Travel Wild Guess

The game is exactly as it sounds – it is a quiz where everyone has a wild guess at the answer and the closest guess to the answer wins the points. All answers are numeric, with questions such as: what is the distance between the north and south poles in kilometres. This game is great for a relaxing family quiz that everyone can enjoy. It is highly unlikely that someone will know the exact answer to a question. The answer is literally anyone’s guess and for some questions the wilder the guess the closer you will be.

Cheatwell Games Travel Wild Guess £9 from Amazon

Travel Family Quiz Night

Cheatwell’s Family Quiz Night is a rare gem of a game that really can be enjoyed by all ages. The questions cover 8 popular quiz topics such as movies, science and nature and history. However, where this differs from traditional quiz games is that the question cards include two sets of questions, one for adults and a different multiple-choice question for kids. This means the whole family can get fully involved in the quiz, giving everyone fair stakes in the game.

Cheatwell Games Travel Family Quiz Night £13 from Amazon

On the Go Games

As it says on the tin, this is a compact set of games that is ideal for travels or taking to play with friends and relatives. Card games work well for all ages, and these cards are attractive colours and well made. The pack also includes 6 dice and comes with instructions for three dice games: Chicago, Going to Boston, and Midnight.

On-The-Go Games by Kikkerland £10 from The RNLI Shop

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The new set from Geomag’s early years Magicube now comes with a set of 6 colourful, double-sided cards to build little one’s confidence in creating any number of shapes and creatures from the blocks. Card ideas include a shrimp’s tail, a hot air balloon and a centipede. And once your child has got started with these, you’ll be surprised at just how many more ideas start to flow.

Earlier sets, such as the Animals set, came with an instructional booklet of ideas, but the cards are much more robust and easier to use for the age range at which it is aimed. The cards are also created to encourage different levels of challenge, with shapes on cards increasing in complexity from 1 colour and 1 shape to 3 colours and 3 shapes for the child to match.

Magicube are the starter set from the magnetic toy maker Geomag. Aimed at ages 2-5 the chunky blocks are easy to for small hands to grip. They are educational as well as fun, supporting children with hand-to-eye coordination, spatial awareness, and motor skills.

The blocks are magnetic so snap together to hold a shape. However, while the magnets are strong enough to give a child a satisfying snap sound, they are not too strong that it isn’t very easy for very little ones to separate them and put them back together without any risk of trapping tiny hands.

This set comes with 10 blocks, but once a child gets used to playing with them more sets can be added to create larger structures, including sets with wheels for creating movement.

Our mini-reviewer, while old for these toys now, was used to playing with previous versions as a child, and gave the new card version a big thumbs-up for added kid friendly design.

Geomag Magicube 16 Piece Blocks & Cards Set is available from Coolshop for £30.

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Connetix Tiles are a range of colourful magnetic shapes that can be used to create both flat and 3-D structures.

The tiles come in a good range of shapes and sizes providing plenty of options for little one’s imaginations. The tiles opaque nature means that the light reflects through them giving a beautiful appearance, almost like stained-glass.

The toy can help children to learn about shapes and colours as well as build cognitive skills such as spatial awareness and hand-eye co-ordination. But added to that they are both fun and relaxing to use.

The tiles are made from non-toxic ABS plastic that is BPA, lead and phthalate free and feel quite sturdy. We were able to build a three-level structure, with the magnets clicking together simply.

In a fast-paced, low attention span world, Connetix tiles provide a relaxed form of focused play that stimulates through tapping into children’s creativity and engaging their imagination with shapes, noise, colour, and touch – snapping the magnetic tiles together was like playing with a fidget toy.

The set comes with an Inspiration book to give some ideas to get started. While this is helpful, be aware that you won’t be able to create everything in the book from one set. It looks like the Inspiration book is standard across the different sets rather than specific to the rainbow set we have.

The set also comes with a drawstring cloth bag to keep the tiles in one place. For little kids this is a great idea because they don’t need to spend time working out how to place them back into a box, because they can all just go in together and are study enough not to break by being stored in this way.

The tiles can be used from age 3 upwards. But as our young reviewer found, if you are looking for relaxing play these creative toys can be enjoyed at any age.

Connetix Tiles UK 62-Piece Set is £65 from Connetixtiles.com

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Top It

Occasionally you come across a game that is surprising for all the right reasons. Top It is that game. On the face of it, it doesn’t look that exciting. But it is an easy to learn and play game that quickly becomes addictive and has become our go to choice for winter nights.

The simple premise is you get a topic on a card, for example, ‘famous singers’ and you have a limited time to come up with as many famous singers as you can starting with the letters in the 9 letter grid-board. Each time someone comes up with a right answer their counter is placed on top of the one before – basically they top it. The counter on the top when the time is up wins all of the points for that letter. Both the grid letters and the cards are changeable, so coming back to it feels fresh every time.

