Best of Boston

Finding the right playthings can be something of a tightrope walk—they need to be educational but not boring, creative but not too messy, fun but without an overabundance of grating beeps and whistles. Henry Bear’s Park has been striking that balance for three decades, with a whimsical selection bursting with enough pirates, princesses, and robots to stoke kids’ imaginations for years, not days. Little ones will love the wide range of Brio trains and Melissa & Doug retro wooden toys; for preteens there’s more-substantial fare, such as a model kit that teaches them how to make a life-size human heart.