Lincoln logs ruled when I was growing up - loved them

My brothers and I had a large set of wooden blocks my dad had cut from 2x4s and rounded the corners with a sander. We had Lincoln Logs and sometimes used both sets...scale wasn't quite right but who cares about such details? Usually though we just used the large blocks because we needed room to play with our scale model tractors and farm equipment.

My kids favorite was Duplo blocks...have you ever tried to build a tower to the ceiling with Legos?

Had Lincoln logs for my son. I liked them more than he did.

Didn't have Lincoln logs here in Oz. played with all the rest.

Lego and all the cool variations. Betta blocks, duplo etc. Most of the time we played with it all at once. Wood blocks were in the top of the favourite list too

I chose Lincoln Logs even though I like to use other construction toys as well. I do think that Lincoln logs are a bit easier for little hands to handle. My granddaughter is getting a "Civil War President building set" for Christmas as we had to call it last night. We also need a set to keep here at our house because our grandchildren spend a lot of time here.

I also like Grider and Panel sets and Tinkertoys.

Tinkertoys, yes! Thanks, CarolKelley! I always had Lincoln Logs on my Christmas and Birthday wish lists, I loved them. But Tinkertoys were No2, and Erector sets were No3 especially as I got older.

Those wishes were always granted, btw, my dad was really hoping at least one of his children would follow the many generations-back of civil and mechanical engineering training in our family:)

I actually had a friend that had a giant stack of regular red bricks in her side yard. We spent an entire summer building barbie houses with them EVERY day. It was the best.

My boys and I spent hours playing with Legos. They are both in graduate school now, one in engineering and the other in architecture. My daughter loves them now, who knows what the future will bring for her?

That's interesting, Hart Studio, I know my 'toys' engendered a lifelong love of building, especially homes, and my husband, who grew up with Meccano building sets, grew up to train as an urban planner, later veering into chartered surveying and building conservation (he's now retired from 30+years of historic building conservation).

I wonder how many of the professionals on Houzz had similar toys that either inspired or hinted at the future. The only reason I didn't go into civil engineering was I wanted to be a full-time mum more than an engineer. I think I broke my dad's heart just a little.

Lego's at home when I was a kid and Tinker Toys at my grandparents home over the summer break and holidays!!

Legos. I don't think I've met a kid who wouldn't play with Legos. My little brother had the first Legos that came out. He played with them almost non-stop. Our grandma would sweep them out the back door when he didn't put them all away and I would go out and pick them out of the yard for him. :D

Lincoln Logs - the original wooden logs - I loved playing make believe in my fantasy house and "town" - I also love the wooden toy cars and car tracks that you can find in Germany.! Good memories, all. :)

I always wanted a dollhouse. Now I can enjoy the one I just finished "renovating" for my 5-year-old granddaughter. The house, interior, base and every piece of furniture were hopelessly ugly when I bought it at an estate sale last summer, and there were many frustrating times that it came very close to joining the trash curbside. It became the never-ending project I had to hide under a blanket every time she came over. When I disassembled it, I discovered it was "born" the same year as my son. So my labor of love for his little girl seemed serendipitous. I only wish I could show you the wonder and awe in her eyes when she first saw it. Yes!! A dollhouse is definitely my favorite. Every girl should have one. No matter how old we get.

My photos didn't attach from my library. I'll try to snap one directly with my camera.

Nope... Can't get pics to attach. :(

My three sister and I grew up seeing, but not touching, my Grandfather's toy, a 22 piece German village. When we divided up the household goods, each of us wanted that village and we agreed it was too wonderful to split up. My sister, Debby, and I took on the Herculean task of replicating the village x3. Now each of us, ages 58 to 62 "plays" with our villages at Xmas.

Girder and panel building set. The only problem was the plastic panels and girders didn't hold up to repeated reconfigurations.

