Stuff Parents Need - Easing the chaos in the nest, one find at a time.

(Giveaway!!) Summer Time Means Family Play Time! Playdate Ideas for The Whole Family!

May 28, 2015 · by Tiffany Merritt · 115 Comments

This post brought to you by Quaker Oats. The content and opinions expressed below are that of Stuff Parents Need.

School has been out for my kids for a week and a half, now. We spent a week of that time at the beach, and have only been hanging out at home for 3 full days Any guesses how many times I have heard, “Mom! I’m bored!”?

The answer is TOO MANY TIMES. I’ve had to explain to my kiddos that boredom is actually the birthplace of imagination, so it’s good to be bored. But I’ve also discovered that in many cases, that plea of boredom is a thinly veiled disguise for a request for me and/or their dad to play with them. And playing with my kids is honestly something that I need to remember to do more often.

Quaker Chewy understands the needs for families to play together, so when they reached out to ask me to talk about getting adults and kids to play together this summer, I knew this would be the perfect opportunity to put together a playdate that was for kids and adults alike.

We were recently with all of the cousins on my husband’s side of the family, a fun group of 7 girls and one baby boy. Since we all live so far away from each other, we only get together every other year, which makes our time together very precious. Every adult wants to get to spend special time with each of the kids, and play is one of the very best ways to do that. Here are a few key tips I have for making a playdate inter-generational, and not strictly for the kids.

Find a Larger Space

We were fortunate to have access to a very large back yard that was fenced in and even had a grove area, as well as a huge open space for running. A larger park or green space can work in a similar way. I found that giving people lots of room to run around meant that lots of running around actually happened, and it provided enough space for kids and adults to participate in different activities at the same time, just depending on their interest. But the big space certainly didn’t keep the kids from gathering near each other, as Uncle Tim experienced!

Provide Yummy Snacks (and Don’t Hide in the Kitchen!)

It’s well-known that food brings people together, so be sure to have a snack assortment that is pleasing to the eye AND to the body! I put this tray of Quaker® Chewy® Granola Bars (with 8 grams of whole grains per bar) and fresh fruits and veggies together in just 3 minutes and it was a huge hit. I wasn’t stuck in the kitchen making food while everyone else was hanging out, and I felt good about what I was serving. I had a variety of Quaker Chewy Granola Bars (Chocolate Chip, Chocolate & Salted Caramel and Caramel Popcorn Crunch) so everyone could pick their favorites.

So what did the kids think about the snacks? Well, just look at their reaction to being told it was time to refuel!

Games: A Little Planning Goes a LONG Way

I fully admit that my personality type would feel comfortable scheduling out a playdate in 15 minute increments, and then drilling right through that list. This is not a strategy I would recommend, though! Kids need the freedom to spend more or less time on activities, depending on their moods and interest. Something as simple as a flower they find might entertain them for 30 minutes, as it did for one of my neices. I couldn’t have planned that, I assure you!

Still, it’s good to have some interesting options on hand and not leave the playdate entirely up to the kids to figure out. I recommend having a few new items offered up so that every child and every adult can have the fun experience of playing with something new. Look for items that promote active play, such as a cool new ball (go for something unusual, like the one pictured below), a bubble machine, or might I even suggest a stomp rocket? Each of these items was played with by everyone, but the stomp rockets stole the show. The children couldn’t resist, and neither could the grown ups. I suppose it brought out the kid in each of us!

Don’t Put the Snacks Out Right Away

I know from experience that when snacks are presented first thing at a playdate, it tends to slow everything down. Kids and adults will gravitate toward the food, and the adults, in particular, might struggle to get out of their chairs once they are comfortably seated. At least that’s how I am! The kids will also be back in an hour asking for more snacks, I promise! Save the snacks for the midway point or beyond, once everyone has worked up an appetite. Let the snacks be fuel for round 2 of play instead of a stumbling block to get to round 1.

