How to Use the Toy Lending Library
Just like a traditional library, you can check out items to try and exchange them for new ones as often as you’d like!
Families, foster parents, child care providers, educators, mental health practitioners, anyone who works with children, can select toys and books to borrow and then exchange them for different items as often as once a week.
Register on our Toy Lending online platform.
Purchase a Play Passport Subscription for a 1-month, 2-month, 3-month, 6-month, or 12-month annual subscription.
Come into browse our collection of 1,500 toys and 350 resource books to choose up to 5 toys/books you would like to borrow.
Play Passport Subscribers can also make online reservations for selected toys for easy pick-up from our digital/online catalog.
Return your toys/books in a week or two, and pick up a new set of toys/books!
Current Toy Lending Library hours are Saturdays 10-1.
Our Community Play Space, programs, and events are free of charge.
Toys are carefully selected for quality, safety and educational enrichment. All materials are cleaned and inspected between users.
The Toy Library collection of play materials is focused on children from infants through age eight as well as for children with differing needs. There are also lots of games and puzzles appropriate for intergenerational family play.
The Resource Library collection for adults includes over 350 parenting and educator resource books. The collection includes books on child development, parenting, play-based learning, creating learning environments, science, math and nature explorations, as well as equitable teaching practices. You can find the titles on our online catalog under Resource Library.
‘Play Passport’ Subscriptions are available for less than $1 per day – less than a cup of coffee!
1-month subscription $30
2-month subscription $60
3-month subscription: $90
6-month subscription: $180
12-month (annual) subscription: $360
Financial assistance to obtain Play Passport Subscriptions is available to those in need. Massachusetts EBT, WIC, and ConnectorCare cardholders can receive a 3-month Play Passport Subscription to borrow toys from the Toy Library at a "pay-what-you-can” rate (0-$30 per month). After the 3 months, cardholders can receive a 12-month subscription at a "pay-what-you-can" rate. Additionally, our community play space, programs, and events are free of charge.
For Financial Assistance applications or more information, please contact us info@capecodtoylibrary.org or call 508-648-3227.
Financial assistance for Play Passport Subscriptions is available to the extent our financial assistance fund grows through sponsorships and grants. For more sponsorship information, please contact us info@capecodtoylibrary.org or call 508-648-3227.
Why Become A Play Passport Subscriber?
I think one of the most valuable elements of the Cape Cod Toy Library is the Play Passport subscription. When you consider the high cost of purchasing toys for your children such as at Walmart where you will not get quality, developmentally appropriate, sturdy toys - or the cost of well designed toys such as Melissa and Doug, you will spend about $200 per year per child. I discovered this when buying a single Child’s Christmas Wish List for a local fund drive. A trip to Walmart shocked me. I watched the numbed faces of parents trying to buy toys for their children’s Christmas and sorting through the shelves of poorly made and extremely expensive selections.
From a financial standpoint, spending the cost of a Play Passport for a family, is less than what most families pay for a single child’s annual toy budget. Families either spend more than that or considerably less, which means their access to a larger number of toy options is lower.
The Toy Lending idea gives the entire family access to a rotating selection of toys, games and books for the cost of a single child’s annual toy buying budget. High quality toys, such as Melissa and Doug, games create brain and coordination development that help further children’s imagination and creativity through play objects.
As a psychotherapist and grandmother I am delighted with the concept of borrowing toys which can be returned and selected in rotation. One of the best ways to grow better brains is novel experiences. Every-time a brain encounters something it hasn’t seen before, it grows. So investing in a rotation of sturdy, developmentally appropriate play enhanced toys makes a lot of sense.
In this modern world ACCESS is everything. Having a door of opportunity opened in which a child can explore through play, develop key elements of creativity and imagination with a greater number of options helps families support their children.
A Play Passport is a gold mine of enjoyment for any family - throughout the year and grandparents and visiting families!
Janet Doucette, LMHC
The Toy Library is located at 1663 Main Street (6A), West Barnstable – at the back of the First Lutheran Church - Just a mile down the road from Barnstable Park & Ride, Cape Cod Community College and the YMCA.
Toy Library Location Address: 1663 Main Street, West Barnstable, MA 02668
Mailing Address: Cape Cod Toy Library, PO Box 555, E. Harwich, MA 02645
For more information contact: