J.S.
I would suggest a kitchen set. My DD's bday is on Dec 27th, and she got one for her first bday. She wasn't ready to play with it then, but she did really start to love it at about 18months - and if we had waiting to give it to her at her 2nd bday/Christmas we would have lost 6 great months of playing with it. For her 1st, we got the basic kitchen set and a few pieces of food, pots and plates. Then for her 2nd, we added more food, a tea set, and other fun things like a cupcake set, pizza set, etc - she was soooo excited when she opened each one, because she already loved playing with the kitchen so much!