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Clics Circus

We needed a circus, so we made it from a Clics building kit. Elephants and children with moms and dads are Playmobil toys. Elephants and tigers are the most favorite animals after visiting a real circus.

ClicsToys is a Belgian company that was established in 2001. It makes the well-known Clics building blocks in its own factory in Kempen. Clics building sets have square pieces of identical form and shape. They easily connect at their edges, creating joints you can move.

With These plastic squares, you can create surfaces and fold them into 3D shapes. There are endless possibilities, even though Clics have very few extra pieces and accessories. Some sets have wheels and decorative panels, but this is pretty much it. On the other hand, Clics sets usually have many pieces, so you can create something truly complicated from just one set.

Since the basic pieces of a Clics building kit are squares, all the basic forms you can assemble from it are cubic or brick-like. However, thanks to the movable joints, you can assemble them at different angles, creating different shapes. There are ways to create triangular or sloping figures if you assemble the pieces just right. The cubes, however, are the most sturdy and reliable structures this set can offer. There are also a possibility of creating a flat mosaic, combining the pieces of different colors.

Clics Circus
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Zoob Racerz

Zoob Racerz set focuses on building moving cars. It has 76 pieces, but 12 wheels with moving tires, and offers many vehicle model to build. You can build up to 3 cars at once. Also this set has typical Zoob pieces of rarer silver color.

Back in 1997, inventor Michael Grey introduced Zoob, a toy inspired by the science of motion and organism development. Zoob represents an acronym for Zoology, Ontology, Ontogeny, and Botany. Each set has rod-like pieces with joint balls and sockets on their ends. Each of these balls has small bumps on its surface, so the joints can both move and stay in a certain position if you need them to.

This innovative toy features a ball and socket connection system, mimicking the natural movement and design found in people, animals, and machines. With just five basic shapes, Zoob offers 20 different ways to connect them together.

Zoob building sets have won awards because they’re different from regular building blocks. They use plastic pieces that snap together, like gears and joints, to build all kinds of objects, limited only by your imagination. After you build something with Zoob, you can actually play with it – the pieces were designed to move after being assembled, so you can have fun with the toys you create.

Zoobs are great for helping children improve their fine motor skills. The pieces are small enough to easily manipulate and put them together, but they’re not too tiny like some other toys, so it’s easier for kids who find small objects tricky.

Zoob Racerz
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Tired Tiko Mongol Warrior

Tired Anny in another set of Tiko armor – today she also was a Mongol warrior.

Pythagoras, Tiko, and Tako are vintage building sets. They have big panels of different colors and shapes, that connect by the edges. Each piece has sockets and balls that can snap together, connecting the pieces. You can also connect the pieces of different shapes, as long as their sides match. This connection is strong enough to hold even the biggest structures together.

Because of the sockets’ form, Pythagoras and Tiko panels can form both flat surfaces and 3D shapes. The flexible joint connection means that you can connect the pieces at different angles. The bigger panels are huge – they are a few inches long, so kids can create toy hats or items to hold, and not just toys. They are sturdy enough to wear and to play with. There also are smaller pieces that can help connect the bigger pannels together or make smaller crafts. The pieces of this set have all kinds of shapes – there are different triangles, rectangles, squares, pentagons, and so on, all in different colors.

Sadly, Amazon seemingly has no sets exactly like Tiko and Pythagoras, but some very similar concepts also are interesting enough.

Tired Tiko Mongol Warrior
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Our K’NEX Crafts

These are Kitties, Birdie (bottom right) and a Hedgehog (top right), all made from the same K’Nex 100 model set.

K’Nex comes in two sizes: regular and mini K’Nex. There are also matching thick and thin rods, as well as some rods that can connect large and small pieces together. Not all K’Nex sets include mini parts.

Just like with any other K’Nex sets, this one has pieces that securely fit together. You can easily take apart your creations and use the pieces to build something else. Regular pieces, like ones in K’Nex 100 model set, have stronger connections and can handle even very active play. Mini K’Nex creations are a bit more delicate.

While the crafts you make with K’Nex can be quite large, some of the pieces, especially the mini ones, are very small. This makes K’Nex sets unsafe for small babies who might accidentally swallow the pieces. These pieces can also be a bit challenging for younger kids to assemble correctly. That’s why it’s recommended for kids aged 7 and older to use K’Nex sets.

It’s also important to note that most K’Nex sets don’t come with detailed crafting instructions. Some packages may only show completed toys without step-by-step guides. However, K’Nex offers a lot of versatility and possibilities, so this is usually not a major issue.

Our K'NEX Crafts
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Clics Chess

Artem made a chessboard from a Clics set, he plays chess and loves this game. Then we saw a table with checkers on the Clics website, and Artem also converted the chessboard into a table. In the evening, he took the figurines aeay, and in the morning, while their brother was at school, the younger sisters came with their bear dogs and used the table for the tea party. We had to quickly build chairs for the animals. Arisha and Alesya actively helped, snapped parts, folded legs, and then happily played, fed their pets and had a tea party with them.