Cheatwell Games Top It £18 from Zatu Games

Kids Charades

Charades has long been a popular party game for all ages. This boxed game gives younger ones a little helping hand in coming up with ideas to act out, and helps adults playing with them too by making sure everyone has child friendly mimes.

The cards come in 6 categories: objects and animals; people and characters; actions and phrases; films and TV; books, songs and rhymes, and an all encompassing anything and everything. The first team to guess a mime in all six categories wins the game.

Cheatwell Games Kids Charades £12.49 from Amazon

The Thumbs Up! Orb Retro Dance Mat

This is one for big kids, especially those adults who remember playing dancing games in amusement arcades or early computer games like Space Invaders. The mat needs about two-feet square of floor space. It is easy to set up with a TV – just plug in and play. Working out the rules of the game is a little more tricky, because the instructions aren’t great. But when you get the hang of it, it’s an active game that comes with 9 different games, 10 dance characters, 110 original songs, and three levels of increasing intensity.

The Thumbs Up! Orb Retro Dance Mat £29.99 from Prezzybox.com

On The Go Games

As it says on the tin, this is a compact set of games that is ideal for travels or taking to play with friends and relatives. Card games work well for all ages, and these cards are attractive colours and well made. The pack also includes 6 dice and comes with instructions for three dice games: Chicago, Going to Boston, and Midnight.

Kikkerland On-The-Go Games £10 from The RNLI Shop

For a card game to play individually, solitaire is always a classic to keep people of all ages entertained.

Dantoy BIOplastic Bio Baking Gift Set

Dantoy’s BIOplastic Baking set for kids is versatile in that it can be used to make real edible cookies from dough as well as role-playing for very young children, working with modelling clay or making shapes in sand.

All the products are made from BIOplastic, which is both biobased and recyclable. In this case the biobased material is 90% sugarcane, formed from a by product of processing raw sugar cane into sugar.

This eco-friendly toy set includes a rolling pin, a whisk, 2 bowls and dough cutters. Whisking, rolling and cutting out fun shapes helps to support fine motor skills, learning play and imaginative fun, as well as encouraging children to learn about renewable plant-based materials that offer a greener way to play.

We made real cookies with it and while the small sizes meant it was a little challenging at times, the bio-plastic equipment made for a fun afternoon of break-free baking.

Dantoy BIOplastic Bio Baking Gift Set £10 from Smyths.

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The Danish toy producer recently picked up the Toy Industry of Europe’s silver award “Play for change sustainability” for its latest Blue Marine toy collection.

The Blue Marine Toys are made from discarded plastics from the fishing industry, from old nets, trawls, and ropes which have been turned into sand and water toys for young children. The set comes in a net bag which encourages conversations about the origin of the toys, making links to the importance of recycling and cleaning the oceans.

Dantoy’s other ranges also support sustainable toys for early learning and child development. The company’s BIOplastic Baking set for kids is versatile in that it can be used to make real edible cookies from dough as well as role-playing for very young children, rolling out modelling clay or making shapes in sand.

This eco-friendly toy set, made from 90% sugarcane, includes a rolling pin, a whisk, 2 bowls and dough cutters. Whisking, rolling and cutting out fun shapes helps to support fine motor skills, learning play and imaginative fun, as well as encouraging children to learn about renewable plant-based materials that offer a greener way to play.

Dantoy BIOplastic Bio Baking Gift Set £10 from Smyths

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The sets are aimed at pre-school children between one and five-years-old. The magnetic properties allow these brightly coloured blocks to attach to each other in whichever way little hands want to place them. However, while the magnets make a satisfying clicking sound as they snap together, they are not so strong as to trap tiny fingers or for toddlers to struggle to separate them.

The Blocks and Wheels set brings an added dimension to this early building system. It contains 13 pieces from the Magicube range, including square, triangular and curved blocks as well as a set of four wheels.

There is a small instruction booklet with some ideas to get started. But you’ll quickly find that a child’s imagination can dream up no end of creations.

The toys are educational as well as fun, helping children to develop their hand-eye co-ordination and cause and effect thinking. The product is also sustainably produced, being made from 100% recycled plastic.

Our mini-reviewer found the wheels to be an attractive extra and can imagine little ones spending hours building, pushing and taking apart brightly coloured vehicles.

The Geomag Magicube Magnetic Blocks & Wheels Set is £29.99 from Elc.co.uk

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The Geomag Glow and Geomag Glitter are two new lines that add an extra dimension to the popular panel and rod building sets.

Both sets were a hit with our 10-year-old reviewer, who was fascinated by the ‘magical powers’ of the Geomag glow rods to light up after dark, and loved the vibrant colours of the Geomag Glitter, which has become a new favourite.

The toys come with their own neat storage box to keep the small parts, particularly the magnetic balls, safe. They are also interchangeable with other Geomag products. So if you have a set already this can be used to create larger and more colourful creations.

As with all Geomag products there is an instruction booklet that offers suggestions on the kinds of shapes you can make. But coupled with a child’s imagination the options are endless.

