It's alive! Some of the most popular holiday toys don't leave much for the imagination

Jovan Hernandez, 5, of Greeley, wants a football and Mia Saenz, 5, of Fort Collins wants a baby doll for Christmas.

But Kaylei Villalobos, 6, of Denver, wants a Baby Alive doll so she can play "Mommy" along with her older sister.

This year's top toy lists feature some of the most lifelike toys ever. They have surpassed board games, crafts or hands-on toys that spark the imagination or teach children how to create on their own.

FamilyFun.go.com tested more than 1,000 children to determine the most popular toys in 2006. With more than 30,000 hours of play, the children picked 42 winners and 21 grand prize winners, including the Top 10 absolute must-have toys.

This year, they chose a toy dog called Love 'n Licks Puppy as the Toy of the Year. The toy is filled with water, and the more you pet its head, the faster it wags its tail, kicks its hind leg, and the louder it will bark. The dog also will give the child a big wet kiss.

Also on that list is a Baby Alive doll that is lifelike and blinks, talks, drinks, goes potty and even poops. It has all the motions of a real-life baby.

"Baby Alive is cool," said Kaylei. "It's like a real baby. You get to feed it and change the diaper."

Kaylei's mother, Natalie Castaneda, however, said she's not getting one.

"It makes the kids grow up too fast," Castaneda said. "It's teaching them it's OK to go out and have kids because they can handle it."

Children will agree the toys are fun, cool and even awesome, but child development professionals question how much of the toys actually stimulate brain growth.

Linda Neigherbauer, director of Monfort Early Childhood Education Center on the Aims Community College Campus in Greeley, said children need to be creative.

"We recommend to parents to pick up a toy that would be interactive," said Neigherbauer. "They need to be able to manipulate material and be creative. Children learn by doing hands-on activities."

Other professionals say lifelike toys are not as harmful to a child's development as some would think, but they're probably not as stimulating as other toys could be.

"They're not harmful as some toys that require aggressive play," said Dr. Michelle Athanasiou, school psychological professor at the University of Northern Colorado. "They certainly don't do anything for you."

Athanasiou said as far as development is concerned in children, a Raggedy-Ann doll or a cardboard box can provide better pretend play time. She said toys such as the dog that drools or mechanical toys with buttons to push are gimmicky.

"After about three months that toy can be found in a closet," she said. "After a child is tired of pushing a button several times and seeing what it does, they find it harder to look at what else could I do with that toy."

Parent Shirley Esquibel said her two boys have questioned seeing some of the toys in department stores.

"They've seen the mechanical dinosaurs, and Maverick is always asking, "Mom, is this real?' " Esquibel said. "Do horses talk? Do dinosaurs talk? Are they pretend?"

While she said the immediate fun of watching the toys move or roar are fun, after a while, her boys, Isaiah, 3, and Maverick, 5, will get bored with them.

"It kinda confuses them," she said. "They need a sense of reality, and I would rather them play with a toy that they can use their own imagination so they could do the work on their own."

But because of technology, the toys have become so advanced. For instance, Hasbro's I-dog is an electronic dog that when plugged into an MP3 or an I-pod, moves its head and ears to the music being played. It also turns off and on by touching its nose and when there isn't any music playing, it'll give out a bark.

Whatever the toys are able to do on their own, Esquibel said she'd rather see her kids move around and play with each other and other kids.

"I wouldn't buy a toy that you just push the button and sit there," she said. "It makes them lazy. They need to develop their motor skills, and how can they do that when all the work's done for them?"