ClicsToys is a Belgian company that was established in 2001. It makes the well-known Clics building blocks in its own factory in Kempen. Clics building sets have square pieces of identical form and shape. They easily connect at their edges, creating joints you can move.

With These plastic squares, you can create surfaces and fold them into 3D shapes. There are endless possibilities, even though Clics have very few extra pieces and accessories. Some sets have wheels and decorative panels, but this is pretty much it. On the other hand, Clics sets usually have many pieces, so you can create something truly complicated from just one set.

Since the basic pieces of Clics are squares, all the basic forms you can assemble from it are cubic or brick-like. However, thanks to the movable joints, you can assemble them at different angles, creating different shapes.

Clics Chess
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Working With Gears

Daughter also worked with her dad’s crafts 🙂 Here is the proccess of working with her Quercetti Gears set.

These gears by Quercetti has all the essential thing you’d desire in a gear system. Firstly, their construction quality is top-notch, and the pieces have robust and solid design. The set also has a seamless gear interface, so they interlock securely. With this reliable connections and sturdy pieces, the set allows you to build machines that can perform real work.

The set includes several base plates that fit together like puzzle pieces. Nearly half the time these are in use at our house, kids made colorful boxes from them. So, they’re not just basic pieces but are interesting decorations in their own. The second set of pieces has support structures, which are tubes and joints that interlock to create sturdy poles. These pieces come in a consistent size, without the frustration of dealing with components at slightly different heights, a problem we’ve encountered with other sets in the past. The support connects are sturdy, so that the structures stay intact once they’re built.

In addition to the gears, this set also comes with attachments like chains and rubber bands. You can use them to connect groups of gears that would otherwise be separate. Also, you can use them with other toys and building sets.

Working With Gears
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Tiko Balls

Balls we made from two different Tiko sets. Tiko manuals don’t have these models, and they are good optionsfor the builders who don’t have some pieces.

Pythagoras, Tiko, and Tako are vintage building sets. They have big panels of different colors and shapes, that connect by the edges. Each piece has sockets and balls that can snap together, connecting the pieces. You can also connect the pieces of different shapes, as long as their sides match. This connection is strong enough to hold even the biggest structures together.

Because of the sockets’ form, Pythagoras and Tiko panels can form both flat surfaces and 3D shapes. The flexible joint connection means that you can connect the pieces at different angles. The bigger panels are huge – they are a few inches long, so kids can create toy hats or items to hold, and not just toys. They are sturdy enough to wear and to play with. There also are smaller pieces that can help connect the bigger pannels together or make smaller crafts. The pieces of this set have all kinds of shapes – there are different triangles, rectangles, squares, pentagons, and so on, all in different colors.

Sadly, Amazon seemingly has no sets exactly like Tiko and Pythagoras, but some very similar concepts also are interesting enough.

Tiko Balls
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Qubits Pieces

Pieces of this building sets come in many different colors. Qubits manufacturer often offers sets with random colors in them.

Qubits is a small toy brand making very interesting and unusual building sets. Their sets have only two types of pieces – rectangular planks and multi-triangular pieces.

The multi-triangular pieces look like they are made from many connected triangles. They can connect to each other with the matching holes and pegs in the triangles’ centers. Each of these pieces has the same shape, but, connecting and overlapping, they create strong, flexible openwork structures. They can create any shapes and forms, flat or 3D. However, triangular shapes are the most sturdy and resilient ones.

There are also rectangular pieces, that can connect with multi-triangular ones both with the edges and with the openings on their surfaces. These pieces can also connect to each other. Both shapes come in multiple colors, often random, colors. Together, these two shapes can create many surprising and fascinating crafts. Sadly, Qubits have no extra pieces like wheels, so the number of moving crafts and toys is somewhat limited.

Qubits are big enough to be safe even for toddlers. However, these sets can be confusing for the smaller children, so the recommended age is 6+.

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Playcube Photo Frame

A frame for a photo (a teddy bear figure) from the Playcube pieces.

This is a vintage set of interlocking cubes by the French Playcube brand. The set has a bunch of big cubes with rails and openings on their sides. The cubes can interlock with any of their sides. The direction of the rails sometimes limits the number of possible positions. But it’s not a big problem, since all the pieces are cubic and all their sides are equal.

The set also includes soft plastic figures to decorate the crafts. These figures are flat, they are just silhouettes with no further details. They are thick enough to hold between the rails on the cubes’ sides without falling out. They come in different shapes – there is a shell, a teddy bear, a horse, and so on. They also have different colors.

This set is simple and fairly basic. It has very few pieces and no extra pieces like wheels or alternative shapes. There are many things you can build from this set, but it has way fewer possibilities than the building sets for the older kids. However, it’s a good toy for younger children, with big pieces that are also pleasant to touch. And the connection method is somewhat unique, there are very few building sets that offer something exactly like it.

Playcube Photo Frame