So far I think the “box” wins. What was more fun than a refrigerator box?
Soccer ball? All you need is two cans for goal posts.
Another vote for Lego. 
By the way, are you thinking of your mission here? Trying to find toys for the kids? I think that coloring/activity books might do well, in that case. But yeah, it’s hard to beat a refrigerator box, or any big appliance box.
or on the roof with the water rockets
My favorite super-cheap toys were those little plastic rigid army soldiers. Another great toy is a soccer ball or football. Water balloons are a good two hours of fun for about a dollar, but the cleanup sucks. A few pieces of furniture to drape a blanket over in the corner for a fort or hideout can be great fun too, and it’s free. A big sheet of cardboard is pretty fun for sliding down a grassy hill.
I was so disappointed when I was a kid and my parents got a new fridge, and they ripped the box off to get it out. How could you?!
The dishwasher, on the other hand, was a house for a week.
Not really, but balsa wood gliders wood friggin’ RAWK down there!
Whenever one of us could scrape up a dollar and manage not to spend it on the ice cream man, we’d head to the corner store and buy a pack of water balloons.
Soon the whole neighborhood would be awash with water and what seemed like hundreds of kids would be going at each other with water balloons, water guns, hoses and just plain buckets of water.
A female-to-female RF cable adaptor, and a small length of copper wire.
Kinda like a zen garden, only with more despair.
Sounds intriguing… I wish I understood…
Cardboard boxes, tape, and scissors. We moved when I was eight, and my mother allowed me to keep and cut up a lot of the boxes. I made a huge dollhouse out of them, using some as rooms, and cutting others up to make furniture. It was completely awesome.
I used to love flying kites. You can get one and some string pretty cheaply.
Every spring I tell myself that for nostalgia’s sake I’m gonna get me one. I never do.
Maybe *this *year I will…
Unfortunately, I have a child who hates to color. I call her the born supervisor – ever since she could talk she’s handed me the crayons or markers and begged me to do the coloring for her (of course, in the colors she wants).
Now she’s 5 and in a school where they do weekly homework in a workbook, and she just can’t tolerate the pages where they have things like “Color all the pictures with the letter “r” in the name.” She hates these and argues with me about the educational value of it all – “Why don’t they let me just circle the ones with R? Coloring is boring!”
…And people keep buying her coloring books, because they believe every kid loves to color. Sigh. I need to find a good charity to donate them to.
I liked Legos, although most of the Lego sets I see now seem designed to build one thing (like a Star Wars Death Star) rather than the generic sets we had. Mind you, Lego sets can be a little expensive, but they are endlessly playable. And while I didn’t have this as a kid, I bought Stomp Rockets for my nephew once, and they were a lot of fun.
As for the ultimate cheap activity, in our house it’s got to be a bottle of glue (19 cents at the back-to-school sale), scissors, and old scraps of paper/newspaper.
Today my 5-year-old spotted an ad for a fabric store in the paper’s sunday magazine (and claimed it even before I could read the backside). She got out her scissors and cut interesting shapes from the gorgeous patterns. These got glued onto some cardstock and became her grandmother’s birthday card. I have no idea why people would pay $3.99 for a store-bought card!
I don’t know if a bicycle really counts, but it should. Sure, I could build things all day out of Legos and an Erector set (It also meant that I liked garage sales more than Mom), but a bicycle meant freedom, that I could visit friends outside my neighborhood and that I could keep up with the big kids.
If he likes paint by numbers, google *porn by numbers * . Some fun kits made by a very clever young lady.
I would like to say yo yo and pogo sticks.
Yoyo’s brought in a duel level of fun with the skillz and then using them as weapons on each other.
Don’t forget the pure joy of tube of tennis balls, lighter fluid, (something else) and a match . Mix with ZERO parental supervision = Good Times.
Newer Low Tech Fun: Stomp Rocket’s. (Buy extra rockets. Trust me, you will be glad you did.)
Crap, I didn’t even see your post!
GMTA.
Stomp Rockets are one of the best fun toys out there. (Fun to do inside too.)
Diving for pennies in a pool was always great fun.
My uncle would come home from work and see a gaggle of kids all waterlogged from swimming and running around like escaped lunatics all day. To ensure he had some peace and quiet, he would walk over to the pool and toss in his pocket change.