Jun
19
*** Update: contest is now closed, winner to be announced on the next post
First things first: this is a sponsored post, in that a company sent me something to review and paid me to do so. Sponsored posts aren’t my usual thing, but in this case I was super-interested in the product and thought it sounded like a fun opportunity. If you’d like to skip it, no hard feelings — I recommend checking out the fascinating ongoing craziness between The Oatmeal and FunnyJunk.com. Or maybe this mesmerizing teaser for The Master, which I am inexplicable addicted to watching over and over (“How would you yourself rank your overall health?” “Strooooooong“).
Okay! So I got a chance to check out a BabbaBox from BabbaCo. BabbaCo was founded by Jessica Kim, who I do not know personally but seems to be a very cool lady with enviably shiny hair, and the idea behind the company is to provide a monthly subscription of fun crafty activities to do with your kids (target ages 3-6).
Basically, the idea is that you subscribe to BabbaCo’s service (U.S. only, at the moment) for $29.99 a month, and every month you get a box of activities (and all associated materials) that’s centered around a particular theme. Each box comes with 2-3 hands-on projects/supplies, an ‘explore’ project which encourages kids to engage with the world, a book, and a prepaid download.
(BabbaCo has a “What’s in the Box?” section with more info. Also, are you able to see the words “What’s in the box?” without instantly thinking of this scene? Man, me either.)
I got my BabbaBox a couple days ago, and here’s what it looked like:
The interior packaging was great, which I think is a big plus for something like this. Part of the fun of this would be opening it up together, so it’s nice that they clearly gave a lot of thought to the presentation.
Here are the contents of the box, unpacked:
The theme for this box was “gratitude,” and I’m not gonna lie — my initial feeling was that I wished it was “dinosaurs” or “killer robots” or “super obnoxious things that make pshew pshew pshew sounds” because, well, that’s what my kids are mostly into. I wasn’t immediately convinced the boys would be interested by the activities, but once I started digging into them, I could see that they had a pretty universal appeal.
The three main crafty projects involved paint, stickers, pens, and other fun/messy things, and the kids were delighted by the influx of new materials. The first thing we made were thank-you cards:
Another activity was a hot pad (painting words on a cork pad), a third was a plastic serving tray (finger painting, creating handprints, stenciling letters). Again, everything’s included — the washable paint, stickers, brushes, etc.
The included book was called Giving Thanks, and it’s a nice one. I like the artwork quite a bit, and the message (a father walking with his son, giving thanks to nature) worked really well for us — Riley said it reminded him of walking in the woods near the cabin with his dad:
Although you should take note that according to this amusing Amazon review, it’s a PAGAN book full of dirty PAGANISM and you might want to be careful because it could possibly turn your child into an animal-worshiping heathen OH MY GOD BURN HIM WITH FIRE.
“This is not a book about being thankful for nature. It is about being thankful TO nature. The book teaches children to be thankful to animals, and inanimate objects of nature – not God. It would be helpful to the consumer if this book was labeled somewhere as a book of Paganism as this is not clear from the cover.”
(Hooooooooooo boy.)
There was a “gratitude camera” and journal for posting the developed photos of the things you’re thankful for (I plan to send the camera with Riley to his day camp this week and make a journal of that instead):
Also, a free code to download the Cookie Doodle app, which Dylan was a big fan of:
Decapitated cow! Where’s the severed head? IT’S IN THE BOX!
(BabbaCo, at this point: “Holy shit, this is the worst blogger review *ever*.”)
Lastly, there was a little gift for mom in there:
All in all, I thought this was a very, very nice collection of things. It seems like BabbaCo really puts a lot of effort into assembling items that are engaging and strike a good balance between offering lots of opportunity for education — and just being plain old fun. It feels pretty flexible, like you can either laser-focus on the provided theme, or treat it more loosely to fit your own preferences.
As for the value ($29.99/month, and there’s an annual membership that’s available as well), I think it’s particularly well-suited for parents like me. Meaning, I’m not naturally creative when it comes to activity ideas, and I don’t have a ton of materials at all times. It’s nice to have a bunch of pre-defined things to do, and not have to run out and buy a bunch of supplies for one particular project.
I easily spend $30 every month on dumb crappy things to distract the kids. I mean, EASILY. On the other hand, committing to $30/month is a different sort of purchase decision, but I think the fact that the box isn’t something that’s instantly used up and forgotten makes it a decent investment. Plus, there’s the value of having someone else hand-pick the contents — you’re gambling that you’ll like them, of course, but it saves time and makes for a fun shared surprise each month.
