This month as part of the Blogger Board Game Club with Asmodee we have been playing Bananagrams!  It's a game that I've seen around for years but never actually played, so I was really excited to be able to play it with the family.




Bananagrams comes in a small banana shaped pouch and includes letter tiles and instructions.  That is literally all that you need to play, which makes it ideal for travel.  We actually brought it along to a family Christmas celebration, and it was perfect for people of all ages to play.  The game is recommended for ages 7 and up, so I worked as a team with Ivy who is only 5.


Each player takes 21 tiles from the bunch in the middle of the table to begin and independently makes their own word grid out of all of their letters.  This makes it quite nice as a challenge to yourself as well, just trying to make as many words as you can without worrying about anyone else.  You are trying to make these words as quickly as you can to win, but I did reassure the children that it is mostly about making great words themselves.


If you can't make any more words with the tiles that you have you call out 'dump' and put back one of your letters into the bunch, but then you have to pick up three more tiles to replace it.


When you have used all of your tiles you call out 'peel' and each player has to pick up one new tile from the bunch.  This goes on until there are no tiles left (or less tiles than there are players) then whoever uses all of their tiles first is the winner.


The other players then check the winners' grid to make sure that all of the words are correct and useable in the game (no proper nouns or abbreviations) and if all is well then they are declared the winner.


The children both really enjoyed the game, even though they did need a little bit of help to make their words.  It is such a great game to reinforce spelling skills as well as quick thinking and following the rules.  It will be great to take with us when we travel as well as playing at home after school.  



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* This is a review post, we were sent Bananagrams to play with and write our honest opinions.*

We went to Legoland Windsor (affiliate link) yesterday for their Legoland at Christmas celebration!  These special Christmas days are open for weekends throughout November and December, but we left if right close to Christmas to go, on the day after the children finished school for the term.  We were lucky as well as we waited to buy tickets and bought them on sale on Black Friday.



The day we went was unfortunately very rainy, so in our park bag along with the usual snacks, water bottles, first aid kit, wipes and other essentials we also brought spare socks and gloves to try to keep warm.  I package these in individual waterproof bags so that they definitely stay dry, and the wet socks can then go into those same bags.  I also brought some fun things like sticker books for in the car and glow sticks for when it got dark.



We arrived at Legoland around 11am and went straight to the gates, the children were each given a special passport and we were each given a golden ticket to keep.  The childrens' tickets had a tear off voucher for a gift from Father Christmas and the adult tickets had a voucher for a hot drink and a cookie.



Once we were in the park we were greeted by a Lego Santa, perfect for photo opportunities!  There was also a chance to meet Lego characters (Minifigure Santa and Holiday Ollie) at set times of day outside of the Little Shop (times can be found on the Legoland app).  Unfortunately we weren't up at the top at any of those times so we didn't meet any characters yesterday.



However, there were lots of other Christmas activities for the day and we couldn't wait to try to do them all!



A stop in the Hill Top Cafe first to make a plan for the day and have a quick coffee and a cookie.  (The Hill Top Cafe is the only place in the park that you can find these minifigure cookies as well as other Lego themed snacks like cupcakes with a Lego brick on top and the Lego fries).



We then had to pay the Star Wars Miniland a visit because it closes on December 31st (not sure what it's being replaced with) but we do love it in there so we will miss it.  Going through was definitely an indication of how the park would be for the rest of the day, as we had the whole place to ourselves!



Then onto the Brickmas Express!  The Hill Train had been transformed into a festive journey down into Legoland with the wreaths on the doors and other decorations.  It was a fun start to our day.



We also loved all of the festive backdrops around the park that were great for photos of the children throughout the day.  We love an Instagram wall!



The longest line that we waited in was for the Lego City Driving School as there weren't very many cars running, and unfortunately it was absolutely pouring rain!  However it was a little bit special as the background music was Driving Home for Christmas as the children drove around.



We then went on to other rides, all with very short lines.  We went on the new Haunted House Monster Party with just a 5 minute line, the children went on Thunder Blazer (the swings) and we went on Laser Raiders together.



We looked for some of the fun Christmassy scavenger hunt items around the park, there were Lego elves all around to find.


We had a prebooked time of 2:30pm to visit Father Christmas, so we then headed over to the Enchanted Forest to check in and walk through the Christmas trail.  It's decorated with Lego scenes as well as lots of Christmas decorations.  At the end of the trail you then head over to the other side of the castle (lead by the elves).



