When I was a kid, Fisher Price Little People were, hands down, my very favorite toys for a very long time. My mom was (and is) an excellent garage saler, so we had a huge collection of the stuff. My brother and I would dump all the accessories into a big pile in the floor and then take turns choosing pieces one by one until they were all accounted for. We called them our “people stuff.”

But my mom’s house is low on storage space (and my mom is, perhaps, lower on nostalgia than I am), so all the Little People were long gone by the time my own kids came along. But my immense love for Little People never died. I used to sell a lot on ebay and, consequently, go to a lot of garage sales back when we lived in Boston. And I started picking up Little People stuff when I came across it….you know, for my future kids. Sure. For the kids.

But my first batch of kids just wasn’t all that into the Little People collection I had lovingly assembled for them. They liked it okay. When Milo was little, we kept all the toys he might choke on in the big walk-in closet in Ari’s room, and toddler Ari referred to it as “my choking hazard closet.” But he never spent that much time playing with his adorable vintage choking hazards. He actually preferred new, non-choking hazard style Little People, which everyone knows are NOT AS GOOD. Well, Ari didn’t know it.

Anyway, though, I never had any intention of parting with my Little People, even though we didn’t know if we’d have any more kids after Gus. So as soon as Abe hit three and was therefore old enough to know not to eat the Little People, I started pulling everything out of the basement for him.

And so far?

He LOVES it all! Yay! Fourth time’s a charm, right? Really, it’s hard to say if Abe’s love for the Little People will last as long as mine has, but for now he’s having a blast with everything. He says things like, “Thank you for my school and my castle and my airplane and my mail truck” and he plays and plays and plays. It’s adorable:

Right now he has the castle:

This was by far my best Little People thrift score. I found it, complete with all the accessories, for $5 at a church yard sale outside of Boston. The dragon’s tail didn’t used to be broken. And I’m not sure how we ended up with two queens. It’s a very progressive sort of kingdom, I guess.

The school:

So I found the school at a thrift score for just a couple of dollars (and the bus somewhere sometime; don’t remember the details there), but it didn’t have any of the accessories with it. I just went on ebay a couple of weeks ago and paid way too much to buy the people and desks and playground equipment. I must not make a habit of this. But what’s a school with no desks or playground?!

The house:

The rather beat-up barn:

Airport and airplane (there an older version of the airport that I like better, but beggars can’t be choosers). Not that Bert and the King are in there buying tickets. Wonder where they’re going?:

And the Sesame Street apartment building:

For some reason, we have two of most of the Sesame Street stuff: two Big Birds, two Cookie Monsters, two TVs, two each of Bert and Ernie’s beds, and two Mr. Hoopers to run the store and lunch counter (but only one Bert and one Ernie. And NO Count!):

There’s a houseboat that you can see in one of the pictures of Abe playing, and a somewhat broken pop-up camper and somewhat more broken ferris wheel, too.

And, of course, a big pile of random stuff:

Oh, and Fergus likes to hang out with us while we play Little People:

It’s a fairly extensive collection, and it’s already bigger than what his room can really handle (we need to clear out some of the baby toys and books he’s outgrown, and then I think it will be in better shape in there)….but I still think he needs MORE.

I mean, obviously he needs the A-frame; his grandmother lives in an A-frame!

And he would really get into the garage right about now, what with ramps AND an elevator.

The village was always my VERY FAVORITE so I he needs that, too.

And the camper. Duh.

I really liked the nursery school, too. I mean, what’s not to like? The roof turns into a playground!

I could keep going. But I think once I get all those sets for Abe, anything else would just be a nice bonus.

Now all I have to do is take on an extra job to finance the purchase of all of these sets off of ebay. Or luck out and walk into a thrift store one day just as they’re putting out someone’s entire childhood collection of Little People. Fingers crossed.