travel pack of wipes - though now she can open them so after she dispenses 1 or 2 that game is over

my chunky beaded necklace - she shakes it, she doesn't really put things in her mouth, not yet anyway

anything with a buckle or metal clasp

shoe laces

plastic containers and lids

a water bottle with a few pennies inside

a water bottle in general - who doesn't love to play with one?

paper

Once Alex and Anna got older we passed on a lot of their baby toys (let's be clear, Pete cleaned house. Stieby's like to pitch things, my family hoards –ok mom– saves things). Now that Ella has come along we are re-entering the world of baby toys.The first time we went all out. Alex and Anna were the first grand kids on my side so everyone wanted to buy them gifts. We had plastic coming out the whaszoo (I have no idea how to spell that.) That stuff takes up a lot of space so, even I was happy to see it all go and we moved on to more condensed toys like action figures, Legos, and art stuff.When Ella arrived we had many, many offers to take hand-me-down toys. We have really great friends-thanks again, and we did take some of them up, but our house is small and I just couldn't bare going back to a sea of bright colored plastic. Instead we have come up with some more creative toys. Ella's favorites:But I have to say her all time favorite toys have buttons. She loves phones, remote controls and will bang the hell out of the computer keyboard if we let her.I thought I had a brilliant idea. I saved an old cell phone and an old remote control that still light up but don't do anything. I actually considered going on Shark Tank with this idea it was so genius. But when I conducted my market research study of 1, she wouldn't bother with them at all. It was like she knew she was being scammed. She actually tried to dive head-first off the couch to get to the "real" remote. I swear it's instinctive or something.