Conclusion: I like the BabbaBox, and I think some of you with kids in the 3-6 range might like it too. I also like that this is an independent business run by a big-dreaming woman with little kids of her own, and I am not EVEN going to call her a mompreneur.
BabbaCo gave me a couple deals to pass along to you. One is a coupon code, which you can use to get 50% off your first box if you buy a subscription. Here’s the code, which is good for the next 7 days:
SUN50OFF
They’re also offering a giveaway of one BabbaBox to a randomly-chosen winner. To enter, leave me a comment (be sure to include your email address!) and I’ll do the integer-generator webamajig, and if you win — to be eligible, they’d like you to have signed up for their newsletter, and the good news about that is it automatically gives you another chance to win — a box will be mailed your way ASAP.
(Unfortunately, they only ship in the U.S. right now.)
Okay, if you’d like to throw your hat in the free-box ring, please do leave a comment — you can tell me whether or not this service sounds interesting, what you’d like to see them add/change, or just say hi, it doesn’t matter. I’ll announce a winner by Friday, June 22nd. Good luck, and if you actually read this far down, I AM REALLY SORRY I USE SO MANY WORDS.
*** Update: contest is now closed, winner to be announced on the next post
Comments
-
My product review site:
[
This sounds interesting. I currently have a subscription to kiwi crate and they only send a few crafts. No presents for mom! I want presents too!! Heh.
I like it! We currently subscribe to another monthly box (geared towards babies) so my 3-year old would love to have one of his own.
Sounds like an interesting concept, one that would help tremendously in my house considering I’m always looking for new and exciting things to do with my two boys, but always fail miserably. Love that they include a gift for Mom too!
Fantastic! My kid loves crafts and the US Mail, so this seems like it was invented just for her. Thanks for the review — and btw, I don’t care if it’s sponsored. You’re honest about your opinion, and you disclosed up front, and now we’ve got a discount and a potentially great product. Rawk!
Love this idea! Great for other distracted, work at home moms…. great business idea for her, great support for the rest of us. Thumbs up!
Count me in–would like to give it a go. Would like to see them expand the age range to around 10yrs old or 3rd grade-ish.
Paganism? Sign me up.
My 5 year old is really in to crafts. I would love to supplement our weekly Michaels run with this! It sounds great.
WOW! This is a great idea! I’m always looking for new stuff to do with my boys. I’m decidedly uncreative when it comes to this type of stuff. This would be a huge help.
This sounds fun! Not sure if I wanna buy, but definitely sure I want to be in the running for the free box prize!
I would also love to try this idea. I’m extraordinarily bad at figuring out crafty things to do with the kids, having it prepackaged would be a win for me and the kids.
Okay, this sounds cool. I love doing crafty-type projects, but I never seem to get around to assembling all the pieces within the span of a year.
Oh man, my kids would love this since I usually just throw down some paper and markers and call it a craft.
Would love to try this out. I’m always looking for ways to keep the kids entertained!
I would love to win this, but only if one of the months the box actually contains Gwynnie’s head.
I used to be subscribed to a Magic School Bus montly activity thing, when I was a kid. It’s definitely not a new concept, but with the spark of Pinterest and all things DIY I think mom’s will jump on this. I’d love to try it out for my neice and nephew!
Definitely sounds like something we’d have fun with at our house!
This looks awesome! I have an almost 3 year old and a 5 year old and it’s hard trying to keep them both occupied.
I suddenly have a 4-year-old and a 6-year-old to entertain occasionally and I would love to check this out. Thanks, Linda!
this sounds like an awesome product, and one we’d enjoy at my house
I love that sponsored posts aren’t really your thing. Honest to god, I thought this exact thing the other day… Your blog is always my favorite because it’s not plastered with ads or reviews as it seems most blogs are nowadays. THAT SAID, thank you for posting about something that I care about as I have a 6-year old on summer vacation that I need to keep somewhat entertained. And the review was really fun to read. :)
Summer is sucking the life out of me. Please sign me up, I will take any distraction I can get.
I would love a free box! But it looks so cool, I might just sign up and pay for it. This is a fantastic idea.
