Featured Gift Ideas

Fun Family Card Game - Rat-a-Tat Cat

cammie@momsmaterial.com — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 17:55:08 GMT

Are you ready for a fast and fun game involving strategy, memory and math? Get your poker face on and steer clear of rats!

Decide who goes first and who deals the cards. Dealer gives each player 4 cards face down and each player gets to peek at 2 of the 4 cards. During your turn, draw a card and decide if you want to discard or replace one of your cards. The object of the game is to end up with the lowest score based on the value of the cards. Will you take a chance on the cards if you don’t know their value? In addition, a few power cards are included in the deck. Power cards have special powers such as peek, swap and draw 2.

The “Peek” card allows you to look at one of your cards.

Cards included – numbers 1-9, peek, swap and draw 2

Someone drew a “swap” card.

This has been one of the most played games this summer. They both love it! Last night we even had the family Rat-a-Tat Cat tournament.

Product Features

    * Children's card game that helps develop timing and basic mathematical concepts
    * Teaches strategy, memory building, and addition
    * Oppenheim Toy Portfolio Platinum Best Toy Award; Mensa 1996 Best New Mind Game Award
    * Includes 54 rat, cat, and power cards
    * For 2 to 6 players

Click here to find out more or purchase Rat-a-Tat Cat.

Cammie Moise

Featured Gift - Boochie, A Whole New Ball Game by GameWright

cammie@momsmaterial.com — Thu, 14 May 2009 16:19:36 GMT

Boochie is a fun action-packed family game that the whole family will enjoy. It has become one of our favorite games. Get ready to laugh at others, as they try to complete their challenge. But wait, don't laugh too hard, because you never know what challenge you will face next. Odds are you can and will do something hilarious for the entire group and show up on the next edition of America's Funniest Home Videos.

Product Description by GameWright

There’s a new name in indoor/outdoor games – Boochie! Whether you’re hanging out in the back yard, or heading to the park or beach, we guarantee you’re going have a blast playing this game. There are so many things to love about Boochie: from the active-play element, to the unique 12-sided rolling target, to the amazing variety of throwing challenges packed inside. No two games will ever be the same! Take note that all of the wrist trackers have completely different sets of challenges so be sure to try them all. Get out and play!

How To Play by GameWright

Get ready for this all new action-packed family game that will have you tossing, kicking, bowling, and throwing like never before! First toss out the soft foam Boochie target and then try to land your ball and hoop as close to it as possible. Keep score on a special wrist tracker that gives you a different outrageous throwing challenge every round. You may have to toss between your legs, behind your back, or even with your eyes closed! The player with the most points wins. Play Boochie... Have a ball!

Boochie has received these awards:

* Oppenheim Toy Portfolio Gold Award
* iParenting Media Award
* National Parenting Center Seal of Approval
* Major Fun Award
* Parents' Choice Silver Honor
* Dr. Toy's Best Product Award Winner
* Creative Child Magazine Game of the Year
* National Parenting Publications (NAPPA) Gold Award
* Today's Parent Magazine Top Toy of the Year

MomsMaterial recommends this fun family game. Click here to read our review.

Click here to purchase this game online.

Cammie Moise

Featured Gift - K'Nex Speed Coaster and Octopus Whirl Encourage Creativity

cammie@momsmaterial.com — Wed, 08 Apr 2009 15:42:16 GMT

K'Nex are one of our families favorite building sets. My kids enjoy playing with them and many times have kept them busy for hours. I love it when my kids play with K'Nex because they help educate kids in the area of design and creativity.

After receiving K'Nex Octopus Whirl this past Christmas (2008), my 7 year old son put this together quickly and wanted more. The box included pictures of several other sets that work well together (great marketing). Since his birthday is in January, he added the other sets to his birthday list.

I was definitely sold on these when he had a friend over to play. They pulled the Octopus Whirl out, put the Speed Coaster together and then preceded to use Lego's and K'Nex to make an amusement park. They included lots of rides, shows, concession stands and people. It was amazing!

These building toys are great for the imagination and build skills like dexterity, planning, teamwork, patience and following instructions. I highly recommend the K'nex Octopus Whirl and also the Speed Coaster. ages 7+

MomsMaterial recommends K'Nex building sets. Do you have any K'Nex sets? If so, which ones and how do you like them?

