Lego Ninjago Review

For Mikeys birthday the other day, we brought him a couple of sets of Lego Ninjago, which was the main thing he had asked for (not sure if that was his choice or if he'd been influenced by his older brother!) lego always goes down well, the little figures seem to have a certain appeal to small hands, maybe its the fact their limbs remove, or that you can change their heads, who knows but these small little plastic figures seem to have more longevity than alot of other toys.
Although lego in itself is an age old classic, it never seems to date, and as it is so universal all sets go well together, so you really can't go wrong buying more and more of the stuff, I guess the only down side is some of the pieces are very small and easily hoovered up!

The idea behind ninjago, is that ninjas have learnt the new art of spinjitzu, where they can spin so fast they make tornadoes defeating their enemy made up of remarkably cute looking skeletons.

The starter set retails at £12.99 from all good toy shops, toys R us etc
this is a great set and not too highly prized, you get two figures one all important ninja and one skeleton, you get several weapons, some cards to add extra elements to the game, 2 spinners and a simple arena.

Ninja Ambush set retails around £6.49 and you again get 2 figures, ideal set to purchase with the starter kit as the figures are different in each, you also get some weapons and you get a nice little set which when built has a push up button which opens the gates and fires the ninja forward. Be aware tho that no spinners are included in this set, the spinners being a highly important part of the whole 'ninjago' range.

These sets have been greatly received by my two boys, and have brought new adventures to their existing lego, we now have ninja hide outs and skeleton caves made up of our old lego pieces.

Overall lego will always get a high mark I think, but these sets do have that little extra 'fun' about them with the spinners and the cute characters, also the sets seem reasonable priced and have really brought out the imaginations of my boys.

Lets Play...

Over at ' TheboyandMe' they are doing a linky about play.... Play, well its something all children excel at right? well mine do love to play, most often their play is more exploration together, outside climbing trees, hiding in long grass, catching butterflies and looking for four leaved clovers or frogs and bugs! But for a while each day they 'play' in the common sence of the word, with toys, together, without my guiding role and I love listening to them playing, one of my all time favourite things is when I wake up in the morning and hear them chattering away completely involved in their games, they seem to play so much nicer in the early hours of the mornings, it is at these times when I think it is so nice to have three fairly close in age, after school the older two are often too ratty and tired to play so nicely, but those hours in the morning they will happily create worlds where they are completely emersered in wonderful childhood!
Jake and Chloe being only 18 months apart have always been fairly close and always shared these early morning play sessions, even tho Chloe has her own room, they wake and end up in the boys room, which is where all their toys seem to find themselves, Chloe who is not a huge 'player' is far more arty, and at all other times seems to turn away from any conventional 'toys' she has never been into dolls, or figures in any way, no barbies give her much pleasure, however anything arty and crafty she loves, although I seem to have spent a lot of time trying to find something to spark her imagination in the same way as the boys get from their figures, castles, cars and trains, it is only in these morning hours she will entertain the boys games.
The boys however do play together pretty much the majority of the time, they set up good guy and bad guy bases, that span across the entire floor, they rope in all sorts of things to join their gangs, from teddies to bricks and books the scenarios they come up with vary from the conventional fights between goodies and baddies, to things more interesting like family scenarios they call 'playing life' which I think comes from Chloe who as I say seems to not be quite as imaginative as the boys so her play always seems to drift to reality situations.
these morning playing sessions are top on my 'favourite sounds' list and its truly refreshing to lay awake in bed listening to all three of them playing.. however these blissful situation shatters the second I wake, they seem to be powered by my awakeness to turn into unreasonable monsters, maybe they subconsciously know when I'm in bed they have to sort things between themselves, but as soon as they hear me up the 'muuummmmmmmmmm' calls seem to echo through the house I have checked the theory that it is due to me being awake that triggers these out bursts and it truly seems that way, I can sit awake in bed, silently for an hour or two with not a whimper of 'mummmmmmmmmm' or 'hes moved MY toy' or such wonderful phrases, but the second they hear so much as a scuffle in the room they are drawn in to see if I am actually 'awake' and as soon as I venture down the stairs you can guarantee no matter how much I praised them for 'playing nice' and asked them to continue whilst I sort breakfast, they will, give it 5 or 10 minutes, be trailing down the stairs one after the other with what has caused them great concern and then that will single the end of the blissful sibling togetherness, and then through the remaining of the day Chloe will not entertain her brothers, and its hit or miss if Jake and Mikey will spend time together, some days the boys never faulter and their games will expand and go on all day long, others they can not get the togetherness right and they have to play separately, so I guess that's why the mornings seem so special as its in these mornings I let my self believe that all three do actually get along and are rather fond of each other as at other times I do have to wonder!

