Amy Carney Bevins: Hi! I am Amy Carney Bevins. I am a Writer and Educator, and I am also a Mom. Today, we are talking about Award Winning Toys with long term playability. So let's take a look at the next great products for family holiday fun.

Khet is chess for the new millennium. It combines laser beams, classic strategy and Egyptian theme to create an award winning toy. Khet is winner of over eleven prestigious awards including a Mensa Select Award, Swedish Toy of year, and winner of Technology Innovation awards. The goal is to illuminate your opponents' pharaoh by bouncing a laser beam blast off mirror in pieces. The challenge is to shield your own pieces while out maneuvering your opponent. Simple to learn, but challenging to master. This game draws you back again and again. At the Expansion packs, Eye of Horus, and the Tower of Kadesh, to play in 3D or split the beams and bring this great game of laser chess to a whole new level.

Every child deserves a great set of alphabet blocks. Uncle Goose box are beautifully emboxed, hand-crafted in the USA and made with non-toxic child safe paint. The wonderful thing about these blocks is not only do they come in your standard alphabet blocks, they also come in foreign languages such as Arabic, Hebrew, French, German. They also have sign language blocks, braille blocks and math blocks. Uncle Goose blocks are light to handle and play with, and in this age of disposable toys, Uncle Goose blocks are an A one quality block that will delight your family for years to come.

Puzzle Play Rain Forest is an eco-friendly child safe toy that is a fantastic two-in-one combination. Children must spend hours playing with the colorful rain forest animals, and then have fun puzzling out how to put the pieces back together, made of durable, renewable rubber-wood by a company that utilizes fair trade practices. The Puzzle Play Rain Forest is a toy your kids will play with for years to come.

Hop balls are irresistible kid magnets. They deal with the fun as your children grow. These Italian made hop balls are latex and fairly free and extremely durable. The hop ball comes in three different sizes. The small one is perfect for pre-schoolers and the giant hop 66 holds up to 300 pounds, making it large enough for teens and adults, and it's a great thigh workout I must say. Your whole family can be out hopping and bouncing around and having fun. They also make a small hop horse for that younger pre-schoolers and toddlers, so that they can be out there with the family enjoying bouncing as well. This is a great indoor outdoor exercise toy for the whole family.

Finally, a game your entire family can play together from your 4-year-old niece to your 74-year-old grandmother, everyone will enjoy learning about outdoor fun together. The unique thing about this game is it features four levels of play in one game so that you all have the opportunity to play at the same time. No playing down to your child with the younger game or having the child not able to play with the rest of the family. You all get to move around the board together, learning all kinds of wonderful trivia and answering questions about things like the migration habits of birds, animal identification, and with 99 fun facts included, you will be amazed that what you have learned. Did you know we each have 32 brains, I didn't until I played camp. We have had an opportunity to learn all kinds of wonderful fun information, we're all having fun together at the same time, and it's a great bringing the family together game.

Musical building blocks make magical fun. With smart builder piano, toddlers and pre-schoolers will have a great time building blocks and this is a wonderful toy for children to play together because older children love to build with this piano as well. Not only does it make great music when you play the keys as you add the different blocks to it, it changes the sound pattern. Sometimes you can have a guitar,you can have old McDonald, a drum rhythm. Smart builder piano is also compatible with other mega block sets, so you can build both basis and build on top making this not only a building toy and a musical toy, but a great combination of fun for older and younger kids. Those are six of my favorite award winning long-term playable toys for holiday family fun. I hope that you and your family have a safe, healthy, and happy holidays.