Tough one. It depends on the age and ability of the child. In our home we have 5 grandchildren under age 5. The oldest child uses a combo of Duplo Lego, retro Lego kits from his uncles heyday, wooden blocks and foam blocks if the little babes are crawling around. ;-)

I had Lincoln logs and two sets of fake legos; cousins had 'real' legos, an erector set (always coveted and my dad would never let me have a set) and I had a large set of cutoffs turned into blocks from the early years of the house remodel. And a set of 'Tinker Toys' that were sort of lame.... Oh, there was a tin dollhouse that the chimney promptly came off of and floated around for many years (just the chimney). The dollhouse got used for storage cubbys.

I loved building 3D jigsaw puzzles when I was young . I would get them for Christmas and spend a whole day making them ! :)

My nephew and I used to play "train garage" all the time with his Thomas the Tank Engine and his Lincoln Logs.

Scrap wood, nails and hammer.
I started building tree forts at a young age - still enjoy it!

I used to have a tin dollhouse back in the 60s, but mine didn't have a the ultimate late 50s/early 60s add-on: a bomb shelter. That's right, some dollhouses made by the Marx toy company in 1962 came complete with a bomb shelter. You can see one under the Culture: Wonderful Oddities section of RetroRenovation. http://retrorenovation.com/2013/01/16/rare-1962-marx-metal-dollhouse-with-a-bomb-shelter/

I can't fathom getting a dollhouse with a bomb shelter.

Legos didn't exist, and the Lincoln Logs came in a close second to my favorite building set - American Building Blocks. Legos are essentially a take-off of these old building blocks. Many, many hours of fun building homes, offices, and towers. While off at school, found out my parents cleaned our "Old toys" out of the house. Didn't get to pass them on, nothing like them since. :-/

At a very young age, I would take cardboard boxes and form them into floor plans for my dolls. My mother, bless her naïve heart, would give me an Exacto knife at about age 5 so that I could cut out pieces of cardboard to make furniture and room dividers in my boxes. I used wall paper sample books and carpet scraps. I used Saran Wrap for the windows. I'd stitch curtains and upholstery on my mom's Singer featherweight out of the remnants she'd buy for me. My dad would help me with landscaping using bits of outdoor foliage we'd plant in Dixie cup planters.

Days of fun and creativity for a very nominal amount of money. My Barbie clients were extremely satisfied with my design, architecture and landscaping services!

I used to use whatever I could find around the house; kleenex boxes, barbie furniture, books, potted plants etc. It was funnier to be creative with thinking 'out side of the box' for building my barbie houses.

Gee I thought I was the only girl who did that!

I grew up in the 60's and had a big can of American Bricks. They were plastic bricks, like Legos, but looked more realistic, and had operating windows and doors of different styles. I spent hours playing with them.

Lincoln logs...but only the old school wooden ones.
But a little mix of "Erector Set" & "Mold Master" thrown in for good measure!

In the nineteen fifties, I only used found cardboard boxes as "houses" but my youngest daughter played with blocks then Legos and Lincoln logs. However, at the age of eight, for Christmas, she asked for and received an Erector set, which she enjoyed for many years.

I totally used to like my brothers toys more....his always had power! It's always more fun when things plug in. :0)

We had most of these in our house growing up. My brother was amazing at Lego. I had all girls but made sure we had Duplo and Lego in the house. Now my grandkids are starting to play with it. My 11 mth old grandson LOVES blocks and Duplo already.

I used to build houses and rooms, mostly using cardboard boxes. I'd pick up brochures with paint and stain samples that I'd use to make "parquet" floors. I tried pinning a house together with styrofoam sheets and built one with double pieces of very thin plywood to which I planned to add pipes and electrical. Unfortunately, we moved before I could finish it.

I liked Lincoln logs more than legos because they were faster to assemble, I didn't end up with a garish multi colored plastic box, and I just preferred the feel of the smooth wooden logs to sharp plastic corners.

