More Great Princess Gift Ideas for Girls
Suggestions for Toy, Doll, Arts and Crafts, and Game Presents
Nov 22, 2008
When it comes time to purchase a gift for a girl who loves princesses, instead of automatically buying every item in the Disney Princess line, look a little harder for unique princess toys that promote creative, open-ended princess play.
Suggestions for Princess Toys
Suggestions for fun princess playthings for her royal highness include:
- puppets, hand puppets, finger puppets, and marionettes by brands such as Melissa & Doug, Folkmanis, Manhattan Toy, Galt, and Kathe Kruse.
- soft toys and playsets or pop up playhouses from brands such as Pockets of Learning, Haba, and North American Bear Co.
- charming ceramic tea sets from a quality brand such as Mud Pie.
- puzzles and floor puzzles from brands such as Djeco, Melissa & Doug, iKids, or Mudpuppy.
- wooden dress-up dolls by brands such as Melissa & Doug or Woodkins.
- soft fabric dolls such as North American Bear's Topsy-Turvy Princesses, Manhattan Toy's Dress-Up Princess, or Kathe Kruse's Waldorf dolls.
- 3-D paper dollhouses like the Princess Palace book by Piggy Toes Press.
Suggestions for Princess-Themed Art and Craft Kits
For little princesses who love art, look for princess-themed:
- stencil kits
- stamp kits
- sketchbooks and portfolios
- sticky mosaics kits
- lacing and tracing cards
- magnetic travel art kits
- make-your-own tiara sets
- locked diary
- wood craft kits by brands such as Works of Ahhh and Melissa & Doug
Artsy and crafty princesses may also enjoy Usborne Activity books such as How to Draw Princesses and Ballerinas by Fiona Watt or Princess Things to Make and Do by Ruth Brocklehurst (both ages 4–8).
Suggestions for Princess-Themed Games
Here are some excellent, non-Disney princess-themed games that encourage the use of many different developmental skills:
- The Princess Charming game by International Playthings (ages 3 and up) serves as a good first introduction to how board games work. Players move around the board and collect tokens.
- The Sleepy Princess and the Pea Game by Haba (ages 3 and up) encourages players to hone fine-motor and cooperation skills by working with other players to balance tiny mattresses on a bed.
- The Once Upon a Time Matching Game by eeBoo (ages 3 and up) requires players to use both memory and matching skills to pair cards with the same adorable fairy tale pictures. Younger children can just match cards, while older ones can flip the cards over and play a game of Memory.
- The Princess Jewel Game by Haba (ages 4–12) nurtures memory skills by requiring players to remember where jewels are. Comes with fun game parts such as fabric crowns to wear.
- Royal Rescue by Educational Insights (ages 5 and up) hones spatial reasoning and logic skills by requiring players to arrange different wooden blocks to make a path between the princess and the knight. Includes many levels of puzzles that get increasingly harder.
- The Clever Castle Game by Think Fun (ages 5–7) requires players to apply logic to use clues to figure out where to place princesses, knights, and dragons in specific patterns.
- Princess-opoly by Late for the Sky (ages 5–8) develops visual perception and logic skills such as matching and color recognition. In this age-appropriate adaptation of the classic Monopoly game, players move around the board collecting princess friends instead of properties and providing them with crowns instead of building houses and hotels.
- The Enchanted Forest Game by Ravensburger (ages 6 and up) requires players to use their memories to remember where different treasures are hidden around the board.
Young princesses will also enjoy dressing the part and playing in a princess-themed environment. Shoppers interested in additional kinds of princess gifts can check out Great Princess Gift Ideas for Girls for suggestions for dress-up items, bedroom furnishings and kinds of room decor, and princess-themed play areas that a princess might enjoy and Princess Books for Girls and Boys of All Ages for suggestions for books that make good presents for princess-loving girls of all ages.
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