Tag Archives: SpinMaster

Photo-A-Day, Toys

Give it Forward: Christmas is For Kids 2017 Donation

Christmas is for Kids 2017 Donation
Photo-A-Day #4594

These are toys that we received from various toy companies for free. Opinions are our own. Amazon.com affiliate links are withing the post.

Back in 2008 we began a Christmas tradition. That year a friend of mine was having a toy drive for Christmas is for Kids, a local charity that collects toys for the area children. That first year we donated a couple of toys but then we decided that each year we would put aside some money each month so that we could make a decent toy purchase at the end of the year. That way we could give a good sized donation. Fast forward to today and we’ve been making larger and larger donations because of the work that we do through this blog. From contests to conferences and everything in between there are many toy companies that have been providing us toys each year and we give the overflow to Christmas is for Kids.

Early on Allison and I decided to involve the kids in our toy buying. We wanted to show them, from an early age that they can help people less fortunate. You may not change the world for everyone but you can start locally and help those in your immediate environment. My kids have never had any want for toys especially because of this blog. Involving Eva and Andrew in the process of selecting toys for other children is very important. This year they were fantastic in the store. Not once did they ask for any toys for themselves. The hardest thing was saying no when they choose expensive toys. I had to keep explaining that the higher the cost of the toy the less toys we could buy to help out the kids. I think we also had some lessons in math and estimating and rounding and more and also understanding how much prices are for toys came in to play as well. Andrew wanted to get a toy and thought that it was $6 but was actually $64. It gave me a chance to talk money with him.

We also recorded a video thanking many of the toy companies for sending us toys to review and some that we were not able to review but instead added to our gift donation. I wanted to recognize them here. You can see the video below. And below that a bit about the toys.

Continue reading Give it Forward: Christmas is For Kids 2017 Donation →

Blogging, Conferences, Photo-A-Day, Toys, Travel, Vlog

#BBNYC17 A Hard Rock Morning & A Glittering Hatchimals Night

At the Hard Rock Cafe
Photo-A-Day #4475

Despite being up pretty late last night I only slept until 7am. I actually fell asleep with my phone and therefore did not charge it overnight. Whoops. I when I awoke I packed up everything that I was given at Sweet Suite. I unfortunately had to take the LightSeekers toys out of their packaging so I can’t do an actual “unboxing” of them when I do my review. But, if you’ve seen one person take something out of a box then you’ve seen them all, right?

After packing everything up and checking my bag with the luggage robot at Yotel (check it out in the video), I met up with my friends Tim and Allison of Jones Family Travels. These guys are the nicest folks and their two kids. They were also headed my way to a breakfast at the Hard Rock Cafe for YouTubers. Tim and Allison and their kids have a popular YouTube Channel and they go on all sorts of crazy fun adventures. They are part of the Family Video Network. A Multi-channel Network that really works for their partners, unlike the MCN I stupidly joined about 4 years ago. Once I am out of that contract I am looking towards the Family Video Network. They really help their people. They also were gracious enough to invited me to this breakfast and treated me like part of their family. That was really nice.

Breakfast was fun and it was great to see all these YouTube kids playing together. I think that Eva and Andrew would have fit right in. I’m thinking that the family will have to make the trek down to NYC next year. This year I will concentrate on making the YouTube Channel more popular with the kids and Allison’s help.

After breakfast I walked over to The Cantina Rooftop for another event. This was the Stuff for Moms & Dads” Media event. ?It was hotter today than yesterday but the walk wasn’t too bad. There was a wait to get in and once upstairs I was able to check out the few things that I was interested in. I missed one thing that I learned about later, I wish I had seen it. I’ll have to figure out how to review the product.

I walked back to the hotel with some friends and then hung out in the lobby for a few hours until it was time for my next event. That would be my last event of the day. While I was hanging around I made a quick little stop motion of the LightSeeker toys.

My last event of Blogger Bash was a private party for Hatchimals from SpinMaster. It was the release of Hatchimals Glittering Garden. There were a ton of YouTuber kids and their families at the event. It was well decorated and at a fun location that overlooked part of the city. They had some very tasty snacks including pretzel bites that were stuffed with hot dogs and stone ground mustard. They were excellent and I had a bunch of them.

There were also mocktails that were colored and named for the different Hatchimals. Then of course there were a ton of Hatchimals that were put out for the kids to hatch. I waited till near the very end and picked up one of them to bring home for the kids to hatch. As luck would have it the goodie bag that I was given as I left contained a second one. This way, the kids can each have their own.

I headed to the train station and had a pretty easy ride home. I got home after midnight and then got woken up by Andrew around 4am. Welcome home. I did miss them all very much.