Meeting the New Furby Connect - Review

Toys have come a long way since I was a young girl and none more so than the Furby, first arriving in the late 90s it was a must have toy and I remember my then boyfriends mum scouring the shops for one for his sister's Christmas present.

With it's own Furby language and cheeky nature, this fluffy little fella has been given a modern day makeover, Bluetooth enabled it has an internal year round clock, so he even knows when it's Christmas, Easter or Valentine's Day.

With so many moods it is like having an additional albeit brightly coloured member of the family, everything from happy to sad, scared to excited and best of all each Furby is unique.

You can interact with the Furby by tickling, cuddling or shaking it and with the addition of 4xAA batteries (not included) he is ready to go out of the box.

I absolutely love the LCD eyes, they are so expressive and being big and round definitely makes them cute and loveable. The ears move around and it also has a light up antenna, making up over 150 different expressions, so it does take a while to get bored of it.

My children both fell in love with our Furby straight away, even though it is purple (more pinky purple) my son adores it and has probably played with it more than my daughter. The interactive app allows them to become involved in the Furby's life, feeding it, taking it to the toilet, watching videos and raising Furblings all from within the app.

I absolutely love how the Furby interacts with the app and for me this has been the icing on the cake, when the Furby sings popular songs along with the app it is really very clever and means even I have been singing along to Flo Rida and Ellie Goulding in a Furby style voice.

These videos and the content within the app are updated regularly so the Furby and Furby Connect World are constantly evolving.

The Furby does come with some very life like sounds and actions, these are hilarious for my two children however may not be for everyone, with burps, trumps, going to the toilet and being sick it is a bit like having a newborn.

One thing a few people did mention to me, was the old Furby's of days gone by and how you could never get them to shut up, well this one comes with its own sleep mask so you can simply pop this on and you don't need to worry about being woken up to him singing or talking Furbish.

The new Furby Connect comes in four different colours, pink, turquoise, purple and blue and although I was worried about what colour we'd get and how each child would react the purple has gone down a storm.

The Furby Connect comes with a £100 price tag, so for Christmas this would definitely be the 'big present'. Do I think it is worth it? If your children love interactive toys and technology then yes, with the app constantly being updated I can see this bringing something new every week and will keep it fresh and exciting.

NB: We were sent the Furby Connect in order to form this review, all words and opinions are my own.

A Record Breaking Day Out

During the October half term, we were invited to the Guinness World Record HQ, for a day of record breaking fun.

I feel bad to say now that before this, we didn't got one of the books in our house. So, once I knew that we were going, I tracked them down in the library and showed the children what it was about and what we might expect.

We headed on the train down to London and walked from the train station via the British Library to their head office, we were welcomed in their rather fun office with goodie bags and a party buffet.

My son was instantly entranced by their latest offering, the Guinness World Records Gamers Edition, he loves Minecraft and playing games so this was just perfect for him. My daughter looked through the shiny gold book which was the actual Guinness World Records. We also had a little booklet with some interesting facts in, including a picture of the tallest man in the worlds hand....just look at how tiny mine is in comparison.

image courtesy of ivan gonzalez

With our tummies full, we sat down and got ready to hear all about the new books and how they were created.  

The talk from Craig Glenday about how they put together the Guinness World Records book was really insightful, he quizzed us on our world record knowledge and shared lots of fun facts with us. He even showed us some dinosaur sick that they had just lying around the office.

Then we went on to hear about the new Gamers edition from editor Stephen Daultry, my son really enjoyed this session and was intently watching and listening to what was being said. Him learning that you could break a record for something he loved so much was great to watch.

After we'd heard all about the new books, we headed to a bar down the road to try and break some records ourselves.

In the bar, there were set up six different records that we could attempt to break, it was an exciting prospect that a few of us could potentially break a record.

First though, we were treated to some fantastic hoola hooping, I can't hoola hoop with one hoop let alone many hoops! The girls from Marawa's Majorettes are part of a team that hold the Guinness World Record for Most Hula Hoops Spun Simultaneously, it was fantastic to watch and then my son and daughter had a go too.

Image courtsery of ivan gonzalez

We got on and started trying to break some records of our own. These were of the physical variety first and the children had goes at trying to break some hopping, jumping and stepping records, they loved getting involved, but it was a little too energetic for me! It was lots of fun though and I think the kids both really enjoyed themselves, we didn't manage to break any records though.

Next, we got to see a few other amazing tricks, from freestyle football to cup stacking, watching these guys who are experts at what they do was astounding.

We got to try a few more of our own record breaking attempts although we didn't make it to the top of the boards and therefore didn't get to attempt a record but it was super fun none the less. I wasn't really any good at the Minecraft one but not too bad at the lego, my daughter spent a good five minutes building a lego tower up, not sure she realised it was supposed to be against the clock but it was cute none the less. Even if myself and the little man didn't break any records it certainly gave him something to aspire to, so he's been practicing at home, in fact we all have, even getting Daddy involved.

We have the loved reading through the books, in fact the gamers edition hasn't left my sons reading pile. These books are definitely on our gift list, for both birthdays and Christmas.

On the day two records were broken, one by freestyle footballer John Farnworth and another by one of the other children there at the day, how amazing is that!

Below is a video of our day at the Guinnes World Records HQ and what we got up to, it was an awesome experience and we would like to thank the team for looking after us.