outdoors, sports equipment etc. And of course the inevitable PS2, Gameboy stuff.

I think sending something from your own country would be a better idea - probably something they can't find here. Do they speak English? Books, videos..... a game in English???

Hank W. · Post by **Hank W.** » Sun Dec 03, 2006 10:27 pm

Basically, if you buy off ebay.co.uk or ebay.ie you can get "in English" and then try and get the packet sent to a different address - might work if you put the alternate address on PayPal. Sending from USA might cause a visit to the customs office, a bit of customs and a slash of VAT 22% and a peeved person in the recieving end. Comes more expensive than bying it from here most of the time. EU is "safe" in that aspect.

Millie · Post by **Millie** » Sun Dec 03, 2006 11:45 pm

Thank you. So maybe I haven't been too off whith my choices in regard to the k'nex. One year I mailed them one of those rugs that look like a village. I was a exchange student with this family 25 yrs ago. My children have grown, so it is hard to know the popular toys for boys.

Rosamunda · Post by **Rosamunda** » Mon Dec 04, 2006 12:06 am

I don't think I have ever seen k'nex on sale here. My kids had some from when we lived in France, they enjoyed playing with them, makes a change from Lego.

Certainly when my youngest was 8 he was still playing with Bionicles etc. Now he is ten and he mostly plays outdoors, but he does play on the PS2 when he has no friends/brothers to kick a ball with.

Millie · Post by **Millie** » Mon Dec 04, 2006 6:19 am

It looks like I have been doing okay with my choices. Thank you, you are very re-assuring. I bought them some Bionicals one year along with the K'nex. My son (17) suggested that I buy one of those laser tag sets. He had one & used to have alot of fun with his friends. Or he suggested a transformer. I would like to stick away from the PS2 or Xbox games.

What do you think of those toys? Thank you for all of your help.

Rosamunda · Post by **Rosamunda** » Mon Dec 04, 2006 9:59 am

Mine didn't play too much with transformers, maybe when they were younger eg 5-8 but not since.

Arg! I have NO IDEA what a tag laser set is, but I'm intrigued..... what are they for?

Also board games are quite popular in Finland. If English is not a problem it might be fun to find a game the whole family can play (sort of half in English and half in Finnish!!!) Not Trivial Pursuit or Pictionary (they are too language specific) but what about a fun Monopoly set (Disney version, or your local version etc etc)

sinikala · Post by **sinikala** » Mon Dec 04, 2006 10:04 am

penelope wrote:Mine didn't play too much with transformers, maybe when they were younger eg 5-8 but not since.

Arg! I have NO IDEA what a tag laser set is, but I'm intrigued..... what are they for?

Also board games are quite popular in Finland. If English is not a problem it might be fun to find a game the whole family can play (sort of half in English and half in Finnish!!!) Not Trivial Pursuit or Pictionary (they are too language specific) but what about a fun Monopoly set (Disney version, or your local version etc etc)

Transformers are definitely for under 10's, my brothers had them aged about 7-9 (when transformers were popular first time round in the 80's!).

Laser tag is presumably like http://www.laserquest.co.uk/ same idea as paint balling, but less messy. Occasionally went to a professional one with student friends in the early 90's, great fun.

Board games, reminds me, I should take some with me to the in-laws at Xmas. Scrabble in Finnish is great fun

Rosamunda · Post by **Rosamunda** » Mon Dec 04, 2006 10:19 am

sinikala wrote:
Laser tag is presumably like http://www.laserquest.co.uk/ same idea as paint balling, but less messy. Occasionally went to a professional one with student friends in the early 90's, great fun.

Mine would definitely like that (it's like Megazone, right?). Not sure I'd want one in the house though (noisy???) but presumably they work in dense forest..... Great idea.

sinikala · Post by **sinikala** » Mon Dec 04, 2006 10:28 am

penelope wrote:
sinikala wrote:
Laser tag is presumably like http://www.laserquest.co.uk/ same idea as paint balling, but less messy. Occasionally went to a professional one with student friends in the early 90's, great fun.
Mine would definitely like that (it's like Megazone, right?). Not sure I'd want one in the house though (noisy???) but presumably they work in dense forest..... Great idea.