Cammie Moise

Featured Game - Fluxx - The Card Game In Which Everything ALWAYS Changes

cammie@momsmaterial.com — Tue, 27 Jan 2009 05:19:30 GMT

How do you win a game when the rules constantly change? You win by meeting the goal, but that can change with each play! This game can drive you crazy, just by reading the directions. But after one game, you are hooked!

For the last year, Myles (8) has talked about a game he played at his friends house called Fluxx. When I asked him how to play he said, "It's hard to explain. Every game is different, the rules change, the way you win changes." Since it wasn't available at Toys R Us or Target, I had to do a little internet research and found it at a local comic book store.

The game starts off with the basic rule of the game, "Draw one, Play one". Then it gets crazy! The cards in the deck consist of keepers, action, rules and goals. The rule cards change the rules - lay one down and it adds a new rule, or replaces an old one. The action cards allow the player to do certain things within their turn to further them toward the current goal, or push others further away from it. The goal cards change the goal of the game completely, making it impossible to input long-term strategy to your game. The keepers determine the game; he who has the most keepers is most likely going to win. Together, these cards weave a seemingly-impossible, engaging, outrageous game that fluctuates restlessly. In order to win the game, you must meet the requirements of the goal. But, the goal can change on the next turn. You never know what cards the others will play. And occasionally, the way things are set up, you can't reach that goal. You could have a goal card of "You must have 5 keepers in play" but one of the rules states "keeper limit of 3". Therefore, no game is ever the same and you never know what to expect.

This has been a frequent family game lately. The games last from 5 to 30 minutes and is recommended for 8 years and up. Some 6 and 7 year olds may enjoy the game too, although they need to read fluently. MomsMaterial.com highly recommends this game. We have played it so many times in our house. A neat thing about it is while strategy counts, your fortune can change quickly depending on a random act. In other words, Dad cannot always win.

The Best Present Ever

cammie@momsmaterial.com — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 23:32:43 GMT

There is something we have done for a couple of years for our own family enjoyment and for some of our kids friends. A few years ago, my son(8) started to really enjoy baseball. He inherited this from his Dad who is a huge baseball fan. We regularly go to the Astros games. Whenever we go, we make a point to get there a little early to see if we can get a player's autograph.

We caught the bug for getting professional baseball players autographs. We have attended a few low-key card shows. When the Astros have their FanFest, we are there to meet as many players as we can.

Between these events, we had a nice collection of signed memorabilia on display in our son's room. We read about people sending cards to the players in self-addressed-stamped-envelopes (SASE) with a nice letter and getting signed cards back. We started the practice for ourselves. What started out as a nice collection is now somewhat respectable. My son has quite the load of signed memorabilia that his friends will admire for years to come.

Since we send man of the players two cards, we often get multiple signed cards back. In the spirit of sharing the wealth, we started a practice of giving out these cards as birthday presents. When one of our own kids has a birthday, we get a lot of things that are played with once and put in the closet. There are others that are just excess. We really do not need anymore Star Wars Lego sets. Since we felt that way, we were sure other parents felt the same. A signed baseball card is an alternative to the regular fare. It is not something you see a lot of people handing out. Before we give this as a present, we do try to find out if the kid is a baseball kid or not. If they have no interest in baseball or do not know any players, it is not the best thing to give.

One of our sons friends (we will call D) we knew loved Hunter Pence. Hunter Pence is the right fielder for the Houston Astros. He is a really exciting young player and the fan base here loves him. D was at a game last year and had some seats close to the field. When Hunter was running into the dugout after one inning he waved to the fans. He looked in D's direction. D's commentary was "Hunter looked right at me and waved. He knows who I am!" A fan was born that day.

After hearing this story from his parents we knew we had to give D one of our Hunter Pence signed cards. Upon his birthday, we put the card in a gift bag, put it in the present pile at his party and had a good time. Later that day, and after the party, when D was opening his presents - we are told he was amazed at his new piece of memorabilia. We received a call from him that night thanking us and telling us this was the "best present ever". His mom called the next morning and told us how she went to get him up for school and he was already up and just admiring his new card. The card was in a case and "he did not want to open the case because Hunters fingerprints are still on the card and it could mess them up".

A big thing for us to try and do is create memories, not only for our own kids, but for those around us. Stuff we give them is nice, but the memory on how they get it is even better. When people do weddings, vacations, holidays - creating memories is the core of all these events. A little extra effort on our part just created one more great memory for a kid.