You are then assigned an elf (ours was called Candy Cane) to walk you over to Santa's cabin through the trees.



Santa was fantastic and had a full conversation with the children.  He knew their names and asked them all about school and what rides they liked at Legoland and what they wanted for Christmas.  We didn't feel rushed at all.  The children sat down for photos with Santa and we were able to take our own (they also took one which was available to buy at the end, but we didn't buy it).  Then they were given gifts from Santa.  Again they were so personal to the child.  I believe that the blue symbol bags are for boys and the red for girls, but when Santa asked the elf for a blue and a red bag, she then said that she would look at a black one.  So she handed a blue one to Ethan and one of the special black ones to Ivy.



When they looked in their bags after we left Ethan found a Lego set of an airplane, which is perfect for him and Ivy's had a sequinned soft toy unicorn, which is absolutely perfect for her as she is asking for a unicorn toy for Christmas.  So although it isn't a Lego set (I believe that it is probably Lego Friends sets in the red bags) it is actually something else that she loves and very sweet of that elf to find it for her.



We then went for a late lunch at City Walk Pizza and Pasta (as we always do, it is quite pricey but it's so easy for us as there's something that everyone likes to eat).  They had a special Christmas themed pizza in the buffet that had chicken and cranberry sauce on it.  The pop badges that they gave out were also Christmassy with an elf on them.



We then went next door to Mrs Christmas' Toy Shop!  This runs every half an hour (times can be found on the Legoland app).  It's so lovely, Mrs Christmas is up on a stage and tells everyone that she is a bit behind on helping to make the toys so she needs some help to make some Lego trains.



Each of the children is then given a little bag of Lego pieces to build a train.  Mrs Christmas walked around while they were making them, so we were able to get a photo with her as well.



At the end she then told everyone that they had done such a good job that they could bring the little trains home with them.  It was very sweet.



By then it had started to get dark, so we walked around looking at all of the beautiful Christmas lights around the park.  It truly looked magical all lit up at night.





It had also really emptied out at this point, so there were no queues at all for the rides.  Ethan was able to go on Ninjago six times in a row!  Ivy was also able to go on Desert Chase (the carousel), Thunder Blazer (the swings) all by herself and we went on Aero Nomad (the ferris wheel) all by ourselves and were treated to a few extra goes around and a nice little stop at the top to see all of the lights.



We finished off our day with a walk around Miniland all by ourselves, finding all of the Christmas characters and seeing all of the lights there too.



We popped into the Hill Top Cafe again just before setting off home to pick up some Lego fries (of course) and other snacks for the way home.



We had a fantastic day at Legoland at Christmas, despite the rain we were able to go on so many rides and the visit to Father Christmas was fantastic.  The other little Christmassy touches really made the day super festive an we would definitely go back again next Christmas.




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It's that time of year again, and we are compiling our list of Educational Toys for Christmas Gifts!




We like to break our list down into the different areas of learning so that you can gift in a balanced way.

Literacy Toys

Of course there are plenty of wonderful books to include, but we already own so many Christmas themed books that we haven't brought any more this year.


We also love personalised books, we were sent this very cool WatAdventures book for Ethan that is just so cool! The one that we chose is called From the Sewer to the Stars - The Rise of the WatAdventurers.  It's quite a long book, very well made and it's all about saving the planet.  Ethan's name is throughout the book as he is the main character and I was able to chose the avatar that looked most like him as well.  There are two stories in the book and some activities all related to environmental issues.




I have also ordered a personalised Disney book for Ivy from In the Book, which hasn't arrived yet, but it looks like another great option.

We also love activity books and wipe clean books to practice writing as well as spelling games and toys.

Mathematics Toys

We love maths!

We recently reviewed a variety of Rubiks Toys from John Adams, please read our review for more details, but we really do love Rubiks toys and they are perfect Christmas gifts and great for children's strategic development and coordination.





We also received this Counting Mountain game from Orchard Toys which is a lot of fun!  It's great for learning and reinforcing counting and addition skills.  There is a 3D mountain that you set up in the middle and try to climb by answering the questions correctly, but you might get a yeti card that sends you back down.  It will be perfect for family games afternoons in the winter.

Science / STEM Toys

It is fantastic how easy it is to find wonderful STEM toys now!

