Review: Bakugan 7 in 1 Maxus Dragonoid

Do you get Bakugan? I confess I knew little about them before this toy arrived on our doorstep in our last Toyologist parcel. I'm not sure I know much more, even now. 

Apparently, there's an anime series that runs alongside it, but the game was released a good year beforehand. Fair enough. I looked into how to play the game and found this on Wikipedia. That clears it up, doesn't it? Erm, no. There's also a whole Wiki devoted to it: 82,000 pages and counting. Always a worrying sign, I feel. Not your average kids' game.

Monkey was keen to give this a go. In the box are six different "traps" that you can use to play the game and they connect up to the Bakugan to make the Dragonoid. The traps are rolled onto the gate card and transform into action figures. There is only one gate card, as well as one ability card (which affects various things; yep, don't understand that bit either). This limits the amount you can play the game unless you already have other Bakugan sets. Monkey enjoyed clipping the parts together to make "the robot" . Beyond that, there wasn't much more for him to do with it beyond taking it apart again and rolling the traps onto the gate card. Monkey doesn't really grasp the concept of the game, and to be honest, neither did we - but without more equipment, we can't fully try that out. 

The pieces are pretty solid and I would imagine this is why it costs £39.99. I think that's quite expensive, especially as you cannot play the game without other pieces. It's suitable from 5 years old, but I suspect older children will get more out of this than a 5 year old as they can learn how to play the game.

I think this could be better value. It needs pieces from other sets (a Bakugan starter pack, for example, costs around £12) to make full use of it. Although Monkey enjoyed it, I think it could either be more straightforward for his age, or merely aimed at a slightly older market.

Oh, and if you know how to play the Bakugan game, could you spare an hour teaching us?

(I was provided with this toy to review and have received no other compensation. The opinions stated here are my own, and have not been influenced by the aforementioned compensation.)

My news (or what I was going to blog last night before sleep took hold of me)

I took my first radical step a few days ago. I stood down from my main volunteer role and it feels like a weight has been lifted.

I was the Regional Coordinator for the NCT in the North West. It was a role I had taken on by default, in the absence of anyone else and initially, I was just helping organise a training day for volunteers but I ended up taking on the whole role. It hadn't meant to be that way as I had wanted to stick to helping other branch treasurers, sharing the experience I had picked up doing the same role in my own branch.

I've been doing the job for two years. Some of it was hard work, some of it was a doddle. I became part of a fantastic, if disparate, group of ladies who do the same role in other parts of the UK. We regularly swap emails and occasionally met up at quarterly meetings; something not so easy for me due to the distance and the difficulties of arranging childcare if my husband was working the weekend (and there's a 50:50 chance of that).

I experienced some great highs and some awful lows. My high was organising a training day which was attended by over 40 people in March. We'd never had that many people turn up to such an event. Forty fantastic volunteers giving up their Saturday; barely a negative comment and lots of positive ones about how well it was organised and how much people had got out of it. My low point saw me in floods of tears over an email I received, which berated me and everything I stood for. Luckily, that low was a one off; it was soon dealt with and forgotten.

The problem is, as I've blogged before, I'm moving on now. I hinted at it, but didn't directly mention that I was thinking of giving it up. But it was becoming too much effort, and I have a growing interest in doing other things, like this. Tasks I was supposed to be doing were being left. My enthusiasm to get them done was waning.

And yet I felt guilt. I'd taken on the role because there was no-one else doing it, and hadn't been for some time. There wasn't anyone else coming forward to help me that could take my place. However, I knew from my experience as a volunteer, that guilt alone is not a good enough reason to stay, and that it is the wrong thing to do - to keep doing something that you're not paid to do, to which you are no longer fully committed. Far better to create a vacancy - because others will step in and cover - than to mess it up royally by being half-arsed.

I have always known that the treasury work is my strength. In NCT circles, I am famous for it, strange as that may seem. A lot of it is about how to use an accounting application, which I've used for years now, and I worked for several years supporting accounts systems. Some of it is training - again, something I have done in my working life. Some of it is just common sense, although you wouldn't believe that sometimes. I can help other people in other branches quite easily, without thinking too hard about it. In other words, I can still make a difference without putting in too much effort. That sounds perfect to me! I decided I would ask to step back and just do that.

It didn't make the process of resigning any easier. I had let it drag for a while. I attended a training weekend last month, which was enjoyable and useful but at the end of the first day, I was returning to my room feeling very emotional without knowing why. I got back to my room, lay on the bed, and just cried. I knew at that point that stepping back was inevitable; it was just a matter of when.