: Trackback link: http://www.theboyandme.co.uk/2011/05/13/showoff-showcase-the-one-about-play/trackback/

Fingers firmly crossed!

Toys R us, on their facebook page ran a competition to find this years toyologist, to enter you had to review a product to be in with a chance to become part of the toys R us toyologist program, this would be an amazing opportunity, so I set about making my review, which you'll find here: zhu zhu hamster review there was around 150 entries which Geoffrey and the team at Toys R us, read through and picked out a shortlist of 25 hopefuls, I was so pleased to be picked into the shortlist!
So I was sent the final stage questionnaire, which I filled out (maybe a little hastily!?) and now am sitting patiently waiting and hoping with everything crossed that we 'might' just be lucky enough to be picked to be toyologist!
Please keep your fingers crossed for us!

4 years...

It was my littlest birthday the other day, and he is now 4 years old, seems like the past 4 years have passed so very quickly, but then in the same way it seems like hes been here forever.
It does seem a little crazy that I now am 'mum' to a 9 year old, 7 year old and 4 year old.. seems like they are all so grown up now, well and truly out of the nappy stage, all proper little people with their own views and opinions, which is certainly intresting!

Anyway we had a small tea party just the family, and a BBq with granny and grandad the next day, it was lovely, Mikey desperately wanted Lego Ninjago for his present (which may have been influenced by his older brother!) and I also got him some lego hero factory sets, and he was very impressed with them all, lego certainly never fails to entertain and they have such good variety of toys there is something for everyone! I do like the hero factory toys they clip together easily and offer a variety of play opportunities, they can all be mixed up to creat new heros or stick to the book so to speak, the main draw I think to lego toys is the fact they come apart, my boys seem to love to engage in games and battles between there toys ultimately having a winner and all the others seperated into several pieces where through the battle they have lost there limbs one at a time!



I even went all out and tried to make stripy jelly not the most difficult of tasks but it certainly pleased my three, coupled with sandwiches, cakes and balloons what more do you need for a party!

Zhu Zhu Hamster Review

One of the Toys high on my 3 childrens Christmas list was Zhu Zhu Hamsters, and as it was something which all three asked for, I thought they were a good idea.
So on Christmas day morning when Santa had been and left a selection of Zhu Zhu hamsters and Kung zhu Hamsters there were three happy children.

I've been meaning to do a review on these toys for a while, and when I heard Toys R us, were holding another competition to find there new 2011 Toyolgists on their facebook page, I thought we would finally get round to reviewing these Christmas toys.

So heres our Review.

The toys we have are:
The Kung Zhu Battle arena : £29.99
The Kung zhu Headquarters : £19.99
Sgt Serge : £9.99
Rocko : £9.99
Kung Zhu Special forces Armour : £9.99 x2 pieces
Kung Zhu Alpha training ground : £14.97
Kung Zhu Bravo Battle training Ground :£14.97
Rockstar Hamster - Pax : £9.99
Rockstar Hamster - kingston : £9.99
Grooming Salon - £19.97

Initially I thought these toys were expensive, and perhaps wouldn't be worth the money. You have to buy several sets to get anything like what is portrayed on the pictures on the boxes, but that being said, the main draw of these toys was the fact that all three children seemed equally interested in them, and this turned out to work as I hoped and every time they play with these toys they do so together happily, the oldest who is 9 now, and the youngest who will be 4 in a few days, all seem to be able to interact with these toys and make up various games to suit their age.