We are crazy about these Coding Critters from Learning Resources that they sent us.  The set that we got is Ranger and Zip, two adorable little dogs that can be programmed and played with the move around in different ways.  It is aimed at children from age 4 and up, which is fantastic as these toys are often aimed at older children.  It comes with a storybook that your child can follow along with to play different games with the little critters.  There are two different modes, the coding mode which you use to control their movements and also the interactive pet mode which you can use to play with and feed your pet.  The other sets are the cats Scamper & Sneaker as well as the dinosaurs Rumble & Bumble.




We also received this amazing Space Rocket Kit from Rex London that Ethan is going to absolutely love!  He will get to build his own space rocket and then add baking soda and vinegar to make it fly!  I mean, that's going to be incredible and so much fun for an activity over Christmas break.



We also received this Landmarks Lotto game from Orchard Toys , it's one of their mini games which are perfect for travel and this one just happens to be travel themed!  It is aimed at children from age 4-7 and for 2 to 4 players.  The players have to collect the landmark cards to fill their passports and they learn facts about them along the way.

Physical Development Toys

It's important not to leave out toys that will help with gross motor skills as well as fine motor skills.

We received a very cool toy called Boom Trix which is basically a bunch a mini trampolines that you can set up in a sequence and then bounce your metal balls along the track from one trampoline to the next.  So it's all about creativity and coordination to make it work, and to challenge yourself to make more difficult each time.  This is aimed at ages 8 and up so it will be more of a challenge, perfect for Ethan.

Creative Development Toys

There are so many different creative toys to choose from!

We love play dough, colouring sets and jewellery making at the moment.

I also picked up this Toy Story melting bead set the other day, it's similar to Hama Beads and we haven't really done any before this seems like a good start.  It's a great little stocking stuffer and activity for a rainy day.

Social Development Toys

Social development is another area that is sometimes forgotten about, but small world play can be fantastic for helping children to understand how to interact with people.

We were given this lovely Beauty and the Beast set from a toy event that we went to (Dream Toys) and it will be perfect for imaginative play and acting out situations between Belle and the Beast.




Games are also great for social development and learning about playing fairly, turn taking and being a good winner / good loser as well (we definitely need to work on that!)

We recently reviewed this Harry Potter Dobble game from Asmodee and really enjoy playing it as a family.  It's perfect to take with us anywhere and would make an excellent stocking filler.



And that's it, lots of fun and educational gift ideas for this Christmas!
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* This post contains gifted items for review as well as affiliate links, however all opinions are our own.*

We were invited to the preview event of the Christmas Circus called Help Rudolph Shine at Squire's Garden Centre in Shepperton the other day.  The circus is now on and you can buy tickets here (some dates are 25% off at the moment.)


The circus begins with the Ringmaster explaining that poor Rudolph's nose is not glowing because there isn't enough Christmas cheer, so we have to Help Rudolph Shine!


The first act was balancing on a stack of wobbling cylinders and stacked up boards.


Next we had Ivy's favourite act, which was the silks.  The acrobat performing was fantastic and kept Ivy mesmerised during her whole performance.


Next we had another sort of acrobatic act doing some handstand type balances on some lamps.


Onto another balancing act, this time balancing knives and candles on herself and then climbing up a ladder.


Onto some juggling and using a diablo for another juggling type act.


In between all of these acts there were times that we checked in with Rudolph to see how his nose was doing as well as seeing the clowns who came out to entertain whilst the stage was changed.


The final act involved a motorbike riding round and round whilst the very talented acrobat hung off of a tower on silks as well as by her teeth!


The show ended with Rudolph's nose glowing again and then Santa made an appearance!


We were then able to meet Santa at the back of the tent, and he gave each child a gift.


Ethan and Ivy were both given the same gift, a table tennis set that they both really like.


Overall I would say that the children enjoyed parts of the Christmas Circus, but not as much as they have in previous years.  It seemed that a lot of the acts were juggling and balancing, and there weren't as many thrilling acts as there were in previous years.  

They have also changed the system of meeting Father Christmas and you no longer go to a separate building to queue and have your own turn to meet and take photos.  You now just pass Santa on the way out, and when we went there wasn't a proper queue system which made it all feel a bit rushed.

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* This is a review post, we were gifted tickets to the preview event of the Christmas Circus at Squire's, all opinions are our own.*