Gifts for Kids Under $30, From Age 3 to 12

Pretend food is one of the few toys that preschoolers come back to for years, and this pizza is the classic of the kind. It's a wooden pizza in six slices held together by self-stick tabs; cutting it with the wooden pizza cutter pulls them apart with a satisfying rip. There are 36 wooden toppings to choose from, a spatula and a serving tray, and it all stores in a wooden box.

It suits a child who already plays restaurant, shop or kitchen, and it's a good choice for two siblings to share, since one can take orders while the other makes the pizza. Melissa & Doug pitches it at counting and fine motor skills, which is true, but the real appeal is simpler: it's a toy a child can play with on their own for a long time. Melissa & Doug recommends it for ages 3 to 6.

The catch is the toppings. Thirty-six small wooden pieces will spread through a house, and a set with half its toppings left feels less special. The wooden box helps; so does a rule that the pizza goes back in it after dinner.

The Moon Ball is a small ball with a cratered surface, made to bounce much higher than an ordinary rubber ball. Waboba describes it as the highest-bouncing ball there is, and the craters do two things: they make it pop on every bounce and they send it off at odd angles, which turns a game of catch into a game of chasing it.

It's the smallest gift on this list and the easiest to fit in a stocking, at 2.48 inches across. Waboba marks it for ages 3 and up, and it works for a teenager on a driveway as well as a preschooler in a hallway. It needs a hard surface to bounce on: a sidewalk, a patio, a basketball court or a kitchen floor.

The catch is in the description. A ball that bounces this high and this unpredictably does not belong in a room with a TV or a glass vase. Give it with the understanding that it's an outdoor or basement toy.

Plus-Plus is a building toy made of a single shape: a small double plus sign that clicks into others at any angle. With 400 of them in 16 colors, a child can make a flat mosaic on a baseplate or a standing 3D animal, car or building. It's the same idea as a box of bricks, but more forgiving, because every piece fits every other.

This Learn to Build set is the starter box. It comes with two baseplates and a guide book that walks from simple flat pictures to 3D models, so a 5-year-old has somewhere to begin and an older child has a reason to keep going. Plus-Plus makes the pieces in Denmark, in a factory it says runs on wind power, from BPA-free plastic.

The pieces are three-quarters of an inch long, which is the whole appeal and the whole problem: they'll turn up in the couch and the vacuum. Keep the box away from toddlers in the house, and give it with a lidded container if the child doesn't have one.

A Stomp Rocket is a foam-tipped rocket on a stand, connected by a hose to a pad on the ground. A child runs at the pad and stomps on it, and the burst of air sends the rocket up. The maker says this Ultra set reaches up to 200 feet, about 20 stories, and it runs entirely on stomping: no batteries, no pump, no charging.

It's the gift for the kid who needs to run around, and it gets the whole family outside on a cold weekend, because every adult who watches wants a turn. Stomp Rocket recommends it for ages 5 and up. The set includes the launcher and six rockets, so a lost one on the roof doesn't end the game.

It needs space. A rocket that goes 200 feet up comes down somewhere, so this is a park, field or big-yard toy, not one for a small patio between houses. And the rockets will be lost to trees and gutters; that's part of the fun, but it's worth knowing before the first launch.

Throw Throw Burrito is a card game with a dodgeball problem. Players race to collect sets of three matching cards, but certain cards start a fight, and then two squishy foam burritos come off the table and get thrown. Get hit and you take a Burrito Bruise, which costs you points. Some cards start a duel: two players stand back to back, walk three paces, turn and fire.

It's the rare game that a 7-year-old and a grandparent can play together and both enjoy, because the card part is simple and the throwing part levels the field. Exploding Kittens rates it for ages 7 and up, two to six players and about 15 minutes a round, short enough for a second and third game.

The catches: it's loud and physical, so it needs a room where a foam burrito to the face is funny rather than a problem, and nothing breakable on the table. And it's built for a group; with only two players, most of the chaos is missing.

The Wild Robot is a novel about Roz, a robot who switches on alone on a wild island with no idea how she got there. To survive, she has to learn from the animals who don't want her there, and slowly the island becomes home. Peter Brown wrote it and drew its illustrations, and it's the first book in his series about Roz.

It suits a confident reader between 8 and 12, the age range its publisher gives, and it works as a read-aloud for a younger child with a parent. The chapters are short, which makes it a good bedtime book, and the questions it raises about nature, machines and what it means to belong give a family something to talk about. The paperback is 320 pages.

The catch is that it isn't all gentle. Roz survives a storm and a bear attack early on, and the story has real danger near the end, so a sensitive 7-year-old may be better off hearing it with an adult nearby. If the child already loves it, the sequels make the obvious next gift.