I finally decided to do it this weekend. I had wondered if I should stay for a few months, hope to find a successor and hand over to them neatly. I don't like leaving people in the lurch. The risk was that I would let it drag even further. I arranged another training day and I couldn't attend for childcare reasons. I could have booked a babysitter but it was all day and I wasn't comfortable with that, as it would have had to be a stranger. I lay in bed one morning thinking about when I should go when I realised that there was no point in delaying any further. I was making a hash of it now, so why stay?

I got up and I composed the email. I had tears in my eyes as I typed the words. It isn't a full resignation - because I offered to do the treasury work. Other parts of the North don't have any extra help with their accounts and so I can reach further than my own region. I said that in my email; that I still want to help with that, because that is what I'm good at. I told myself I wasn't completely walking away whilst I was writing it. I delayed hitting send, using Twitter as a distraction for a while until I could delay no further. The moment of truth. I cried. Whether it was with relief or with sadness, I don't really know.

I got a reply back the same evening and I even delayed reading that too, but the reply was polite and positive, if regretful at my decision. It asked if anything could be done or could have been done differently, but the answer is no. It's not that the role is horrible, it's just that it's no longer for me. My offer of helping with treasury stuff has been accepted and after a chat on the phone with someone yesterday, I've handed over pretty much everything else I had on my plate. I'm still helping my local branch too - although I am naturally moving away from that now that the children are at school and I don't regularly go to activities. The relief is enormous but I'm still feeling emotional about it all. To blog about it last night would have been a step too far and even writing this today has been hard.

It's been fun and I had a ball at times. It wound me up at others, and it made me cry just once - except for the process of making the decision to step back, which has been one of the hardest things ever. I achieved some things of which I will be forever proud. I will miss being part of the fab team that is Karen, Helen, Joanne, Elaine, Geraldine, Miriam, Lonnie, Claire and Hayley (and just recently, Caitlin) but for now, I am still allowed to play alongside them. If you read this, ladies, thanks for the support and the laughs (and late night wine-fuelled chats at conferences). If truth be known, I still feel guilty about going now, but I know that that will pass.

As one door closes, another should open, right? Let's see where this one leads.

I was going to blog tonight.

But it's late. I have tried starting a couple of posts. They went nowhere, so they got trashed.

I know now what I want to blog about, but it's late. I am sat here in my chair, my eyes genuinely drooping, and I'm all restless - which, for me, is always a bad sign. And there goes a massive yawn. My jaw nearly fell off.

Sleep wants to steal me away tonight. I can't even type. I've typed some words about 4 times and still not got it right.

So, you'll have to wait. Sorry about that. I'll try to make it worth it. Right now, I just have to sleep.

Come back soon, there might then be something coherent for you to read then.

Night.

The Gallery - Here come the girls

So this week's prompt should be easy, right? I have 3 sisters, a mother and a daughter. I grew up surrounded by females. I am a mum, and hang out in NCT circles, with lots of other mums hang out too and have become my friends. There are lots of "girls" featuring in my life, which should make this a doddle, right? Wrong!

The trouble is, I don't take lots of pictures and also, I feel a bit odd putting pictures of just anyone on my blog. I always ask before putting pictures on my blog, except where it's not possible to ask - like ones of my Dad - or they're of my children. I don't see my sisters or my mother very often - Mum and two of my sisters are 200 miles away and my youngest sister lives in Devon, almost as far as you can get away from me in England. So.... you got Missy Woo again. I'm sorry about that but she's very photogenic and she loves having her photo taken, as does her brother. But today is about girls. My girl, in fact. My beautiful, funny, clever little girl. You may switch off now if cute girly pictures are not your thang.

This was taken at Missy Woo's nursery graduation ceremony in July. They'd been learning dances with a teacher most of their preschool year and performed a few for the parents at the start before the certificates were handed out. Here she is processing past our seats. All the children had to wear black and white (Why? They are not colours that children often wear!) but Missy Woo had the added accessory of a pink cast, after she fell off a slide in a neighbour's garden and cracked a bone in her humerus on Father's Day. After crying a lot when she first did it, she was a real trooper once her arm was in a cast; first a temporary one, then got to choose this fetching pink number. As you can see, it was not bothering her one bit.

So when you say "Here come the girls", I think of her. My daughter, my girl. My Missy Woo.

(This is my entry for Week 30 of The Gallery at Sticky Fingers. Please pop over and take a look if you can, there's always some great entries.) 

Mum's cooking... Coffee Cake

I'm writing this post in response to a new challenge out there in Blogland called Oui Chef! on the Beckicklesie blog, written by the lovely Beckickles and her other half, Cheffy Daddy. It's a challenge about, obviously, food, and entrants earn points to ascend through various levels.

