More fun than a canned ham, this flip-top storage tin has a train set inside, with a plastic steam engine, tender, boxcar and caboose, as well as a 12-piece track that forms a 10" x 22" oval. Tin and train car colors may vary. You add a "AA" battery and you're the engineer. 

Spin the ribbed 7" handle of this hand-powered prop between your palms, and watch it take off. (If it lands instead of flying off into the wild blue yonder, reverse the spin!) Neon handle, bright, metallic-flaked 8" propeller, and a lift so high we imprinted it with our logo - the airborne Jarvis. It's all plastic, and won't decapitate anyone, but it's still for 10-year-olds and up.

Does anyone need to be told what a Slinky(tm) toy is?? Okay, it is a very slack spring, 2-7/8" dia x 2-1/2" long, compressed. It will stretch out to about 5 or 6 feet long without deforming. That's the boring part. The interesting part is that it "follows" itself. Slosh it from hand to hand. Put in on the top step of stairs, flip the end down a step, and watch it walk down stairs, or down an incline. Believe us, no childhood (or adulthood) is complete without an original steel Slinky(tm). It was hard for us to find it, but we are glad we did. You should be too.

THE American classic novelty item (even ahead of the whoopee cushion and rubber vomit, we think) is a set of chattering choppers. Auto-dentures. Invented by Eddy Goldfarb in 1949, a man who made the Toy Industry Hall of Fame ahead of Milton Bradley, these are, not to put too fine a point on it, the sine qua non of gagdom, the ne plus ultra of spring-driven frivolity. Ours are 2-1/2" dia, with a wind-up key.

Introducing the Aeromax 2000. This update of the classic parachute toy has mesh under the canopy instead of lines, so it's tangle-free. Big 20" chute floats the little 3-1/2" tall trooper gently to the ground. In assorted colors, which we'll pick because we have really good color sense.

It’s Sandy the spinning seal! From Z Classic Wind Ups™, Sandy spins clockwise, bobs up and down and spins her ball on her nose. Arms and tail move, too. Measures approx 8" x 5" x 3", in teal and silver with a red ball adorned with a festive yellow star. All kids love wind-ups at some point in their lives. Great as kitschy adult decor, too.

Just like our famous cow popper, but this guy is a 5-1/4” tall rubber axolotl with a mouth big enough to take a 1-1/8” dia foam ball and spit it 20 feet when you squeeze it, as you will want to do. And if you’re axolotl-ignorant, they’re neotenic salamanders, the world’s cutest amphibians, and they also answer to “Mexican walking fish.” Ours come with (6) foam balls for your axolotl-squeezing convenience. For ages 4+.

Even if you're not a female flamingo yourself, you can still hatch an adorable hot pink flamingo. You’ll get an equally hot pink, 4-1/4" egg, which you immerse in water and wait a couple-three days while it hatches and grows to 8”+ tall. But the fun doesn’t stop there. Take Pinky out of the water and it will shrink back to egg-size and regrow endless times. (The egg, however, will be history.)

If Werner Von Braun had used these, Londonwould have just gotten wet. Have somegood clean fun with this Hydrotech"Aquazone" rocket set. You get (2) 5-3/4" tall water rockets and (1) 8-3/4" rocket, plus (2) filling funnelsand a piston pump for power. Includes a 6-page pamphlet on rocketry. For ages 8+, for good clean outside fun.

Rattlebacks are plastic semi-elliptical shapes, 3-7/8" long, that illustrate Newton's laws of motion, while mystifying kids. Set them down (the rattlebacks, not the kids) and their offset center of gravity makes them spin. Spin them in one direction and they stop and reverse themselves. You get a package of (10) in assorted colors, along with a lesson plan and suggested activities.