Your Turn to Play

Friends, there has never been a better time to get inspired to play with your kids! Right now, Quaker is hosting an incredible Keep Playing! With Chewy promotion, and you have the chance to win $25,000 to make over your family play space. Let me repeat that: $25,000!!!

Entering is simple: visit www.ChewyKeepPlaying.com and submit a photo of where your family likes to play, and how you’d loved to see the space made over and why. I’m definitely entering and showcasing our backyard, which could certainly use some love to make it more inviting for play, more like the yard where we got to have our awesome playdate! The contest runs until June 13th and in addition to the grand prize, there will also be weekly winners for a $500 gift card. This promotion is definitely not-to-miss!

Your Turn to Win!

Win it!: One lucky Stuff Parents Need reader will win an amazing Quaker Chewy Playdate package, valued at $100 and including the following:

A Chewy Playdate invitation pack to plan your next playdate
A classic Bocce Ball set for endless hours of outdoor summer play
A Gazillion Bubble Monsoon bubble machine for the whole family to enjoy
Sidewalk chalk set to get creative outdoors
A puzzle perfect for indoor or outdoor play
A red storage bin for storing your family’s favorite toys
A NERF Bash Ball for easy family fun
A variety of Chewy Granola Bars to help fuel family play, including, Big Chewy Sweet & Salty Bars and Chewy Granola Bars Variety Pack

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Quaker is providing the prizes for this program at no cost to me. This program is not administered or sponsored by Quaker or its affiliates, but solely byStuff Parents Need

Pure Breakfast Deliciousness: Peachy Protein Shake

May 27, 2015 · by Tiffany Merritt · 1 Comment

This post brought to you by DairyPure Milk. The content and opinions expressed below are that of Stuff Parents Need.

During the school year I confess that we fell into a bit of a funk with our breakfast options. Like most families, we are usually a bit rushed during those first few hours of the day as we prepare to launch in all our separate directions. I found myself buying the same 2-3 things for our breakfasts simply because they seemed to be quick and to be consumed without complaint.

But now that summer is here, we are a bit more relaxed and can spend a bit more time thinking bout meal prep (don’t let this confuse you with spending more time PREPARING the food…I still like to keep it quick!). I am glad to have the chance to give it more thought because I find it especially difficult to get my oldest child to eat some protein first thing in the morning (or ever, actually, but this post is about breakfast…).

But you know what that kid LOVES? Smoothies and shakes. I love giving her a big dose of milk to start the day, too, so I decided to come up with something that was simple, delicious, and packed with protein for her growing mind and body. And what I made was a smash success!

For this recipe, I really wanted to keep the ingredient list simple and pure, with unprocessed ingredients for a fresh, healthy start to the day. That’s why I went for DairyPure milk, which comes only from cows fed a healthy diet, and that is continuously quality tested to ensure purity. Keeping artificial growth hormones out of our milk is a priority for my family, personally, and I like that it is also a priority for DairyPure (though I am required to state the following: “No significant difference has been shown between milk derived from cows treated with the artificial growth hormone rbST and non‐rbST‐treated cows”).

So here’s what I put in my peachy protein shake if you want to give is a try with your family (especially any of your protein-averse kiddos!).

Peachy Protein Shake

prep time: 5 minutes

total time: 6 minutes

servings: 4

Ingredients:

3 peaches, pitted and sliced
1 package (12-16 oz) tofu, silken preferred
2 bananas, peeled and sliced
1 1/4 cups DairyPure milk
1/4 cup honey

1. Place sliced and pitted peaches into a blender.
2. Puree peaches until smooth. Remove from the blender and set aside. Wash out the blender. 3. Add chopped tofu, sliced bananas, honey and DairyPure milk to the blender. 4. Blend until smooth.

5. Pour 3-4 spoonfuls of the peach puree into the bottom of a glass. Top with the desired amount of the shake. Stir to combine, or enjoy it as is!

