Fabulous or Not?

Sesame Street K'NEX and a K'NEX CONTEST!!

If your kids are into sesame street and also like to build and create, a great new toy is the Sesame Street Neighborhood Collection Building Sets.   You can build exactly according to directions or you can use your imagination and build anything you want.  Tons of parts, hours of fun!   K'NEX building sets help physical, social and emotional development by encouraging imaginative play and hand-eye coordination.  You can talk to your child about the creation which enhances language skills and development and sorting through the pieces is great problem-solving.

The building sets are available at Target, Wal-Mart and Toys "R" Us from $9.99 to $19.99. Designed for ages 2-5, from personal experience, I would say an older two-year old is probably more equipped than my almost-two year old who preferred to just disassemble everything as I put it together.

 

We sat down as a family to play with our new toy....

We looked for all the pieces and decided to follow the instructions.

Marc was Head of Construction....

Noah was Head of DEstruction....

But, we all had fun and it was nice family time.  It all came together for a brief moment ...

We really had a lot of fun working on this as a family.  The pieces are easy to grip for small hands and it features recognizable characters and symbols, like the STOP sign. 

Contest!

You have the chance to win $1,000 worth of K'NEX Building sets and be featured on the K'NEX.com website.   All you need to do is make a video showcasing your child's K'NEX building skills using specific products.  

The ten best videos will be featured on KNEX.com and one winner will receive $1,000 worth of K'NEX toys.

Contest ends December 7, 2009 ... so hurry!

No purchase is necessary to enter.  To enter, post a video on your blog or website and submit the link along with a completed entry form, including name, age, email address and phone number to knexvideocontest@knex.com.  If you don't have a blog or website, submit a DVD or VHS along with the entry form to: Make a K'NEXion Video Contest, K'NEX Brand, L.P., PO Box 700, Hatfield, PA 19440.

Videos must be at least 30 seconds long ad no longer than 3 minutes and must include on of the following products:  K'NEX 400 pc Tub  or K'NEX Sesame Street Building Sets

Review: Bella Sara Royalty Trading Cards

Bella Sara is a trading card game with an accompanying online game featuring the magical land of North of North.  North of North is a land that is home to beautiful horses, the same horses that appear on the trading cards.  The brightly colored cards feature a fantasy-land-like world of castles and long-haired horses.

For young girls this is a great game.  It offers the ability to collect the cards and trade them with friends and there is another level of involvement with the online game.  Each pack of cards had five trading cards and a special ticket card.  The special ticket comes in copper, silver and gold featuring different levels of access on the website game.  The ticket will unlock things like horses, horseshoes, castle rooms and other items and prizes.  On this card there is a code that allows you to access different features online. 

The website www.bellasara.com features a parental guide full of information.  It tells parents that Bella Sara is a magical world of horses and other characters designed to expand and encourage your child's imagination.  You can download coloring pages, wallpapers and poster images. 

Just this month Bella Sara has expanded their series to include this ninth line of cards called ROYALTY.  In ROYALTY, Sara is introduced as are more horses, all with just one code. 

When I first opened this pack of trading cards I wasn't sure what was so attractive to young girls but I looked at the cards and then online and discovered that the accompanying games online really increase the activity that the cards encourage.  Bella Sara is interactive, good clean fun for young girls.  A fantasy world of princesses and horses is exactly what I'd want my five year old daughter playing with. 

Bella Sara is recommended for ages 5 and up.  Each pack of cards retails for about $2.99.

Bella Sara was created in Denmark over two years ago.  Since then, over 83 million cards have sold.

The First Years Stack 'n Count Cups

Most fabulous baby-to-toddler toy EVER.

This multi-colored set of eight plastic nesting cups has numbers and patterned holes on the bottom and when inverted, they stack up into a tower.  

This was the first toy I really gave to Noah.  When he was just a few months old I would stack them up and let him knock them over.  I liked them so much I bought a second set to keep as bath toys.   When we traveled on a plane and in the car, I bought another set because, dude! PERFECT TOY!  It is inexpensive and multi-purpose, the simplicity encourages imagination, the colors are stimulating and the nesting and stacking works on fine and gross-motor skills. 

Recently, at the age of sixteen months, Noah has decided that he must have the cups with him at all times.  We have so many other toys, but these darn four dollar plastic cups are his true love.  He stacks them, nests them, mixes them up. 

Sometimes the simple toys are really the ones that kids love the most!

When they get dirty you just run then through the dishwasher!

LINK TO BUY

PRICE:  FABULOUS!  $3.99