The changes your baby makes in his first year are fascinating and mind-boggling. At some point around his first birthday, you’ll swear that you can see him thinking, and marvel at how his physical capacities have caught up to his mental abilities.

When he’s moved beyond mobiles and rattles, your child will want to really get his hands on things, and that desire to create and destroy can be satisfied with simple, old-fashioned wooden blocks. Wooden blocks, safe and durable, are classic toys for babies and beyond.

Babies and toddlers need and want to experiment with their senses. Now that they are developing an understanding of cause and effect and a desire to affect changes on their environment, they’re ready for the serious fun and discovery that wooden blocks can provide.

You probably remember those old-fashioned alphabet blocks with a raised letter in colorful paint on one side and images of things that start with that letter on the other sides.

Those wooden blocks are still around, still inviting babies to grasp them and move them from hand to hand and for toddlers to stack them up and knock them down.

This process is a natural part of discovering spatial relations, cause and effect, and helping to foster a mastery of coordination. Colorful wooden blocks will also help develop an awareness of color and letter recognition.

Another terrific wooden block toy is Backyard Buddy Blocks. Made of all natural rubberwood, these interchangeable blocks store in their own wooden tray, perfect for transporting and using in the car.

These blocks invite toddlers to stack, build, and solve puzzles. Toddlers will delight for hours in fitting together the easy-to-hold blocks to form different animal combinations.

This desire to build and tear down and build again isn’t something your child will outgrow, so let wooden block toys grow with your child. You can choose larger and more elaborate sets as your child gets bigger.

Let his more advanced motor and logic skills take flight as he assembles more complicated creations. Because wooden blocks are so simple, only your child’s imagination will limit what he builds.

If you sit back and watch your child build with wooden blocks, you’ll see his active mind turning away, solving spatial relations problems and making judgments.

You may find it very difficult to remain an observer to this process: another plus of wooden block toys is that you get to participate and learn alongside your child, a gift to him that will last a lifetime.