I hope you love the peachy protein shake as much as my family does! And I hope you will give DairyPure milk a try if you haven’t already. This is something you can get from your local dairy, which makes it a truly simple choice for moms. Don’t forget, it’s backed by an exclusive 5 Point Purity Promise (no growth hormones, tested for antibiotics, continuous quality testing, healthy diet for the cows, and cold-shipped from your local dairy)!

Follow this link to Learn more about DairyPure and to locate your nearest retailer. If you liked this recipe, you can get more DairyPure Recipe inspiration on Pinterest. And you can also get some new ideas through following DairyPure on Facebook. I just signed up to follow them on both places so that I can change our breakfast routine, and perhaps even get some new ideas for lunch and dinner!

Residual Income, Evergreen Content, and Other Secrets to Making Money Online

May 26, 2015 · by Tiffany Merritt · 11 Comments

“How exactly do you get paid?” is a question I hear all the time, and you’d be surprised by how often the question comes from people who are perfect strangers to me. I know people aren’t trying to pry by asking such a personal question. They simply can’t help but blurt out what they are thinking! After all, so few people seem to actually know someone who successfully earns a paycheck while working from home. It’s not an unheard of concept, yet it still seems like a bit of a unicorn (conceivable, but not actually real).

This is how I commute to work. Just kidding, I don’t have a commute!

photo credit: Y’know, hanging with my unicorn via photopin (license)

Well friends, I want to sit and chat with you all a bit more and answer some of the questions you might have about how to successfully make the transition from working outside of the home to working inside the home (or if you are already inside the home, how to fire up your computer and start generating some cash on the side). My friend Kayla Aimee and I will recently recorded a Google Hangout on Air where we chatted a bit more about our own journeys and exactly how we benefit from being our own bosses (and the benefits are many, y’all!).

Come hang out with us by viewing the recorded broadcast! We chat for about 45 minutes and everyone who registers to take a look at it gets some sweet free resources from us, as well!

If you’d like to see us record another session like this, leave a comment below with any questions you might have about how making money from home works so that we can address as many of them as possible! And please feel free to share this with any friends you may have who are longing for a change or who want to figure out how to turn their hobbies online into income-generating activities. We can help!

Join us by clicking here!

Summer Styles for Your Littles to Love

May 26, 2015 · by Tiffany Merritt · Leave a Comment

Complimentary outfit provided for review purposes. All thoughts and opinions are my own, as always.

I continue to love the looks put out by FabKids, and my children continue to reach for their FabKids clothes first whenever they are clean and hung up in the closet. This company seems to have mastered the art of combining fun styles that kids love with comfort that they also crave since they are busy playing throughout the day and need clothes that can keep up!

This month I have two major loves from FabKids. First, is our new outfit selection for the month, which is the Summer Stripe Tutu dress paired with navy leggings.

This dress is reminiscent of one of our all-time FabKids favorites, which Darah wore on her first day of kindergarten and many MANY times after that.

We’ve already washed the dress at least 3 times (due to it being constantly picked!) and it holds up just fine in the washer. The colors are also just so vibrant and fun; it’s really such a great piece!

And the navy leggings are a great pairing for cooler days or for times when your child might be rocking the playground equipment and need a bit more coverage. Neutrals like that will pair with tons of other stuff in her wardrobe, which will make them a great item to have in her collection.

The other thing I am continuing to love is what I call the “fire dress” that I featured last month. I loved it so much, in fact, that I ordered it for each of my nieces on my husband’s side of the family during our recent gathering together for my father-in-law’s memorial service. We live scattered all over the world, so we only get together as a big group every other year. Such an occasion warranted some matching dresses! 🙂

Aren’t they cuties? Let me tell you, it was worth every single penny, because all of the girls ADORED their dresses and spent the better part of the day twirling around in them! 🙂

New to FabKids?