The sets clip together with the same connection mechanism which is simple enough to use, and with or without instructions the sets are easy to piece together, there is no 'right' order to place the different sections of the training grounds so they can be made up into different arenas and create a new game each time. each piece is plastic and sturdy enough, there are a few 'extras' such as flags and guns on the kung zhu sets, and brushes and shampoo bottles in the grooming salon, which are perfect child sized not too small that they get lost straight away! With the Kung Zhu toys, the idea is to set up your arena and training grounds, then place your hamster at the start of your course and watch him make his way over the obstacles and into the main arena, where you can meet with another hamster and they will bump into each other until someone falls over and a winner is found, but my children seem to make up different versions of games each time!

The grooming salon has plenty of features, including a light up mirror and a real spinning fan dryer, which start up when a hamster is clipped into the dryers seat.
The grooming salon also comes with a selection of small brushes and hair dryers and such like which my daughter loves!

All the hamsters take 2 x AAA batteries which come supplied, and as yet we haven't had to replace ours. The hamsters start up when a button on there back is pressed, and they make several sounds and move around, they can go forwards or reverse and turn, they interact with various sections of battle ground or grooming saloon where there are raised areas on the tracks, they also react to the armour when it is placed on the hamsters and then make new sounds.

The hamsters are cute looking handsized toys, and when not in use ours are kept on the window sill, and often get brought into various games even when the battle arena is not set up.
The main downside to the whole zhu zhu range is the overall size of the sets. The grooming salon on its own is an ok size to be left up, but the battle arena and training grounds cover the majority of any of our rooms floor space, so are not kept out set up, therefore in order to play with the toys the children need to first get out and set up the arena, but I think in some ways this is half the fun for the boys as they seem to enjoy re arranging and creating different courses for their hamsters to venture through.

Overall these toys have been played with a fair amount of times, and have been enjoyed by all three children equally, there is plenty of range of sets to occupy any child, it is something which can be added to time and again if you want to, and each time you add a different set you will rejuvenate interest in previous sets. I would definitely recommend the hamsters, they are fun and seem to have a variety of play opportunities as they do not need the sets to be played with. As for spending lots on the whole range of sets I probably won't be adding any more to our collection due to the size of them, but may well increase the collection of hamsters.

hereis our video review:

Twist and Spin Jewellery Maker - Review

As part of our runner up box of toys for the Toys R Us 'do you have what it takes to be a toyologist' competition we had a Twist and spin jewellery maker, by flair.
priced at £19.99 normally, however on offer at Toys R us for £17. 97

Get creative and make funky jewellery with the Twist and Spin Jewellery Maker! Create stylish necklaces, bracelets and hair accessories at the touch of a button with the twisting and spinning motion

To start with C was surprisingly disinterested in this, which did surprise me a bit, the box looks great, a nice sized box, sporting a pretty girl covered in bangles and hair accessories, right up any 7 year old girls street. however C wasn't overly impressed, later tho when she came back to have another look she was all up for putting it through its paces, we opened the box, a biggish box, with not a lot of content if I'm honest, the first thing you need to note, is that you will need 2 AA batteries, which do not come supplied.
You get a Twist and Spin jewellery making unit, a bag of beads, a bundle of cord, 8 fasteners, two clips a threader and a instruction leaflet, C was eager to get making, the picture on the box shows some beautiful necklaces, bracelets and hair braids, C read the instructions and started off spinning the cord, unclipped it and it unwound instantly, she was obviously unimpressed, she tried again, the unit has several switches which spin in different directions, hold the cords still or allow them to move, and without having them set into the correct positions you will always get a unravelled end result. C tried her hardest but couldn't master the spin sequence and so set about making herself a bracelet the 'old fashioned' way - simply threading the beads onto a single piece of thread, this used the majority of the beads, which was a shame, the beads are nice chunky good quality pretty beads, but it would have been nice to have a few more of them, whilst C was busy doing that, I re read the instructions and tried again with the spinning, and did manage to make a couple of nice spinned pieces which did not unravel, the only other down side is the fasteners are big n clumsy and do distract from the overall prettiness of the finished jewellery.