I would guess it's the same thing... laser gun, vests which vibrate when you have been shot and stop your gun working for a few seconds... points are tallied up by computer at the end of the game.

When we played there would be 10-12 people split in two teams. But if there's only two of you, it might get dull quite quickly.... bzzzz.... you're dead. Bzzzz now you're dead. Like Beavis and Butthead with lasers.

It would only really work as a present if lots of kids have them.

Millie · Post by **Millie** » Mon Dec 04, 2006 11:04 am

http://www.toysrus.com/product/index.js ... YTvbnPDwGw

Remeber we are talking kids. Yes it is a toy you would probably want themto play with outside. The boys would get their backpacks on & go out on tatical missions. They also would take walkie talkies. It's true it would be more fun to have a group of boys playing, so they would almost need 2 sets.

My son didn't get into paintballing until around 14/15. Paintball hurts, the guys would come in all black & blue from shooting each other. My husband is an excellent marksman so it was stupid for the boys to try to take him on. lol

Well the transformers have had a resurgance, but you are probably right it is probably a toy more for a 5-8 yr old.

enk · Post by **enk** » Mon Dec 04, 2006 11:22 am

sinikala wrote:Board games, reminds me, I should take some with me to the in-laws at Xmas. Scrabble in Finnish is great fun

Try multilingual Scrabble: use more than one board and words can be
played in the language of the versions used. The one we usually play
is 1 Swedish version, 1 English version and 2 Finnish versions. The boards
are placed in a square pattern and any word is game. Gotta
see about getting an Estonian version some day

-enk

Rosamunda · Post by **Rosamunda** » Mon Dec 04, 2006 11:38 am

enk wrote: Try multilingual Scrabble: use more than one board and words can be
played in the language of the versions used. The one we usually play
is 1 Swedish version, 1 English version and 2 Finnish versions. The boards
are placed in a square pattern and any word is game. Gotta
see about getting an Estonian version some day

-enk

Brilliant idea.... now why didn't I ever think of that

We have French and English versions.... so now I'm off to Prisma to get a Finnish one!!!!

sinikala · Post by **sinikala** » Mon Dec 04, 2006 11:50 am

enk wrote:
sinikala wrote:Board games, reminds me, I should take some with me to the in-laws at Xmas. Scrabble in Finnish is great fun
Try multilingual Scrabble: use more than one board and words can be
played in the language of the versions used. The one we usually play
is 1 Swedish version, 1 English version and 2 Finnish versions. The boards
are placed in a square pattern and any word is game. Gotta
see about getting an Estonian version some day

-enk

Wouldn't work for us as my in-laws are resolutely mono-lingual.

Out of interest - do you need to keep the letters separate? The point values and letter distribution in the Finnish and English versions are quite different.

At best it would make getting rid of the hard letters in Finnish (e.g. C) far easier, but then some poor sod would have to separate the tiles at the end of the game when you just want to pour them all back into the bag.

enk · Post by **enk** » Mon Dec 04, 2006 12:35 pm

sinikala wrote:Wouldn't work for us as my in-laws are resolutely mono-lingual.

So is my MIL. Doesn't stop her, she just puts down annoying words in Finnish that none of us believe are in the dictionary due to limited use (ma, sa, for instance).

sinikala wrote:Out of interest - do you need to keep the letters separate?

By now, no. Someone took the Swedish ones out at some point in time
and that one is unfortunately now lost, so we're down to the Finnish and
English ones.

sinikala wrote:At best it would make getting rid of the hard letters in Finnish (e.g. C) far easier, but then some poor sod would have to separate the tiles at the end of the game when you just want to pour them all back into the bag.

If you play it enough, I recommend having an extra version hanging around the house for single play as that does get annoying.

-enk

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