I also loved my dollhouse. I saved my money to buy the kit, helped assemble, paint, and wallpaper it. Electrified it. I liked to find objects from the normal size world and figure out what it was in the miniature world. (For example, a bottle cap was a pie tin.) And books like "The Borrowers" made it seem magical.

I think that the original Lego bricks were white and red with perhaps some green pieces and some clear bricks. It's been 50 years though so my memory might be a bit faulty on that.

Remember shirt cardboards. My brother and I used to design whole villages of the cardboards with doors and windows colored with pencils and bent into house and shops. We had roadways dug into a dirt patch in the backyard that my parents kept bare for years afterwards. We also had American bricks, lincoln logs and erector sets. My brother is an architect and my hobby is designing houses.

I was a Lincoln logs girl. I made mansions out of those things! However, when the new Montgomery Wards Christmas catalog came out, I'd go through the toy pages and covet all of those fun tin fully-built-and-painted "filling stations", barns with animals, little villages, and, of course, doll houses. I never got any of them so I resorted to my Lincoln logs and loved 'em!

Lego! Still playing with it with little grand kids * blinks eyes* hehe, still as fun has ever, we have been building landmark buildings recently!

I had American Logs, a square version of early Lincoln logs, and my numerous plastic horses, Indians, cowboys, and farm animals. My brother had the erector set and wouldn't let me near it.
I remember shirt card boards too... And cigar boxes, both for construction and to hold all our crayons and school supplies!

I had a big bag of blocks that where my fathers. Made these elaborate structures in the middle of the living room floor which my mother would have to vacuum around for weeks. First photo of the future architect.

And lately I like building paper models. Latest is Gaudi's Sagrada Familia in Barcelona.

I had a Marx Imagination Dollhouse. Best Christmas present EVER! Everything came apart & could be reconfigured to one's imagination.

No Lego at our house(it is Lego, both singular and plural. The Danes get a little upset when they are called "Legos"). I had colored wood blocks and Lincoln Logs, Grandma had Tinker Toys and maybe an Erector Set?

My kids have LOTS of Lego. The youngest one is the one who uses them the most. My oldest was saying the other day he hasn't lived very long so he hasn't played with them for very long. In my "au contraire" Dad logic, I informed her that if he had started building with Lego at 2 1/2 years old(he is now 5), he has been building for half his life. ;-)

OMG....architectrunnerguy! That pic of you is great! Especially since you ended up in the field you're in!

That being said....I guess I should have been a baker! haha

I remember building houses with Lego in the 50's in Europe. At that time you could get different sized windows, doors, flat rectangles to use as a base (upside down) or roof. There were even pieces that worked as beams and little round ones to make columns with. About all you could do with Lego at that time was build houses and we loved it. Then came the wheels and my brothers went on to make Lego vehicles such as cars and planes. I kept my nephews in Lego but by that time it came in boxes that pretty much defined what you could make with them, such as castles, space stuff, etc.. It is a wonderful toy and certainly stimulates creativity. The Erector Sets were a big hit as well but they came a bit later. Thanks for this little trip down memory lane!

Other: Playmobile - totally the way forward! :)

I would get a bag of wooden blocks that had other shapes of wood that my dad used around the house to fix things then I got what was left over for Xmas....had to use my imagination to make any thing but I spent hours trying....

Definitely legos! I STILL (secretly... shhhh!) love them! When I have my own kids I will have an excuse to play with them without people thinking I'm weird or childish hahaha!

Tinker Toys

River Valley, I'm sure you're right about the name...but at almost 50 years old, "Legos" is ingrained in my head!

My younger brother and I had 2 cabinets overflowing with Legos, we built entire towns in our play room. My parents kept all of the Legos until the grandkids outgrew them. We could never get enough of them!

We even referred to them as "onesies", "twosies", "squares" and "bricks" and would ask each other to help find certain size/shapes/colors for different projects. Endless hours of play/fun :) Great memories!