Arts Reviews

It is rare for me to open up a toy and find it not living up to its packaging or advertising. So I was surprised to find that the painting kit in the "Creative Spirit" box was pure garbage. The paint was half dried-up and not nearly enough to paint half of the umbrella. The paintbrush was awful. My son and I have to go to the craft store to buy more fabric paint to finish our umbrella (which is by the way pretty lame-looking already). Hope the paint doesn't wash off in the rain.

My 6 year old daughter had a great time painting this umbrella.

Unfortunately the paint is the kind that stays just sticky enough even weeks later that if the umbrella is folded up for any length of time and then reopened the paint pulls off.

We eventually threw it away. A shame really but it just became a big mess.

My 8 year old was busy for 3 days with this fun rainy day project.

I bought 2 more! One for my 6 year olds birthday and her friend.

My 2 1/2 year old daughter loves her old doodle pad so much it was time to get a new one. We saw this and thought it looked great! It is a joke. Not only are the markers dull in color, they do not erase off the screen at all with the eraser. Also, we found that even when using the traditional magnet pen we had trouble erasing the screen. We went from having a doodle pad be a independent play toy to one that she needs constant help with. Stick with the plain old doodle pad - which is what we went back and got!

Great product with pro's & con's like most. The drawing board lights up blinks & glows. Includes 3 glow markers, 5 tracing templates & eraser-plus a storage drawer for the markers and a separate storage slot for the tracing templates.

Offers quite a bit more than your traditional Magna Doodle, but with that come some inconveniences. For one be prepared, to assist your child in removing and returning the tracing templates to the storage slot. Which, is far to narrow for a 3 or 4 year old to maneuver without tearing the templates.

My 4-year old loves this product and does an amazing job of tracing the pictures, but erasing the pictures is an entirely different story. We used the dry eraser per the instructions and ended up with a mess and a scratched drawing surface. So, we've resorted to first wetting the eraser then drying the drawing surface after with a paper towel. This has worked out very well and my preschooler can do this on her own.

One of the biggest cons for us is not being able to purchase additional markers without buying the accessory packs, which include 3 markers and 10 tracing templates. Although, the cost will only set you back about four dollars, we've already purchased 3 accessory packs leaving us with 35 templates, which is about the max the storage slot will hold. At this point I would rather just purchase 10 markers.

This is awesome. My 5 year old and my 21 month old each have their own. They would always fight over one so we had to buy another. They sit next to eachother and doodle for hours. And ask me to draw (which I love) We have so much fun with it. I don't much care for the markers, although the ones that came with ours are very bright and colorful, its a pain to clean the color off (will only come of with a wet cloth, then a dry one) the dry eraser for the markers doesn't work for crap. Its really neat that you can color your pictures but I get tired of cleaning it off for my 5 year old every few minutes and end up telling her "Lets not use the markers anymore today" They are better for an older kid unless you don't mind keeping some wet wipes handy to clean it off every time. But the magnetic pen, the drawing part is just awesome. My girls never ever ever get tired of playing with this. We also have a smaller one that we take with us (it helps keep my toddler quiet in church and other places)
I think just about any kid would probably love this toy.
Sometimes we have to pull the erase thing across it more than once, but that is really not a big deal. Be sure and read the instructions before using this. It says to color the screen in completley and erase several times before using it to draw. That could be why some people have problems with it. Maybe they did not read where it says to do that.

The paints didn't work at all. The fish was poorly made and was torn in pieces within seconds. We didn't get everything shown in the picture. And the colors leave a disgusting mess in the bathtub. I'll stick to regular colors, pencils, and pens for drawing. This would be educational if the items actually did what they are supposed to do.

I got a similar kit a year ago for my 2 year old. She loved being able to draw on the walls, and these crayons left crisp clear, bright lines, unlike some soap crayons. They washed off of skin and tile easily with water, but stained some rubber ducks. Now 3, the crayons are all used up. I know that crayons are packaged individually for sale, but apparently Amazon only caries the large kits. This seems to me like it will lead to a stack of duplicate sponges and toys as I replace the crayons each time.

My 14 month old was so excited to use the crayons he squealed and kicked his legs with excitement. Just watching his face as he marked the tub wtih crayons and watched every stroke with curiousity. Better deal than the set in the bucket plus free shipping! Plus a child who has just been shown the tub is a fun and creative place to be. Bring out the artist in your child. Get it you won't regret it.

My husband and I bought this ball for our son's soccer team. Even though it is not his regulation ball size (he uses a size 3 ball) We decorated it with the team colors, wrote each kids name on the ball and put "Sharks Game Ball" on it. Each kid gets it after a game they played with teamwork and sportsmanship(not just scoring) and they can take it home and do whatever they want with it for a week. The ball has lasted so far and the paint has stayed on. I do wish it came with more paints or the opportunity to get more. It does not cover very dark.
Hope this gives someone an idea.

This seems like a lot of fun, but at the same time most people nowadays are looking for the new cool-looking Adidas or Nike. Plus it probably won't last very long because of the material.

I bought this for my niece two years ago and never thought about it or heard about it again. Recently, I went to her soccer game and while she was playing, her brothers were playing with this decorated ball. She had fun decorating it and they all love to play with it!! I was pleasantly surprised.