This is one of the largest independent toy retailers in the UK with a huge range and an excellent, easy to navigate website where you can search by brand, type of toy, age group or price. Once you've decided what you want to buy and registered both your address and any addresses where you want your orders despatched to, you simply select from the standard or express delivery services, give your payment details and you're done.

The Kids Window is a real children's department store, offering children's clothing brands from designers such as Catfish, Inside Out, Marie Chantal and Budishh, a full range of baby equipment, activity toys such as trampolines, swings and slides and lots of toys and games. You can search on this website by age, gender, season and brand. or click through to each section of the range.

A great range of gifts and ideas for babies and young children of all ages is available here, including personalised cutlery, clocks and adventure books, baby and toddler sleeping bags, magic lanterns, colourful wall hangings and also some really clever storage ideas. There's the Squishy, Squirty Bath Book, Jungle soft toy Bowling Set and Toy House Play Mat plus loads more clever and innovative suggestions.

Personally I’ve never had the patience to tackle mega jigsaw puzzles but I know that there are those who do, and who keep them out year round for rainy day entertainment. This site is aimed at puzzle enthusiasts of all ages as it caters for everyone with 60 piece puzzles for children and going to right up to the (horrendous to me) 13,000 piece puzzle by Clementoni – I wouldn’t know where to start, would you?

This website is definitely not just for children, it’s for anyone who likes games, including jigsaw puzzles - think double sided and 1000 piece puzzles - family games such as Monopoly and Labyrinth, World of Warcraft and Robo Rally (not family, I don’t think) and Murder Mystery and Casino Games plus for small ones Ludo, Junior Scrabble and Halli Galli. Don’t think that because I haven’t mentioned something it’s not available here, it almost certainly will be.

At Puzzle Plaza you can find a range of Disney jigsaw puzzles for children, 3D jigsaw puzzles, high quality Whimsy wooden jigsaw puzzles, heart, round and panorama shaped puzzles and 500 – 1500 piece puzzles with of attractive scenes and world maps. There are travel games such as Dominoes, Snakes and Ladders and Memo Kid plus metal puzzle brainteasers.

You can buy model cars, tanks and planes from several different websites but there are very few specialising in rockets. By rockets I mean real enthusiasts’ stuff, from starter sets and ready to fly kits to competition standard models. Don’t be fooled into thinking that the rockets themselves are inexpensive, by the time you’ve invested in the engine and all the bits and pieces you can spend a small fortune. They can give hours of fun, however until they blow themselves to bits or land on the back of a lorry; never to be seen again (yes that one happened to us).

Otherland Toys offers a wide selection and this website is particularly good for boys. I suggest when you’re looking round that you click on ‘only show items in stock’ and there’s so much to choose from anyway and at least you’ll not be looking at what they don’t have. There are remote control cars at all levels, excellent gadgets, Meccano Magic and lots of outdoor ideas. Make sure you have your cup of coffee with you when you start, you’ll need it.

Slot City is one the largest independent retailers of slot cars in the UK and Europe and you can only buy from them online. They offer the full range of Scalextric plus other brands such as Carrera from Germany and SCX for Spain – household names in their own countries but almost impossible to find here until now. You’ll also find Hornby and Carrera model kits. Everything is ready for immediate delivery unless you’re told otherwise on the website. Delivery is to the EU and USA.

You may be looking for a complete travel games compendium or just a new reasonably priced backgammon set but whether your favourite game is Mah Jong, dominoes, monopoly or bridge you're sure to find what you're seeking here without having to go to your local store and decide whether you should be in the children's section or somewhere else, then finding that, after all, there are only a couple of options for your chosen game.

Whether you're new to the world of dolls' houses or a dedicated miniaturist, the Dolls House Emporium should fill you with inspiration. The site features fully decorated dolls' houses and thousands of miniatures in colour co-ordinated room sets plus carpets and flooring, lighting and wallpapers. You can also see a selection of 1:12 scale dolls' houses shown open and fully furnished to give you ideas.

