The other day my kids were looking through a toy magazine (a great distraction for the kiddos, by the way), and Wes told me we should get this Club House.
After looking at the picture, I realized we had plenty of big boxes lying around and we could make our own that would be sufficient (more like, awesome) for a 3- and 4-year-old.
I used a few boxes, packing tape and a knife to make the beautiful abode. Wes was pretty set on painting it (because of the original), but he settled on coloring it with markers.
He also insisted on having a mailbox, which I just happened to have the perfect box and wrapping paper roll for. It was a like a "perfect storm" of cardboard house building products. They then spent the next half hour writing notes to each other and putting them in the mailbox while pretending they were Brian and Natalie.
Pure preschooler happiness and I saved myself 40 bucks to boot!