This month's prompt is "Mum's Cooking". Now, this is not that straightforward for me as my mum is not one of the world's great cooks. If anyone did "proper" cooking in our house, it was my Dad. Mum did the basics but didn't really like cooking. It stemmed from a thyroid condition that she had before I was born, which took away her appetite. She found it easier to eat if someone else cooked for her so Dad did. By the time I came along, my Dad often worked late into the evening to repay a loan so Mum had to cook. Nothing fancy - mostly mince in its various forms, the odd roast, rissoles and stuff out of packets like fishfingers.

There is, however, one thing that Mum could make. She wasn't a big baker but she made coffee cake from time to time. It was just a Victoria sponge with coffee added, with coffee buttercream icing. As kids, we would obviously get to lick the bowl and the taste of the sponge mix with coffee added was divine.

I decided to recreate mum's sponge on a whim this evening but I decided to do it the quick way as an all in one sponge. For each large egg, you need 2oz (55g) of soft butter, self-raising flour and caster sugar. To make an 8-in sandwich, you need about 3 eggs, so you need 6oz (170g) of each. After sifting flour in to a bowl, adding in a rounded teaspoon of baking powder and a couple of teaspoons of instant coffee, you add all the other ingredients to the bowl and mix, preferably with an electric hand mixer. It takes about 1 minute, longer if you are having to use a manual whisk or spoon . If the mixture easily drops off a spoon, its fine, but if it's too stiff, add in a couple of tablespoons of milk or water to loosen it until that consistency is reached. Then divide the mixture between two greased and paper lined sandwich tins, level the tops and bake at 170 C / 325 F / Gas mark 3 for 30-35 mins until the mixture springs back when lightly pressed. Leave them in their tins for 5 mins before removing and leaving to cool on a rack completely.

I tasted a bit of the cake mix when I was making this, and was transported back to my mum's tiny kitchen - it tasted exactly the same. This cake must have been my first experience of coffee as a child, and I just thought coffee was sweet like the cake mixture. Well, I guess it was in those days - everyone had sugar in their coffee!

Onto the icing. I dissolved a couple of teaspoons of instant coffee in a little bit of hot water whilst the cakes were baking so that it could cool down to use in the icing. Then I just mixed 4oz (115g) of softened butter and 8oz (225g) of sifted icing sugar together then added the coffee mixture. Half was used to sandwich the cakes together and the rest spread on top of the cake. Mum used to add walnut halves sometimes but I hadn't got any in. Excuse the picture - I took this on my phone, which has no flash. Yeah, yeah, I know - rubbish blogger.

My verdict? Just like Mum used to make! This is pretty close to her version. Whenever I have coffee cake, as it's an option I frequently choose, it always reminds me of my childhood. This is Mum's cooking.

Boobs!

Boobs are a big issue for me, for obvious reasons. *looks downwards* For years, I hated mine because bras never felt comfortable. This was, in part, due to going to a bra shop once, asking for a fitting and the woman looking at me saying "You're a 34DD" and handing me a bra. I took her word for it but seriously, I'm not that dumb, I could have figured it out for myself that it was not right.

Then, one day, I discovered Bravissimo. I love their bras and they opened a shop near us in Manchester. I went and it was a revelation. They didn't use a tape measure, and they fitted by eye. Unlike that woman in the bra shop, they don't just look at you and hand you a size. They look at the bra you're wearing, check the fit of that, and based on what size they think you are, bring bras for you to try on. If they don't fit, they move up and down the back or cup sizes until it fits, just right. I wear a totally different size to what I measure, and it was lovely to have pretty bras that fitted me properly. I went back after I lost weight and my size changed slightly but they sorted me out again.

And then I got pregnant. We all know what happens to your breasts in pregnancy and I knew that the after effects vary. Thanks to my two being quite close together in age, I think I wore maternity or feeding bras solidly for nearly 3 years. I thought - or at least I hoped - that I would go back to nearly my pre-pregnancy size after I'd lost some weight. I seemed to fit into my new bras and after I'd lost a bit of weight, I got fed up with the ones that were starting to fall apart and decided to go back to Bravissimo and get a couple of bras to tide me over.

I was wrong. The fitter kept bringing me bigger and bigger cup sizes until she got one that was obviously too big so we reverted to the size below. It would appear that, despite losing a good half of my "baby" weight, several cup sizes extra have taken up residence on my chest, and they seem to have no intention of leaving.

