My daughter is very quick to point out how and where I should drive when I take him home from school. The traffic is terrible and we always end up having an argument. Then I found the ThinkFun Rush Hour game. At 7, she’s learning deductive reasoning, so this game is ideal for her. Her mathematics teacher also recommended the game.

I allow her to play the game in the car while I negotiate the traffic home and try to get there in one piece. She’s suddenly developed a new respect for the kind of driving that I do since she now also has to obey traffic rules. She often gets stuck and has to redo the game, but I’ve noticed a distinct improvement in her reasoning and the outcomes of the game in the past few weeks.

When we have a chance, I always play with her. Although it’s a one-man game, I help her think through the problem that she’s facing and together we get the little red car out of the traffic.

This is a multi award winning game with 4 levels of difficulty. I can highly recommend the game for all kids 7 years and older.

• ISBN-10: 9781402714535
• ISBN-13: 978-1402714535

If you’ve ever needed to curl up in front of the fire with a good mystery book, this is the one you should have. Although my son (grade 5 ) is an avid fan, the book has kept him intrigued and reading for several days. I also have a sneaky suspicion that the book is about to go for round two with him playing Sherlock and and his sister, Watson.

The Sherlock Holmes stories are filled with mystery and intrigue, as well as intellect and deductive reasoning. As much as you try to think of ways to outwit Sherlock, he always seems to be one step ahead. His faithful friend Dr. Watson is also the perfect complement to Sherlock’s genius. Through his questions, the difficult aspects of the case are simplified and readers are able to follow the thread of the story easily.

The book is unabridged which means that you get the true version of the story and not a simplified version. My son’s vocabulary has suddenly become startlingly sophisticated and everything in and around the house is a mystery to be solved. I can highly recommend this book to any parent.

I wanted to buy something that would keep my seven and five year old sons entertained while playing in the garden. They love rockets and anything that flies so I found the Stomp Rocket Jr. Glow kit and thought that this looked perfect for them. This rocket toy allows the kids to connect the glow in the dark rockets to a plastic tube. They then stomp on the stomp pad which is also connected to the plastic tube. This sends the rockets flying up into the air much to their delight.

The great thing about this toy is that my sons were able to start playing with it as soon as we took it out of the box. It is simple to use and they can operate it themselves with no help from an adult required. There are no batteries so there is no need to worry about having to replace batteries in order for them to keep playing. They love the fact that the rockets are glow in the dark and have been playing out in the garden when the sun goes down. They love having competitions with each other to see how high they can get their rockets to go. The rockets are made of foam so there is no need to worry about anyone getting hurt. I have bought this as a gift for some of my son’s friends too.

My ten year old son is really into spy movies and likes to pretend he is a secret agent. I thought I would look around for a great spy toy for his Christmas present this year and I came across the Spy Net Secret Mission Video Watch. When I first saw this watch I thought he would love it because it looked like the sort of thing that secret agents would have. However I cannot stress how impressed I was once he actually started playing with this toy.

It really is jam packed with features and functions and keeps him entertained for hours on end. This watch will take video and still photographs and it has a 1.4” screen for him to watch the videos that he has taken. If he wants to just record voices then he can do this unbeknown to anyone else as we found out!

On Christmas day when he opened this gift we were treated to our very own lie detector test which was good fun and which my son was in absolute rapture about. He found it very amusing to see us squirming as he fired questions at us – all in the name of fun of course. Other great features include the voice changer and the ability to tell the time in many different countries. He really loves this watch and wears it constantly.

My daughter had a party for her fifth birthday and received a present of the Orb Factory Sticky Mosaics Jewelry Box. The jewelry box is similar to a paint by numbers book in that you decorate the jewelry box with sticky jewels according to the numbered grid on the box. This was so easy to do because every sticker in the pack had a number which corresponded to the numbers on the grid.

Because my daughter is still quite young, I did have to help her with this but to be perfectly honest that was not a problem as we had a fantastic time decorating her own jewelry box. My daughter really loved this gift and we had a lovely time together making her jewelry box look amazing.

One thing I would mention is that you should make sure the stickers have been firmly placed on to the box in order to ensure that they don’t fall off. My daughter could not press too hard or maybe she just didn’t want to but I made sure to press them all on very firmly once she had placed them in the right position. This is definitely something worthwhile to buy for little girls as it will give them something to do on a rainy day and they will have a beautiful box to put their jewelry in when they are finished.

When I was a little girl I had my very own dress up set complete with paper clothes with little tabs at the tops and sides to keep them on the cardboard doll. I remember playing with that set for hours so I thought I would look for something similar for my six year old daughter. I really thought something like this would give her something to do when she is in the house.

I found the Melissa & Doug magnetic dress up set online and it was just what I was looking for. I must say, that these sets have come a long way since I was a child. You no longer have to get your mom to cut out the clothes and you don’t have to worry about them tearing. This set is magnetic so the clothes will just stick to the dolls, which is great.

My daughter adores this set and plays with it for hours. She has had it for about three months now and still plays with it every other day. She absolutely loves mixing and matching the outfits and showing them to me to see what I think. Some of the parts are quite small so I have bought a little box for her to store this set in. I would not hesitate to buy this fantastic toy again.

My husband is a fairly good chess player, but very poor at teaching our kids how to play. I’ve been driven to distraction by the two boys’ frustration at not understanding what their dad was trying to explain.

When I came across the No Stress Chess game, I thought that my prayers had been answered. The game is specifically designed to teach eager minds how to play chess. It’s a double-sided board – one side with clues, the other side a standard chess board. When the kids are playing against each other, they use the board with clues and the clue cards. That way they learn how to move the figures and also to predict the outcome of every move. When they play against their father, they use the standard board and it’s generally both the boys against the man.

Their skills have improved immensely and I’m very pleased that it has fostered their love for chess. It’s quite a sight to see the kids telling each other what to do while playing against ‘the master’.

The No Stress Chess game comes with a two-sided chess board, 56 action cards, 17 ivory pieces, 17 charcoal pieces, a black plastic card tray and the instructions.

It’s been a long time since I’ve seen my son and his cousin (whom I had to babysit this week) so engaged in their games. I’ve been dreading the rainy season as I don’t want to encourage them to watch DVDs all day long. Since I got the Beyblade Metal Fusion Super Vortex Battle Set for them, I’ve had to drag the boys away for their meals. In fact I’ve had to insist that they watch a DVD just to calm down a bit.

Beyblade is now the new rage amongst boys, replacing The Bakugan. The boys have become very involved with making strategies and game plans to knock their opponent out of the arena or even the game that they hardly find something else to talk about.

I must say that I’m pleased with the way that that they improved their strategic and deductive thinking. It’s also helped their creative thinking abilities.

The kids love the fast pace, the excitement and the constant, non-threatening, challenge. I’m afraid that my daughter is also getting in on the game and sometimes one of them has to sit out.

The Beyblade Metal Fusion Super Vortex Battle Set comes with Metal Fusion Beystadium, two Beyblade tops, two assembly tools, two launchers, two rip cords, rule book, tournament tablet, two online code collector cards, and instructions. You can yours at Amazon.