Sounds fun! I have a 3 year old and my idea of craft is, “Here’s a roll of Scotch tape, kid. Go nuts,” so it would be nice to have some crafty stuff to do with her that a crafty person chose.
Oh hell to the yes. That looks like so much fun.
I would love to have one of these boxes to try out for my godchildren, who are 3 and 4.
I think the best selling point you made to me was that you easily, easily spend that much on random junk for your two throughout the month.
At first $30 seemed hard to swallow (I’m a grad student), but I homeschool my godkids, and I like the idea of a variety of activities based around a theme – especially if they are cohesive, yet flexible. I also like knowing the cost of those activities won’t EXCEED $30.
Thanks for the review info, sponsored or not!
Sounds really interesting,and it sounds like $30 bucks worth of stuff, but I’m unsure on jumping in. Your review helps.
I’ve been eyeballing this one for a while: http://www.kiwicrate.com/
My kids love getting packages and art projects – win win!!
This is great…especially as I am not crafty in the least. And I love free things :)
I agree with the above comments … I love your blog and don’t mind the occasional sponsored content because I know it’s genuine. You’re not going to blog about Levi’s if you’re not into the brand, and you’re not going to recommend a product that sucks. (At least, I hope not.)
My 2 and 4-year-old boys would love this. And after they lost interest in the crafts, they’d probably find a way to use the box as a weapon.
My son is always complaining he doesn’t get mail, and while I consider myself fairly crafty.. I’m not the best at putting together crafty things for my kid to do. This sounds like an awesome deal, hoping I win to check it out, but just might buy it even if I don’t.
Huh. That actually looks pretty cool. The pagan thing WOULD bother me, but it’s probably a one-off.
Here’s to hoping there are some killer robots at some point.
so – are you going to subscribe?
A kit of things to do with all supplies provided? Sign me up. Or, I should say, sign my 3 yr old up.
I would love this for my 4 year old. Maybe it would keep him from beating the crap out of his older brothers for a few minutes.
I have a 4.5 year old and this looks pretty awesome for her. (Though she’d like a Dinosaur theme, too) :)
This would be really neat to try — I should do something because we’ll all going slowly mad this summer already, so we need a guided tour through craft-land.
What a great idea that is! I wish they had it for older kids – I have a 10 year old “little brother” I mentor and sometimes I just cannot think of what to do when we get together.
So don’t include me in the contest but ya know what? I’m going to take what crafty things I have and research crafts to do with him once a month.
Thanks!
Man, I wish I had an extra $30 a month to spend on this because it sounds awesome!
What a neat idea – I’d love to win it to “try it out” with my girls! Thanks – and you even made a sponsored post a good read! :) Bravo!!
This sounds like an interesting service. I have 3 little ones under the age of 8 and I’m always looking for activities to do with them. Love that I wouldn’t have to run out to the store to buy anything extra. Would love to try it out!! :)
Sounds awesome. I try to be “creative” with our crafts, but sometimes it’s nice to have a little help.
Sounds fun! I get Birchbox for myself and love the surprise every month. I think my kids (5 and 3) would LOVE this.
Great info – thanks Linda!
I love this idea! Great way to kick off summer too. I would love a way to pick your theme a bit more, like this box would be something I would pick for November, whereas I would like something more summery now, but whatever, surprise is good too!
1) Reading the comments, I feel 100 times better that I’m not the only Mom out there that owns 3,631,982 popsicle sticks, pipe cleaners and glue with NO CLUE what the hell to do with them?!
2) (BabbaCo, at this point: “Holy shit, this is the worst blogger review *ever*.”)<-This? Dying laughing!
At first I balked at the price, but then I realized I spend way more than that on crap crafts for my kid to do every day and realized that the price is actually pretty reasonable.
At first I thought, wow, $30 a month? And then you made the comment about putting together and buying craft supplies… and yah, I probably spend $150 a month at Jo-Ann’s on crafts we don’t even do… $30 a month on something put together is WAY nicer. Thanks for the post and I hope I win! Hee, hee!
What a great idea. Wish I could add an expense like that would be great for my girls.
I think this sounds marvelous, and only regret that my grandchildren are too old for it. Years ago there was a craft club (may still exist, for all I know) which sent a different craft every month and I absolutely LOVED it, I was excited every month to see what they would send. This is all that and more, I think it’s a terrific product.
It looks like a really cool service. I wonder if the excess supplies from one month relate at all to the projects for the following month.