Dressing when you have big boobs is a trial. If you wear baggy clothes, you lose any waist you might have as everything hangs off them. Anything too tight and too high necked and you look like someone has stuffed two balloons up your jumper. Anything too low cut and you look like a hooker or at the very least, slightly precarious. Well, maybe not quite as precarious as Marilyn in this still from Some Like It Hot, but then she's braless too. Mind you, I think I'd rather look like Marilyn than Jordan but her boobs defy gravity thanks to a high proportion of silicone. So, I could probably add trashy to that list.

A substantial décolletage can get you unwanted attention at times which can make you self-conscious when you are displaying any kind of cleavage at all - because I don't seem to do a little bit of cleavage. It's slightly uncomfortable when someone is having a conversation with your chest instead of your face although it can often be much more subtle than that and its only when someone makes a sideways reference that you realise. Or that's just me and I'm a total innocent.

With weight loss comes greater confidence - or at least it does with me - so I'm wearing closer fitting tops that might be considered more "revealing", particularly since I bought my new bras - and another one since, oops! I don't want to look all Carry On or Page 3 model, but I do want to look like a woman with a feminine shape. And I can't hide these, she says, pointing at her bosom, so I may as well work with them. So, expect pictures of my cleavage in future on this blog. S'alright, there won't be any topless ones. I am not yet that confident, nor will I ever be.

And don't start me on sports bras. I am not built for running. Fact. I did have a great bra called an Enell which kept everything as still as it's ever been or likely to be - even if it doesn't look that attractive - but I don't think I'll ever fit into it again. Looking at their fitting guide, I am not sure I will fit into any size! I'll just have to stick to short runs as part of my workout combined with lots of lower impact stuff. I don't need the black eye, thank you.

Why am I wittering on embarrassingly about my boobs? Because, now I've got your attention, I wanted to tell you that October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month - Breast Cancer Care, who support breast cancer sufferers, say that 46,000 people are diagnosed with breast cancer every year. My friend and fellow blogger, Nickie from Typecast is running a series of posts called Pink Fridays to coincide with Breast Cancer Care's fundraising initiatives. Nickie runs a series of guest posts on her blog called Cancer - Your Story, inspired by her own family's encounter with cancer, so it seems fitting for her to feature posts and information about breast cancer in this series during October. The first post is about how to check your breasts, known delightfully as Cop A Feel. It's a humorous name for a serious subject, for I'll bet there are times when we all forget to do it when life gets in the way. I know I do, for shame, but I'm trying to get in more of a routine with it, particularly ever since my sister found a lump, which later turned out to be benign.

If you get a chance, please check out Nickie's post and the rest of the series as they appear. Helping to raise awareness means earlier diagnosis, which improves survival rates. That has to be a good thing. Even one life saved is worth it.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I must go and try to get these two balloons out from under my jumper...

(I didn't get paid to mention Bravissimo, Breast Cancer Care or Typecast, by the way. I mention them all, because I think they're all bloody brilliant.)

Review: Sprayza Studio

The latest episode in the Toyologist series!

Do you ever have one of those moments when you think "Why didn't I think of that?" Well, I had one of those moments whilst we were playing with this. When I first saw it, I just thought it would make a mess but gave into pester power last Sunday afternoon to allow the children to play with it, and realised how wrong I was. Mind you, I still used the messy mat to cover the kitchen table.

The set is unbelievably simple. The "airbrush" is actually a small plastic tube. You attach one of the felt pens to the end so that the tip sits across the bottom opening of the tube and you blow through the tube to airbrush. I was dubious that this would work at first. You also get various cardboard stencils and some paper. The stencils need pressing out on first use but were easy to do although a bit fiddly for little hands. If you're that way inclined, you could create your own, but I'm not.

Once you're ready to go, you point the tube at the stencil and paper, blow and hey presto! It works. It took a little while for the children to work out the right amount of puff to do it well and I did have to help a bit. They blew a bit hard sometimes, leading to a few splodges and you do need to take regular breaks from blowing but they loved it. So did I!

It took about 5-10 minutes to make a picture and that was with a lot of colour changes! That's perfect for Monkey and Missy Woo - what I found was they would draw with the pens on the design whilst the other was using the airbrush. We played for about an hour with it and they have asked to play with it again. For its price (£9.99),  I'd say it's good entertainment value for that price and I'd definitely recommend it for children of a similar age (5 and 4) or older.

Have a look at our slideshow below to see pictures of some of our creations and the children creating them.



(I was provided with this toy to review and have received no other compensation. The opinions stated here are my own, and have not been influenced by the aforementioned compensation.)