Since having the set C has been back to it a couple of times and proceeded to make a couple of pieces, although we are now almost out of thread and beads.

Overall I think this is a fairly high priced set, although better with the slight discount at Toys R us, the frustration a child could get from the unravelling could possibly be a source of upset, and the amount of extras you get with the set really don't amount to much, maybe a cheaper bead set without the novelty twist and spin unit would be better
Over all rating 5 out of 10.

Holidays are coming!

Well with fear of bursting into the theme off the coca cola advert - Holidays are coming!!

I am so pleased the children have broken up from school, and we can really start to enjoy the holidays!

The past week has been filled with school parties, secret Santa sessions and Christmas concerts!
My three children are well and truly shattered! The general exhaustion from a 6 week stretch of school is enough to make them grumpy and foul, add that with the anticipation of Santa's visit and its a disaster waiting to happen!

So to see my daughter looking like she was going to fall asleep on her feet at the school Christmas play was not surprising, and to have to shout at the three of them consistently reminding them to play nice and not fight is getting routine. I am hoping though with them now having a week to chill out before the big day itself tempers calm and attitudes relax so that we can all have a lovely Christmas.

I am really looking forward to this Christmas this year, not only do we have our new puppy Jackson, who is sure to entertain us, we have been fortunate enough to have won a Early Learning Center competition which gave us £200 vouchers to spend in their store!

With some amazing offers on we managed to scoop some wonderful bargains!

I simply adore Early Learning Center toys, the quality and playability of them is amazing, with having my eldest who is now coming up to 9, we already have quite a good selection of their toys, all of which have been well played with and very much loved, and all are still going strong!
So when I won the competition and got my £200 vouchers to say I was happy would be an understatement, I was simply ecstatic! and couldn't wait to run and go spend the vouchers!

We got into our local store and couldn't decided on what goodies to pick, the choice is more than adequate, there is literally something for everyone, from books to art materials to huge play sets right down to pocket money stocking fillers.
We already have the Tower of doom,(all be it the old style as you can see in the picture my youngest loves it, we have had it several years now and it is one toy that gets played with again and agian) we also have the pirates ship which is hugely popular here, along with the pirate figures and various knights and bad guys to go with the Tower, however my two boys really are huge fans of all things medieval, and my eldest still plays with the Tower of doom, so we decided to add to our collection and brought the castle of courage which really will give the boys a great role play
scenario!

As we walked around the store my partners attention kept being drawn to the beautiful cobblestone farm set and the wonderfully realistic schleich animals, so we agreed on a selection of them for my daughter, who is mad on anything with fur, she is an awkward one for toys as she doesn't often show much interest in 'playing' so I am really hoping the farm set and the realism of the animals will grab her imagination, and because of the amazing 50% off sale, we managed to grab a load of swampsterz, which I'm sure will be a huge hit to my youngest, and this amazing Dino racer set which looks a lot of fun!

I will do reviews of all these toys but obviously at the moment Father Christmas is very kindly looking after them for me, and if my three behave extremely well we are hoping he brings them on Christmas eve night!

Review - Robotic Hand

In our Toys R us box we had a robotic hand making kit, by kidz labs.

This instantly caught J's eye, and he was eager to get it out and start making it!

The product description states 'Build your own robotic human hand and amaze your friends with its realistic gripping movements. Robot hand will grab your imagination'
on sale here at Toys R us for £9.99

This product states for ages over 8, and I totally agree.

