Other creative toys/products that come to mind would be, say, Play-Doh as a sort of children’s intro to…Clay, I suppose? But in this vein without being exclusively directed towards children (albeit I imagine many may be).
Always enjoyed a creative kind of toy to mess around with.
I like to program microcontrollers. So that’s sort of my creative toy.
The Arduino or Pi Pico are accessible and fun ones.
I like the Attiny10, but I’m some sort of cursed mercenary science hermit.
The StemmaQt or Qwiic boards from Adafruit and Sparkfun, respectively, are more accessible ways to make physical computing projects with sensors and screens.
I’m working on some simpler discrete circuits with my son, like 555 and shift registers, since he’s really good with his fingers, but only just starting to read. We get to build and test them with Tinkercad or Fritzing and then make them in real life. It’s been awesome learning for both of us.
The CD4069 and LM386 are fun for discrete projects too. Also OPA2132 :)
The Adafruit and Sparkfun stuff is great.
Accessibility is not so much a concern for me, I don’t mind reading long datasheets. That’s half the fun for me. I also like KiCAD a lot, I’ve sent off several designs to the factories to make a few units. Was a really cool experience and I learned a lot.
I’m not a super big Fritzing fan (personal preference I guess) but love Tinkercad for quickly designing something 3D printable.
I have had a few projects manufactured as well. But that was back when Eagle was the best option (Kicad wasnt as usable or stable back in 2008-9).
I’ve really enjoyed the Code simulators in Fritzing, Tinkercad (the electronics section) and there’s a Mac/iOS app called iCircuit that offers SPICE simulating with Arduino code too and makes schematic design pretty fun for beginners. Also it links to wikipedia and data sheets for all its components. The problem is it’s not extensible, so you only get what it has included.
Ah yeah I remember those days. The progress KiCAD has made is nothing short of amazing.
I used to like the code simulator in AVR Studio 4, but since acquisition by Microchip it’s borderline unusable and crashes constantly.
Haven’t heard of iCircuit! Maybe I’ll give it a try.