After two years of the pandemic kids are ready to enjoy the outdoors again with their favorite toys. Cheddar News speaks with Laurie Schacht, Chief Toy Officer at Toy Insider on how to entertain your kids with the latest, and greatest gadgets. 

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Hottest Toys To Chill With Your Kids This Summer

Welcome back to Chester's Guide to Summer. Parents know there is an endless option of toys out there. There's so many and each year the offering just seems to get better than the last. But don't worry, we got you covered, we have an expert, we're joined by Laurie Shot, Chief Toy Officer at Toy Insider who will tell us all about the summer's hottest must haves for your kids. Lori welcome. I'm so distracted here because there's so many cool things now. Children nowadays have so much to deal with the pandemic and just the current news cycle. They've been locked up for the last two years. They've adapt to remote learning and of course dealing with increased anxiety and stress. Is this on the minds of the toy makers as well? Okay, I'm gonna take you through things that are fun indoor outdoor, but we're going to touch on that topic. So hang in there for a second. So let's start with some great indoor toys. And what I love about the first four toys that are indoors, they're also great travel toys as we kick into travel season. So I want to start with the Tony box and the cool characters. So when you first take this out, this is the perfect story time companion for your child. Um and they will have this for so many years. Parents will set this up using Wifi ours is not connected to Wifi right now, but then you take your characters, there's loads of them newest ones, or Arthur and Dora, the Explorer put them on here and you hear stories and songs and they take them on great adventures and you know, when you talk about characters like this, there's also great messages for the kids about being kind, being themselves, being good to others. Right, Okay, and then to get even more into the emotions. So these are the coolest things, emotional support fries. Let's face it, we all need it, but it's really tough for the cats, right? Um figuring out what's going on. It's a great way. And you know, they mark this for an older age for 6 to 8 and up, and the reason is those are the kids that sometimes can't talk about their feelings. Everyone has an expression or every friday, every friday, every spud has an expression. Yes, so just a great way for the kids to really connect and be able to talk to parents and each other about the things that they're feeling. So if you go way back in time, are you a nineties kid? Alright, so Digimon. So it's a virtual pet monster. Kids get to raise them, they have to take care of them and feed them and then they have epic battles and what's new is this little rock doc up here. See these little things. So let's say I had a Digimon and you did, we can put them together and we can battle. Right? Oh my our viewers are looking at it now. That's so cool, I wish we had that when I was a kid and again, look how easy this is to take everywhere anywhere, literally, you can take this anywhere, yep, okay, so the guy that Disney Pixar had turning red, it came out of course, so, and it was all about um Miley 13 year old adolescent who's going through all of those adolescent troubles. Oh, I have one of those at home. Yeah, this is our many moons of, of red panda and she is so cute because from the movie and we squeezed her hand. We here, but we know that. So here's what I want you to do. Holy squeeze her belly, squeeze it again. Look at the mouth. Wait guys, when Natalie gets excited, she turns into the red pandas. So kids are gonna get to go through again those emotions and expressions and then everything. I'm like a kid right now because I'm so excited about this. What else are we looking at? All right now, let's bring it outside and we still have a great travel toy. It's the original Whammo hacky sack, except you and I are playing wrong the way to play with your ankles, ankles, legs, back, head, anything except your arms or your hands. Once you only first throw is your hand and that's it. So love it. Fun. We want our kids to get outside and be physical and it's a great way to do it. This might be my favorite. You're never too old for this. This is from sunny days, It is the bubble jet and you know, it speaks for itself. It's a great item. It comes with the bubbles. You battery this thing up and flip one switch and millions of bubbles for the, for the young and the young at heart. I'm young at heart because I can't get enough of this. I walked to the table and like I love this so much. All right, now we'll talk about this. I have a little remote. Yeah, let's see if this is connected there. It is connected. Okay, so this is our all terrain RC Batmobile by the way. The batman emblem is also on the remote, which I think is so cool. And what I love put this on the rocks. Put this on the sand and put it on the snow. Put it in the water. No. Yes, it looks so sturdy. I mean these wheels, the wheels are awesome and it's pretty light. So this thing will float, it will go across the water, it'll go across anything you put in front of it. It's the Batmobile. I do want to ask you because there's so many toys out there that are expensive. But what are worth the splurge. Okay, so we're gonna get to that. But just so you know, like the Tony box when we talked about this $99 but all of the new characters and there are so many $15 each filled with content and stories. You know the fries, the Digimon, we're talking about $15 items. $25 items. $15.15 15 $6 for a hacky sack. Okay, so the prices are reasonable. The next thing I want to talk about is a bike because that is a staple in life, makes them feel independent. So I think you have some B roll of the Dina kraft bike. It's gravel blaster. It's a 12 inch bike. It's got training wheels that are adjustable and come off and it's so cool. It also comes into sweetheart version. Lots of graphics and you know, I'm, I'm the girl who loves the pink, but so this is about 100 and $10 but it is a reason and it gets kids started. It's that first sense of like freedom and independence. Right? So really, really cool. It's got the brakes on it, cool, cool graphics and lots of colors and my co host ken is on the other in the other room with one of my favorite summer staples of all Lori. Let's go join him. I can hear the sound. Yes, please, yes, go ahead. What is this adorable thing here? So we have, it's called the kid Trax classic pedal car. I don't know if we can see that. We're trying, we're trying to make it work is one of my favorites. I love it. So inside, it's just pedal. So this is all kid power. The steering wheel works. It comes in four different models we have are gorgeous fire truck here does the bell work? The bell works all right. You know that we're coming? It also has a police car, a hot rod. And again, my favorite is the pink convertible. That's my favorite too. I haven't seen it, but that's my favorite, but it's a gorgeous car. Yeah, they're really, really gorgeous. I mean, I just love them. All right, so let's talk about my good friend, ken buffa. Yeah, So let's talk about the Icee machine. So I see um, introduced this and when you turn this on after you've refrigerated or actually put this in the freezer the inside to make it nice and cold, you have to get the syrup, you mix it with water. We had ice and salt put this together. Eventually this turns into the slushies, just like you remember. So the machine is beautiful and they've also just come out with a soft ice cream machine. So you seem concept, You're gonna add your milk, you know, your cream and some sugar, put it in, let it go and suddenly you're gonna be making your own soft ice cream and it's so compact, compact and these are for kids like 12 and up. Um, you know, because they're following the directions and the goal is that they're actually at this point doing it themselves. Um, these run for about $135 or so and they're great for birthday and they're beautiful because it's got that classic look. So it's cool to leave it right in the kitchen, wow, what's your favorite flavor growing up? Cherry to? This is cherry too, and I'm really happy because then I can turn this on later and Lauren break and we could have some, we're going to have and I promise you it's exactly what you remember getting into summer mode. Thank you so much, Laurie Schacht, chief toy officer at Toy Insider.