Sunday 23 June 2013

Looking for Creative, Healthy and Green Activities for Kids? Then Why Not Try a Weekend Box

This is my first review on The Mad Mummy Musings and it’s lovely to be able to bring you something different. If you follow me on my other blog, Sophia’s Choice then you’ll know I've had the opportunity to review some lovely products of an eco, green, natural and organic nature.

Something I shared with my readers a few weeks ago was a ‘Weekend Box’ for children aged 3-8 years from Weekend Box Club. And the opportunity to review a second box for The Mad Mummy Musings has been made possible by Andy Stephenson the founder of this great new venture. Andy began Weekend Box Club after struggling to find gift ideas for his four nieces and nephews, which embodied the healthy living, green and creative content that Andy felt was so important to child development, so he decided to quit his job and launched the Weekend Box with the aim of filling this gap.

The idea is that every fortnight a Weekend box arrives through the letterbox with 4 activities; craft, cooking, green/eco/recycling and creative. If you are interested in what we got up to with our first Weekend Box then take a look at my post from Sophia’s Choice.


The lovely thing about getting the opportunity to review 2 boxes is that we've been able to experience what it’s really like to receive a box more than once. Reviewing one box is great, but the second one gives you a greater idea of how things will work and if you really like the idea.

Belle was chuffed that a second box popped through our letterbox addressed to her. We checked out what was in this new box and we had the following activities:

  • Bertie Birds Nest Craft Activity
  • Patchwork Letters Green/Eco Activity (put together by Groovebulb)
  • Gingerbread Cookies Cooking/Baking Activity
  • Sammy the Squirrel Story Activity

As with our previous box, Tink and Belle were both able to get involved with a couple of the activities together. Belle was then able to complete the rest of the activities herself or with me as a helper. We decided to make Bertie and his birds nest first and the girls thoroughly enjoyed painting, sticking and making Bertie come alive. Both the girls shared this activity and dare I say it, there was no fighting over who did what. This activity had enough to keep them both happy which was great. A fun, quality chunk of time was spent with Mummy which they also love.


Belle and I decided that it would be great to also make the patchwork letters. Belle decided on the word “Summer”, perhaps in the hope that we may actually get one this year ! We decided on an appropriate font on the computer, printed the word off, cut out the letters and then followed the rest of the instructions to make our beautiful patchwork letters. I have to say that I personally enjoyed this activity a lot. Belle became a little distracted at times by her little sister happily cutting cardboard at the end of the table. I found myself in those moments happily gluing on fabric to the letters thinking how therapeutic it felt doing something art and craft based. Sometimes we are so focussed on keeping our kids occupied and inspired that we forget ourselves and I realised how much I miss creative pursuits which almost feel like an active meditation. Anyway, I digress !


Once we’d completed these two activities we decided to leave the cookies for another day and this is the joy of a box like this. Everything is there ready when you are. You have two weeks in between boxes which gives you plenty of time to spread the activities out if you prefer or you can do the whole box in a weekend. The choice is yours.


We chose to make our cookies the following weekend and both the girls got involved in this one. As a parent I do sometimes find creative pursuits a touch stressful when both of them are involved but the more we do them, the more I relax into it. I divided up the steps for the baking activity and it seemed to work really well. There was enough for both of them to have a turn at something and then I was able to split the mixture so they could both make their own cookies. We did have to add an extra egg to our mixture to bind the ingredients together but apart from that everything worked perfectly and the cookies taste yummy.


The story writing activity is one that Belle has taken as her own. I haven’t seen what she has written so far, but she tends to go off and make up her stories when the urge takes her so I’m still waiting to hear about Sammy the Squirrel’s amazing adventures. I’ll report back when she’s completed her masterpiece.


All in all I really like the Weekend Box and reviewing 2 of them has reinforced that. We've decided to carry on our subscription so we’ll let you know how the boxes develop. The girls love anything creative so this takes the hard work out for me and gives them something to look forward to every couple of weeks.

If you’d like to try a box yourself then you have several options available to you:
  1. The first option is a one off box at £10 each
  2. Or a monthly subscription where you get 2 boxes at £7.50 each
  3. Finally there’s a quarterly subscription where you get 6 boxes at £7.00 each; the most cost effective option.
If you’re looking for a gift idea then Weekend Box Club do a 3, 6 or 12 months gift subscription which would make a lovely present for birthdays or Christmas.

If you’d like to give a Weekend Box a try then I’ve been given a discount code for you, which will get you your first box for £5 instead of the normal £10. The code is WBCHARLOTTE.

For more information on the Weekend Box, pop across to their website: www.weekendboxclub.com. They are also on Facebook and you can follow them on Twitter too.

Has anyone else tried a Weekend Box? I’d love to hear your comments if you have and also what you think of this idea.

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Disclaimer: We were given a Weekend Box to keep and review for this post. The views, thoughts and opinions expressed in this post are honest, true and my own feelings on the product we tried.


2 comments:

  1. I've never heard of a Weekend Box but they look great, I have a 4 year old daughter who loves arts and crafts and being creative with things, these look great!
    Emily x

    Now following from:
    http://londonmummyoftwo.blogspot.co.uk/

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Hi Emily. Great to have a new follower - thank you xx These Weekend Boxes are great fun. Both the girls have enjoyed them and if your daughter is 4 yrs old she's love the activities :0)

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