As well as supporting STEM.org educational play, the toys are also a good way to introduce discussions about care for the planet and recycling. The glow toys are made from 100% recycled plastic, the packaging uses more than 70% recycled materials and only renewable energy sources are used in the production process.

The Geomag Glow Recycled 42 Piece Set is available for £34.99 and Geomag Glitter (535) 35 Piece Magnetic Construction Set £26 both from The Entertainer

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Huckleberry Cable Transport

Our little reviewer had hours of fun with this cable car kit that uses a pulley system to transport a little wooden basket between two points. The kit comes with plenty of strong rope included, which means there is lots of scope for trying this out between trees, tables, or posts. This simple toy is practical, fun and encourages a curiosity about engineering and how things work as well as sparking the imagination ¬– just think of what we could do with this if we had a real tree house.

Huckleberry Cable Transport costs £19.20 from Conscious Craft

Huckleberry Popcorn Maker

If you are planning a camping trip this popcorn maker will help you serve up delicious snacks in minutes. But you don’t need a campfire to enjoy this cooking gadget. Not wanting to start any fires that could risk spreading during such a dry spell we used a gas hob. It worked just as well, was huge fun when it started popping, and is now certain for year-round use. Two teaspoons of popcorn kernels make the perfect amount for a special movie night.

Huckleberry Popcorn Maker costs £18 from Kikkerland

Huckleberry Sand Tools

If you’re heading to the beach the Huckleberry sand tools are great for making shapes and textures to add extra detail to sand castles and other creations. The set includes a 3-sided rake for creating stairs, waves, and other textures; a brush to sweep away loose sand, and a smoothing tool for making walls, and smoothing out tricky bits.

Huckleberry Sand Tools costs £15.35 from Conscious Craft

Huckleberry Leaf Cards

Playing cards are a toy that span the generation divide. Here they’ve been given a new look, with an easy to hold shape and a sturdy container to keep all 52 cards safe. It was lovely to see our little reviewer learning new card games from his grandparents and to watch how much fun he got out of playing them.

Huckleberry Leaf Cards costs £9.60 from Conscious Craft.

For more outdoor toy reviews see our Toys for Little Explorers.

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In the video below our 10-year-old reviewer tries out the latest set and enjoys experimenting with polarity to make a spinning mobile.

This set comes with rods in a wide variety of colours. Unlike other sets it doesn’t come with the purpose built, handy-sized, storage boxes. Instead the magnetic balls and rods are packed in polystyrene boxes, which aren’t as practical for reuse. We would have liked to see them using the same recycled plastics, as they do for the Geomag panels, to produce a tidy-away box to keep the different parts safe. And this is an intention for this environmentally aware company longer term – to cut styrofoam use and replace with a reusable box made of hard 100% recycled plastics to ensure protection and durability for the different parts.

The set comes with a small booklet with some ideas of different structures you can build and shapes you can create. But the real pleasure here is getting creative while experimenting with the push and pull of magnetic fields and learning about the strengthening effect of triangulation on structures.

The toy is recommended for ages 3+ because of the nature of the small pieces that could be swallowed. However, it is also suitable for much older children it encourages learning in a playful way, supporting the development of STEM skills (science, technology, engineering and mathematics).

This 88 piece set is an exciting addition to the Geomag construction world. It can be enjoyed on its own or with other sets from the collection as the many Geomag sets are compatible.

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The Geomag Mechanics Gravity Loops and Turns set is a construction toy that allows children to fire metal spheres around tracks of their own creation. The metal spheres are compatible with those from the Geomag Classic series.

Each element of the circuit is made with 74% recycled plastic in lime green, teal, orange, white or clear plastic. To retain the balls on the course, the sides of the tracks have a high curved edge and the ball bearings move about like they are a child zipping down a waterslide.

Magnetic cannons fire the balls around the track so when one sphere reaches the cannon a ball on the other side is propelled around by track by the difference in polarity. This propulsion is powerful enough to get the ball to perform a full 360 degree loop and continue around the track.

It isn’t immediately intuitive as to how each of the 15 types of pieces join to one another but the 32 page instruction booklet is packed with clear diagrams of the correct ways to link the different structural elements together and how to make them interact. Once you’ve quickly mastered the basics, connecting the components and making elaborate routes for the balls to travel along is straightforward.

There are enough pieces to make an assortment of different tracks and you are not restricted to making the one outlined in the booklet. Children will get a lot of satisfaction using their STEM skills to determine how steep they can set the ramp or how far the cannon can fire.

Even when the set wasn’t being used to create circuits, my son had great fun experimenting with the connector pieces building unusual shapes and playthings.

The set can also be joined with one or more of the other Geomag Mechanics Gravity sets that are available such as the Race Track or Gravity Motor using the Easy Combo System to produce larger circuits and more elaborate movement. This particular Loops and Turns set is aimed at children of 8 and over but there are other Geomags Mechanics Gravity sets that are suitable for those 7 and above.

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