If you aren’t familiar with FabKids, you should definitely check it out (when you sign up through me you get 2 outfits for the price of 1 plus free shipping on your first order!). This is an outfit of the month club and it is SUPER easy and flexible, so no worries about getting locked into something you don’t really want. You get new outfit selections (which are plentiful!) on the first of the month and you have until the 5th of the month to either choose an outfit (outfits are mostly $29.95…some are $34.95) or to skip the month. Skipping is EASY…just a few clicks! Trust me, I have skipped quite a few times, myself!

If you forget to log in and skip you will be charged on the 6th and will simply have an outfit credit on file to use any time you like. So you won’t be shipped something that isn’t right for your child as a default. I love that!

Only once have I been disappointed with an outfit purchase, and FabKids very quickly fixed the problem for me with absolutely no hassle. Otherwise, FabKids outfits are pretty much instant hits around here!

Hands-On Prints Books: Bringing Montessori Home!

May 25, 2015 · by Tiffany Merritt · Leave a Comment

I participated in an Influencer Activation on behalf of Influence Central for Hands-on-Prints books. I received books to facilitate my review.

Are you concerned about your kiddos experiencing some brain drain over the summer? This is an issue I’ve been a bit worried about, personally, and it has impacted the types of activities I am going to make available. Of course my kids are going to have plenty of unstructured play time (that’s an important part of learning, after all!) but I’m also on the look out for reading materials that can help with skill development for my pre-reader and my early reader.

Today I want to highlight two books that are fantastic summer additions to my kids’ libraries!

My kids are in Montessori school, and one of the important learning activities that pre-readers do is to practice tracing the cursive letters while making the letter sounds. The focus isn’t on the name of the letter, but rather the sound that it typically makes. And by tracing the letter, you are using muscle memory. This is how learning, and not rote memorization, takes place.

I am really loving the book Around the World from A to Z. This book has the raised cursive letters on one side of each page for the child to enjoy tracing. The other side of the page has very vivid images from around the world. Real-world photographs would have been most ideal, in my opinion, but the drawings are very beautiful. The images show children all over the world engaged in various activities all over the world (for example: kayaking by the Golden Gate Bridge). So in addition to the pre-reading exercises, you are also getting some geography and some information about various physical sports and games.

My youngest has begins her first preschool year in Montessori school this fall. We will be tracing our letters over the summer and continuing to practice with it throughout the school year. When she outgrows the book, I will be donating it to the school!

The other book I’d recommend for little ones as they work on identifying emotions, as well as coping strategies for when things don’t go their way, is Do I have to? What if I don’t want to. Now this book is going to be just as helpful for me as it is for my kids. There are so many great points made just to the parents at the beginning of the book about how hard it is for a child to have so little control over how their day goes (when they wake up, where they go, what they eat, etc.) and that can get overwhelming, and also really frustrating! This book takes an empathetic approach to those difficulties and also helps start conversations between parents and their children so that they can help each other work through those hard moments.

Both of these titles are from Hands on Prints. Christina Cheung is the founder of Hands-on-Prints, and she began writing her books after establishing a Montessori school. The range of material offered on the website spans from the simple to the more complex, and incorporates tactile elements as well as a visually stimulating experience for children. Please take a moment to check out the website and see what might need to be added to your summer reading list!

Customized Pet Food? Yes! It Exists!

May 21, 2015 · by Tiffany Merritt · Leave a Comment

Samples provided for review purposes. All thoughts and opinions are my own, as always.

There’s no doubt about the fact that our two cats are different. One is a senior (she’s 13) and the other is turning 3 this summer. One is long-haired, and one is medium-haired. One is a Maine Coon and the other is a Rag Doll. And while we’re comparing, one is grumpy and the other is constantly fighting to get in your lap.

Different cats. Different needs.

Every pet is unique, no matter the type and temperament. And all pets have different preferences when it comes to food, as well. Petbrosia is a customized pet food provider for cats and dogs that creates truly custom blends of food for your individual pet based on age, weight, activity level and special considerations. It is a very cool concept!

Right now Petbrosia is offering a 50% off coupon for new customers (use code SPNTRY) to try their first box of cat or dog food, and I want to show you what that experience is like.