If you’ve ever visited this world famous Regent Street toy emporium (I hate the word but it’s the only way to describe this store) you’ll know that there’s a huge range of gadgets, games, soft toys, puzzles, stocking fillers and every toy you can think of at all price levels and for all ages. In fact it’s a disastrous place to take more than one child at a time as there’s so much to see. There’s a highly edited range here on their website although the list of products on offer is growing all the time.

This is another of those toy websites that offers so many brands it’s hard to know where to start. To help you I’ll tell you that they have an excellent range of Meccano, Hornby and Scalextric, Lego, Schleich Models, Flashing Storm scooters and Power Rangers. Then for little girls there’s Zapf Baby Annabel, Chou Chou and Colette plus Miss Milly and My Model makeup and hair styling sets (and lots more). Phew.

Based in the Catalan region of France bordering on Spain, Lily and Agathe is a small English/ French speaking company with a love of all things beautiful, charming and vintage. Here you’ll discover exceptional and timeless gifts and toys with a lean towards nostalgia. Many of the items here are one-offs so if you see something you like buy it quick, and if you like the overall idea keep checking back.

This is one of those websites that obviously started off doing one thing and then branched out, because you can not only find bears here; but labradors, elephants, rabbits, cats and dalmations, plus lots of other dogs. So if you know someone who collects soft toys or needs a feel-good gift you should take a look here. Oh yes, and you can buy Lovvie Bears, Thank you Bears and Anniversary Bears here as well.

Mail Order Express claims to be the largest toy website in Europe and who am I to argue? It’s a hugely busy site with loads of offers and pre-order invitations on the home page but where, thankfully, you can shop by categories such as Music, Gadgets, Party, Science, Toy Vehicle, Dolls and Accessories or by brand. Take a look for yourself.

Some general toy websites make you (me in any case) want to run away, they’re so busy on the home page. On this website you’re immediately drawn in, from the train running across the top of the screen to the clear menu, information and special offer details. They sell Playmobil, Thomas trains, Sylvanian Families, Lego and Duplo, Brio, Schleich animals and much more.

This one you’ll definitely have heard of (or seen no doubt) as the UK branch of the US toy megastore. Personally, I think the shops are just too huge to cope with so it’s great that they’re online although this website is one of the busiest around. There’s a fantastic range of well priced toys and equipment for children of all ages including MultiMedia PCs, games, bikes and outdoor fun products. You can also click through to Babiesrus with its selection for the younger members of the family.

Just about every boy has at some time made an airfix model (or quite usually part made and left). The joy of opening all those tiny tins of paint and spending hours making a mess and sticking all those bits together seems totally irresistible. Well here it all is online; on a very simple site where you can order all the kits with just a few clicks and there’s everything from a supercharged 1930 Bentley to a Tiger Moth with clear details for them all.

Lego kits seem to have become more and more complicated and you practically need an engineering degree to build some of them (well I never was very good at that sort of thing). Let your son on this website if you dare. Everything is brilliantly shown, including Star Wars, Lego Sports, building sets, Robotics and the very latest editions. You can take the Club tour, order the magazine or click on to the Games Page.

Model Hobbies are the perfect place for the model addict. They have an extremely well laid out website and offer models by over fifty different manufacturers, plus all the paints, tools and brushes you could possibly need. There are miniature soldiers here as well. They cleverly highlight the newest kits to hit the market so that you keep coming back for more and you can buy gift vouchers too.

Many of the online retailers offering jigsaw puzzles are based in the Lake District – why? Well I would have thought it obvious, having been there many times when it rains: If you’re into jigsaws they’re the perfect answer to a rainy day, for sure. Anyway, here you’ll find mainly fairly large to extremely large puzzles, starting at 500 pieces and going up to 1500. The Bright Ideas animal puzzles are so lovely it’s tempting even for me to give it a go.

Toys by Mail Order specialises in toys, gifts, games, nursery items and jigsaw puzzles for children of all ages. You can search the range of wooden toys and soft toys for baby and toddler gifts, the many items stocked for older boys and girls plus traditional family games. They offer fast delivery, a gift wrapping service and personalised messages for special occasions. As well as all this you’ll find Manhattan bootees, puppets, dolls, puzzles and games for when they're a little older.