At the end of last month, I went along to the Toy Fair 2020 – I go each year, mainly to check out board games for Big Boss Battle, a site I am one of the owners of. As we’ve been reviewing toys on this blog, I figured I’d spend more time looking at the Toy aspect of the Toy Fair. Sadly, on the day we were meant to go to the Toy Fair, our car’s catalytic converter was stolen while parked in a parking lot – what a wild ride. Because of this, I ended up only having part of one day to explore the Toy Fair, but I booked a few appointments and checked out a bunch of different toys. I wanted to share with you what I found to be the coolest toys of the fair!
[Ad- gifted product] It doesn’t really snow in England. Where Jupiter grew up, snow covered the ground by Halloween, causing snow days and road closures by Christmas. She is very fond of the memories of snow, though she never enjoyed the cold, snow down the back of the shirt events that would come with a white, winter dusting. Snow ball fights are something you can see in most TV shows and movies around the time of Christmas, but in England, that’s just not really possible.
This year, we got some Snoball mix from Zimpli Kids. Not sure what to expect, we figured this would be perfect to play with in the holiday before Christmas. The children seemed very interested in the idea of a massive snowball fight outside, and the answers was either chopping up lots of little bits of ice into snow or trying out these Snoballs. The snow itself was very easy to make; we simply mixed the powdered mix in a large bowl with the listed amount of water.
[Ad- gifted product] Frozen seems to have taken the world by storm. What with the amount of songs being sung, Olaf being mentioned left and right, and the number of children trying to get their parents to bring them to the cinema, it only made sense that loads of new Frozen II products started coming out to compliment the movie; jewellery, stuffed animals, Paintoos and more! The eldest child went off to Frozen II first with a group of her friends, which left the youngest talking about how she wanted to go for ages.
Finally, we decided to take her along. To make things more special, we had some Disney Frozen II Face Paintoos ‘painted’ onto her face for the viewing. The Paintoos come with five different designs on their own sheets, an instructions book, as well as a sponge and a bunch of wipes that are made to take the Paintoos off when the child is done. We had expected these to work more like face paint as we had never had Paintoos before, but they are essentially a large, fake tattoo that can be placed over your child’s face.
[Ad- gifted product] Board games are something both of us play, every other week, at their tabletop night! Jupiter wasn’t big into board games, until she started writing for Big Boss Battle and started reviewing board games along side Dann. When John Adams offered up Shark Chase to play with the kids, we felt it would be a perfect time to start getting them well into the world of board games. Shark Chase contains a pretty simple concept; don’t let your sea creatures get eaten!
Unlike the more heavy duty board games we review as apart of our jobs, Shark Chase is perfect for children, providing an easy game that takes a few minutes truly understand. The set up is pretty simple – just just need to follow the instructions and put together a strange shark contraption in between a water level and an island. On your first time playing, you do need to stick all of the eyes onto the shark and various sea creatures, with is better done by tweezers if I am honest.
[Ad- gifted product]Â Recently, we went off to a very special launch party for a new toy called Nestlings! As a fan of toys myself, I was super interested in what these far more adorable then Furbies would be like, especially as they reminded me of Hatchlings, a toy animal that comes in a large egg that children need to pet and play with until it hatches. I was quite disappointed with Hatchlings, if I am honest, as they take ages to hatch and that’s the main fun – there is no way to put them back in their shell, so you just then have a toy to take care of and very slowly teach.
Nestlings is far more interesting. With this toy, there are two versions; pink and teal, both soft and contain the same general look. We got two teal Nestlings to take home and play with, each with two babies inside. You see, Nestlings are creatures you need to take care of and play with, until they are happy enough to have a baby. These two babies come in one of the following colors; yellow, pink, teal or purple, so each of ours had different ones. The Nestlings have interaction points on their head and nose (basically buttons), while the color of their eyes tell you what they need. They talk back to you, but at a very good volume (as to not get very annoying to parents trying to hear literally anything else) to let you know what they need. Their heart on their belly also lights up, which is just apart of this magical creature.