You fill out a fairly detailed profile on the Petbrosia website and placing your order, you will receive a package that looks similar to this:

The bag is silver and doesn’t have information about what is inside because it is truly a custom blend for your pet. You get your detailed product information on a card that looks like this:

I ordered the salmon flavor for Hattie and the chicken flavor for Rose (you get to choose either flavor for cats…not sure what you get to pick for dogs). You can see the difference in their food blends by color alone, and while I’m sure the taste is also quite different, I wasn’t personally interested in doing a taste test for you! 🙂

Hattie absolutely loved her salmon blend. She eagerly eats it every time I serve it. I haven’t noticed any difference in the amount of hairballs she has (a constant problem with her, I’m afraid) and it’s hard to tell if she is experiencing any other health benefits at this point, so all I can go on is the fact that she likes it.

On the other hand, Rose absolutely refuses to eat her custom chicken blend. REFUSES. I can’t offer an explanation. Maybe she would have been happy with the salmon flavor, or perhaps she wouldn’t. Hattie doesn’t seem too eager to eat the chicken blend either, though (I presented it to her out of sheer curiosity). She will eat it, but I can tell she’s not thrilled.

So…maybe go for salmon when you order? At 50% off, I think this is worth the risk to try out for your dog or cat, especially if you are already purchasing a more premium blend of food and would like to get something even more customized for their unique needs.

Balancing Calories in and Calories Out this Summer With the Kids

May 21, 2015 · by Tiffany Merritt · Leave a Comment

Special thanks to the Dr. Pepper Snapple Group and The Motherhood for partnering with me for today’s post. All thoughts and opinions are my own, as always.

Last week I spent an hour on a very informative conference call with some folks at the Dr. Pepper Snapple Group (DPS) to talk about finding a balance between calorie intake and output through play and how DPS is helping to address this issue. DPS sells more than 50 brands of carbonated soft drinks, teas, juices, mixers and other premium beverages. Most of the sodas sold by this (and most every other soda company!) are largely off limits in my house, and are for special treats, only (like during our beach vacation), so I wasn’t exactly sure if I was the right audience since soda isn’t part of daily life for my family. But as it turns out, our conversation certainly didn’t focus on soda!

What I was very pleasantly surprised to learn is that there are some really great new developments in the DPS portfolio that indicate a true desire to meet the changing needs of the consumers. DPS is also spending quite a bit of effort (and money) to develop the “Let’s Play” program to showcase corporate social responsibility and to play a role in helping consumers who enjoy their products find a balance between the calories consumed through food & beverages and the calories you burn through physical activity (more on that, later!).

Over 50% of the innovation projects that are currently being developed at DPS focus on reducing calories and offering smaller sizes for portion control, as well as on improving nutrition provided. I was really excited to hear that, because this is an example of a company who is listening to it’s consumers!

Did you know that you can get an in-depth look at the nutrition content of DPS products at DPSProductFacts.com? This website was designed to ensure that every consumer can feel very educated about the choices they make for themselves and their families. Definitely give it a look. You can get allergen information, find out which products are school approved, and you may even discover some new products that might appeal to you (for example, I learned that there is a line of beverages available made with real sugar and Stevia, which is preferred by some over any type of artificial sweeteners).

DPS is also a proud supporter of local and national programs that encourage active lifestyles and fitness. I was very impressed to hear that DPS voluntarily took full-calorie beverages out of schools, which has reduced the calories in beverage shipments to schools by more than 90%. I certainly don’t want my kids ingesting full-calorie soft drinks during break time by the time they get to middle and high school and have access to vending machines, so I’m pleased to see that this company is already in line with that idea.

