Stacking Nesting Cups

Years of Fun from Simple Stacks

At ages 6.5, 5, and 2.5 years old, all three of my kids still play with our set of ten stacking nesting cups in a rainbow of colors. They use them as pretend kitchen accessories. They stack them and nest them and set them all out in rows sorted by color on the floor. They match other items (plastic animals, balls, and other things I can’t recall) with the different colors of the cups. They gather tiny pieces in them and proudly bring them over to display to me.

I had no idea such a simple investment would pay off for years to come. We’ve had visitors where the adults exclaimed over the baby toys we still have. But when they get weekly if not daily use, and they store so well with their nesting feature, I have a hard time justifying getting rid of them.

If you only want to invest in a few baby toys, a set of cups like these would be one of my top recommendations. The rims along the bottom help stabilize the tower when stacking. Ours also have holes in the bottom for use in the bath or other water. But – full disclosure – I’ve never once used them for any kind of water play or in the bath because we get so much use out of them dry. When we got them, I thought I would move them into the bath once the kids lost interest in playing with them, but so far that hasn’t happened.

In addition, the cups have proved super durable. One of my kids discovered he could stand on them to use them as stool and they didn’t break. They didn’t even crack. They’ve been “cooked,” banged, rolled, sat upon, and stepped on without any evidence of their age (past six years now). Even more impressive, since I had to give up my obsessive “find all the pieces to everything every day” after my second child came along, we still have all ten cups. Together.

The manufacturer recommends them for ages twelve months and up, but they have no small pieces (or any fragile bits that might break off and become choking hazards), so I have used them from ages six months and up – pretty much as soon as my infants could sit up and probably before that, too. They make a very satisfying noise when the tower crashes, yet it isn’t so loud as to be annoying repeatedly, even on hardwood floors.