Fun with Baby Annabell

Last Saturday, we were invited to meet the new autumn/winter range of Baby Annabell dolls at our local Smyths Toy Store. When we arrived the party was in full swing, with face painting, story time and much more. My daughter was most excited about getting to meet the new Baby Annabell dolls and toys, however first she had her face painted.

With some yummy cakes to celebrate and lots of crafts from The Creation Station, it was a great way to spend some time on a Saturday morning.

With a new fold up bedroom, two fab new dolls and probably my favourite, the walking lamb, there were some great toys to play with.

The two new dolls are the stuff of my dreams back when I was my daughters age, with one that drinks and uses the potty and cries, as well as one that learns to crawl and walk, it was great for my daughter to see them up close.

I think these dolls will be on many a Christmas list this year and my daughter thoroughly enjoyed playing with them, I love things that are interactive as they enhance a child's imagination and allow them to take it to the next level.

We had a great morning getting to know the new range of Baby Annabell toys, best of all they have a host of events happening all over the country so why not pop on over to Smyths to see if there is one near you.

Win a Barbie Princess Power Doll

A few months back we were sent the fabulous Barbie Princess Power Doll to have a play with, we had a party to celebrate the release of the doll and DVD and it was great to see my daughter become a little superhero.

Well, I have one Princess Power Barbie doll for one of my readers to win, all you need to do is enter via the Rafflecopter form below, great for any little superhero and dare I say great to put away for a certain C word thats happening in a few months time!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Barbie in Rock N Royals Doll Review

My daughter is growing up rather quickly and part of that means finding new toys that excite and engage her. She has an unbelievable imagination and can often be found playing the most wonderful games and telling stories.

Since she found my old Barbies at my mum and dads house she has loved dressing them up and using them as her play friends. So when we were sent the new Barbie in Rock N Royals doll I knew it would be a hit but I didn't know how much. From the moment we took her out of the box she was full of excitement and spent hours singing with her, it took only a few plays of the song for her to know the words to sing along to.

The Rock N Royals doll is a princess on one side but move her arm up and she turns into a rock star, complete with different outfit courtesy of some clever outfit trickery.

She has really enjoyed the song that Barbie sings and has loved playing and twirling round, we even dressed up for our own rockstar singing session in the garden whilst it was sunny.

The stand out feature is that this doll is 2 in 1, the fact that it sings a rather catchy song is an added bonus. My only issue with this type of doll is that you can't change their outfit, although because of the way the dress flips round and the music-playing part of the body, it means they need to stay in that outfit. But to be honest, she doesn't need more, the two that she has are so very different and so very funky and my daughter hasn't mentioned anything about changing her clothes, probably because "she is Courtney the Rock N Royals doll and thats what she does".

My daughter and I both love the pink hair on this doll along with the funky accessories and I think she is the perfect Barbie that someone who loves singing as thats certainly what she gets my daughter doing.

We've watched some of the clips for the new Barbie in Rock N Royals movie and we can't wait to finally see it, in this brand-new musical adventure two very different worlds collide, when a mix-up sends a princess and a rock star to the wrong camps where they must then face an epic sing-off, it looks and sounds great and I am pretty certain there will be lots of singing along and dancing.

NB: We were sent the Barbie Rock N Royals Doll for the purpose of this review, all words and opinions are my own.

Barbie Bubble-tastic Mermaid Review

Summer is the perfect time for some bubble fun, young or old, bubbles are most entertaining. 

Nothing keeps a child mesmerised more than colourful rainbow bubbles bouncing along on a summer breeze. So, mixing two classics, like bubble mixture and Barbie gives you a winning combination.

The Barbie Bubble-tastic  Mermaid is an easy to use and fun bubble making Barbie doll, great for the outdoors and the bath.

It comes with everything you need to get started including some bubble mixture, I think it could do with a bit more bubble mixture in the pack, as it doesn’t go that far but we always have loads from party bags lying round the house so it’s not a major problem.

The doll itself has a pull string at the back which makes the tail spin around with the bubble mixture on it, making bubbles as you go.

My daughter found this relative easy to master although did struggle a little at first, my only gripe is that a lot of the bubble mixture gets splatted about rather than creating bubbles, meaning you get covered in the stuff. Getting messy is completely me being an adult though, my daughter couldn't care less.  

My daughter was instantly in awe of the Barbie Bubble-tastic Mermaid and has been playing with her, both outside and in the bath, in my opinion the perfect places for her as it can be as messy as you like.

With the sun shining now, it is the perfect time to get out and fly with Barbie and the bubbles. The RRP for the doll is £20.99, with other Barbie dolls costing anywhere between £10-£25 I think this is about the right price. To bring hours of fun and to make bath time exciting this would be a great gift for any Barbie loving child.

NB: We were sent the doll for the purpose of this review, all words, opinions and pictures are my own.

Meet Finn, the Doll for Boys (or Girls)

I don't really like the idea of guns and things that shoot, my son loves Lego and Playmobil and using his imagination with castles, cars and similar toys, so when I was asked if he'd like to review the Finn doll from the makers of the fabulous Lottie dolls I knew he'd really enjoy it.

Arriving with everything you need to get started, Finn comes full clothed and a with rather lovely kite to fly, we were also sent an extra set with fishing gear.

I love that the outfits are fun and age appropriate, my son loves that he has a gilet on just like the one he has. The first thing he did was ask to me to get his Fisher Price house down, he then got to work putting the fishing rod in the garage and finding other things to play with alongside Finn.

The doll itself has posable arms and apart from the hair, which has a rather drastic haircut (the hair at the back is cut quite close to the head), it is well put together, his clothes withstood being taken on and off by a six year old boy.

I really like the idea behind the whole range of Lottie & Finn dolls, they allow children to be children and play with toys that don't promote violence or are overly sexualised as some dolls can be.

Finn is priced at £16.99 which I don't think it too overpriced, the Gone Fishing set is £7.99, it is suitable for ages three and up too so the perfect toddler present.

If you like what you see, then the lovely people over at Lottie are offering my readers 20% off purchases over £20 (Offer code is LOTTIE10 and works at the Amazon checkout only (not on the LOTTIE website cart) offer allows 20% off orders over £20 across entire range.  Offer ends Midnight on Sunday, 14 December 2014)

NB: I was sent the Finn doll for the purpose of the review, all opinions are my own.