Let’s Play

During our chat, I also learned about the play deficet our children are currently experiencing, on the whole. Only 20% of children even live near a park, and thanks to budget cuts and schools, among other reasons, 2/3 of kids get less than an hour of play a day. Today’s children also tend to be more scheduled than we were as kids, and as a result have 12 fewer hours of free time per week, on average. The free time they do have is increasingly spent on devices such as iPads and smartphones. Here’s a startling statistic for you: kids 8-18 spend an average of 7.5 hours per day on media. These are the very people whose growing bodies so badly need to get moving!

DPS has created the Let’s Play Initiative to help provide kids and families with tools and ideas for making active play part of daily life. Since it’s launch in 2011, DPS has committed more than $28 million while partnering with KaBOOM! (a nonprofit that builds playgrounds) and Good Sports (a nonprofit that gets sports equipment into the hands of kids who might not otherwise be able to afford it). You can find an application on the website to apply for a Let’s Play grant if you know of or even live in a community that could use some assistance with getting a playground for local kids. DPS is actively seeking applicants, so please take a moment to apply or spread the word! 🙂

Additionally, you will find on the Let’s Play website a playground locator tool (an especially awesome resource if you are traveling and in an unfamiliar location!) and some original play ideas so that you can have a fun response to the “I’m bored!” cries you will surely hear this summer.

Let’s Play is such a great resources for all families, and the impact of the grants is tremendous: 2,188 playgrounds built or fixed up and new sports equipment issued to 803 organizations, with an overall impact on more than 7.5 million kids. Wow!

How to Get Involved

The best thing you can do to get involved is to, of course, get out with your family and play!

But beyond this step, it would be wonderful if you could think of a grantee that might be worthy of some help from the Let’s Play Initiative. The money is going to be given out to communities that need some assistance, so why shouldn’t it be your community?!

You can also follow the Let’s Play initiative on Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest to keep the fun activity ideas headed your way, and to hear all about the latest grant recipients.

I’d love to hear any strategies you use to keep your kids active!

How to Choose a Mattress (and How to Learn from Our Mattress Mistakes!)

May 20, 2015 · by Tiffany Merritt · 8 Comments

This post brought to you by Serta. The content and opinions expressed below are that of Stuff Parents Need.

Can we have a little chat about how very tired you are, friend? So many of you out there are exhausted. Maybe you have a baby in the house, so you never get through a REM cycle before your sleep is interrupted. Or maybe you are like me and have children who wake up at ridiculously early hours (I’m at the beach right now…the one place where kids surely wear themselves out and sleep in, right? Mine got up at 4:45 am this morning…). Or maybe you have a lot of stress at your job which makes it harder to get to sleep and stay sleeping.

And in any of these scenarios, you may also be sleeping on an old, uncomfortable mattress. I’d love to share our mattress journey with you so that you can learn from some of our mistakes and so that you can think for yourself about if your mattress might be playing more of a role than you realize in your discomfort level.

For 10 years, Tim and I slept on a high-end mattress that was as plush as humanly possible. At first, it definitely seemed like a dream…like literally sleeping on clouds! But as time went on, we discovered that neither one of us really liked the ultra plush mattresses the best. It was actually starting to cause us back and neck problem. And by year 5 with the mattress, we were experiencing some serious sagging. We would both roll toward the middle during the night. Maybe that sounds romantic? IT IS NOT. The edges of our bed were so much higher than the middle part that they were pretty much unable to be used for sleeping, which mean we effectively had a smaller mattress than what we wanted. It was rough, y’all.

We had been told by the slick salesman that our mattress would last us at least 20 years. LIES, PEOPLE!!!! Please do not assume that your mattress will defy the odds and last multiple decades. And really, if you think about it, you spend roughly 1/3 of your life on your mattress, so even for it to last 10 years is quite a feat! All I’m saying is not to put yourself in a situation where you can’t replace your mattress when it is honestly time to because of what a salesperson told you. We held on to our fancy pants mattress about 3 years longer than we had any right to simply because we thought it couldn’t possibly be time to replace it, and all the while our sleep quality was deteriorating more and more.