J opened up the box and set about trying to build his hand, it comes with fairly simple pieces, which are a reasonable size, and a piece of fishing line, you will need some scissors and a pen to complete the hand, and an ability to tie fiddly knots!

Jake sat with the hand for a good half hour before he asked for help
It was the knots which he was struggling with, the idea of the kit is to tie together the pieces and then you can pull the pulleys when it is complete to make the fingers move in a realistic motion.
you are required to tie three knots in each piece of line, and it does get increasingly difficult as you proceed in building the hand, J could not master the knots and so I was left struggling with it.
It was very fiddly and I almost threw it out the window a couple of times, but after I had finally tied the knots in the correct places J was over the moon with the hand!
I think it makes a nifty little gift for those awkward older boys, and once the hand was put together all three of my children wanted to have ago, J said he would definitely tell his friends to buy it, so overall I'd say 7 out of 10 for the fact it could be left in the box unmade if you weren't an amazingly good knot tier, but if you do master the knots then you have a pretty good robotic hand which is sure to entertain, priced at £9.99 I think that is correctly priced.

To be gratetful..

Today we received the Toys R us, runner up prize, for their 'have you got what it takes to be a toyologist?' competition, so with wide eyes and grabbing arms I let my three children loose on the big box that had been brought to our door.


take a look at the above picture, a perfect picture of gratefulness right?

Take another look

My two boys from the second I brought in the box, had massive smiles on their faces, their eyes lit up with delight to see what was inside, my daughter however from the second she clapped eyes on the box looked more weary, like she was pre building herself up to be let down, and true to form when we opened the box the boys gasps of delight were obvious, C on the other hand took half a glance n slunk off saying 'there's nothing I like!'



What makes a child grateful, or ungrateful?
I think the anticipation of gifts, (they have asked me everyday since we won the comp when the toyologist toys would come!) but then being faced with the reality of not knowing what was included, was a bit too much for C to comprehend so instead of show delight in something she was not sure of, she choose to not allow herself to be let down.
she instead of being eager to rip of the tape to see what goodies were inside had already decided there must be nothing of interest, that way it didn't matter if there wasn't?

When she turned and said she did not like what was sent, I gave her a stern telling that these were gifts and she should be grateful of them, she sat and watched the boys marvel over the gifts for a few minutes pondering how to react, then soon came around and in that moment I think she perhaps learnt how to be a little more grateful.

And grateful we truly are!

Lucky streak or creative genius?

I have just discovered the wonderful world of facebook competitions!
and am loving every minute of it!

I am a big fan of facebook, I am a fan of several companies pages, as I have noticed they often have really good offers and discount vouchers specifically on their facebook pages with some great discounts and promotions.

As its nearly Christmas and I have three children my mind has been on searching out good bargains to fill Santa's sack, I found my way to the Toys R us facebook page, and noticed they were running a competition to find a new 'toyologist' someone who reviews toys they get sent from Toys R us.

Great!! free toys! what more could you want on the run up to Christmas?

The competition was to write on their facebook wall, with a photo and/or video attached explaining why you would make a good toyologist.

photos! great that sounds like my sort of competition, so I decided to put my own spin on it and made this photo to enter:I watched their facebook wall on and off for the next few days and saw their fan numbers rise by the minute where hundreds of hopefuls were putting in their entry.

Then the end date arrived and to my amazement I received an email from Geoffery the Giraffe stating I was one of the runners up!

The buzz of entering the competition, the anticipation hoping you had won, and then the excitement you feel when your told you have indeed won is amazing, and I was hooked!

I started to look at other facebook pages specifically to see if they had any competitions running, and noticed Early Learning Center had a comp on their facebook page.
Asking people to create a 30 second video bringing the toys to life.
so we went to work and created our entry which you can view here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DDQ4ol0HQbU

I was amazed to hear back from ELC saying we had won their competition and they would send us £200 vouchers.