Finally we were ready to replace the mattress, and I’ve got a little video diary Tim and I filmed for you to tell you about what we picked and what mistakes we made with our second mattress (because yes, we still messed up…).

We’ve had our memory foam for just over a year now, and we are already disappointed. We clearly got exactly what we paid for, and now it’s time to pick out a mattress the proper way.

Getting It Right (Finally!)

A few days ago I finally did what I should have done way back when and went with a reputable mattress company, Serta. I physically went to a location where a knowledgeable rep could assist me and explain to me the difference between all of the mattress and where I could try out many different models for myself to find the perfect fit. This is where we discovered the Perfect Sleeper by Serta®, which is the only official mattress of the National Sleep Foundation. It holds such a prestigious distinction because this particular mattress is designed to solve 5 common sleep problems:

tossing & turning
lack of support
sleeping too hot or cold
partner disturbance
mattress roll off or sag

Basically, this is the mattress designed to put those sheep you might be counting out of business for good. The Perfect Sleeper line has three different levels of products that can accommodate every budget, with standard queen pricing ranging from $399 – $1299) (so no need to scour the internet for the right price and just roll the dice like I did last year!).

Serta has also made some advancements to the Perfect Sleeper collection in 2015, including adding Cool Action Gel Memory Foam in select models, Custom Support® Individual Advantage coils in select models and a new Perfect Sleeper Memory Foam line, which I am especially excited about, because it provides a memory foam top right along with those awesome individual advantage coils. It’s like a hybrid mattress, which gives you the best of both models for a reasonable price.

While I was at the shop checking out all the mattress options, I also learned about Serta’s adjustable foundations. I’ve never had a bed with an adjustable head, unless you count stacking up my pillows in various ways! Ha!

The Pivot model is what Serta offers to allow you to adjust the head of the mattress, and the Motion Essentials model adds adjustments at the foot of the bed so you can do some pretty awesome lounging (I tried it…it was AWESOME!).

Stay tuned to see exactly what we decided to bring home and whether or not it works for us. We’re excited about having the Serta experience and about choosing a company that is passionate about ensuring that their customers sleep soundly every night.

Feel free to share below which of the 5 common sleep problems you currently experience. Do you have a mattress that gives you trouble? Or that you totally love? I want to hear about it!

Fun New Plush for the Stuffed Animal Fans: Zoonicorns

May 18, 2015 · by Tiffany Merritt · 1 Comment

Products provided for review purposes. All thoughts and opinions are my own, as always.

My girls play with stuffed animals (we call them loveys) more than any other type of toy. I was the same way as a child, so I’m definitely an easy sell on any new plush creatures. So I was excited to get to test out a brand new line of plush toys that also come with a story book. Check out the Zoonicorns.

This set of zebra/unicorn hybrids are a very big hit with my girls. Both of my girls seem to prefer to play with all 4 of them at one time, so rather than dividing the set, they just take turns with the entire lot.

I like the concept behind the stuffed animals, as they are meant to go hand-in-hand with a story (and more books are on the way). But I have to say that the story didn’t really impress me too much. I wanted to get to see more of each Zoonicorn’s unique personality come out in the book than what was presented. And the story was about a baby buffalo who was so sad to be fenced in at a zoo and who wished she could run free. I thought it was kind of a bummer, really! But as I understand it, the Zoonicorns have a purpose to help anxious young zoo animals feel better and learn important life lessons while they dream. Maybe I just need to read a few more for it to click with me.

But for now, I’d vote to skip the book, personally, and just get the super cute plush figures. Each 7 inch Zoonicorn is supposed to have a very unique personality. But since they look pretty much exactly the same except for their colors, my advice is to just get the color your child will like best, or to go all in and get the whole set, as my kids seem thrilled to have a mini collections of Zoonicorns. I haven’t been blown away by the Zoonicorns, and my kids didn’t like the book, either, but the plush loveys are big winners, for sure.

Zoonicorns are currently available for $14.95 each and the book, Buffy Meets the Zoonicorns, is available for $16.95.