I'm a full-time mummy

When I received the pitch request from the developer to review this app, I immediately thought of how I can use this app with our 4.5 years old boy in our learning activities. I have not really dwell into occupation topics with him yet so I guess this will be a perfect timing to do so. Without further ado, here goes my feedback...

* Title: Community Helpers Play & Learn
* Price: $0.99
* Category: Games
* Released: Nov 24, 2013
* Version: 1.2
* Size: 62.2 MB
* Language: English
* Seller: Anshu Dhanuka © Curious Fingers 2013
* Rated: 4+
* Requirements:Requires iOS 5.1 or later. Compatible with iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch. This app is optimized for iPhone 5.

Description from the product page:

"Want to help your kids learn about various Community Helpers? Would you like this learning experience to be combined with fun mini games that boost their knowledge and skills? Here is an app that is packed with information about various community helpers such as Firefighter, Police Officer, Doctor, Plumber, Teacher and many more. Children can select a community helper to know what he or she does. They can also tap on the tools & equipment to know what they are called and what they are used for.

 This educational experience is made even more interesting by letting kids help the community helpers accomplish certain tasks (mini games). The scientifically designed mini games provide a lot of opportunity for learning. While playing the mini games the kids are learning their alphabets, numbers, shapes, colors, patterns, sorting and much more. "

* I love the illustrations of this app, it is very cute and pleasing to the eyes.

* I like that the app is easy to use, I don't even have to show our kiddos what to do!

* This is a fun and educational app where you get to figure out the roles a community helper and what are the tools or equipments they used in their work and at the same time of learning that, I used the opportunity in this app to reinforce to our kiddos (especially our 4.5 years old boy) on aspects relating to numbers, alphabets, shapes, colors and so on.

* Our 2 years old Alyson is able to accomplish some of the games such as the vegetables sorting games and the puzzles as well. I'm impressed she is able to do that and I can foresee this app being reused over the time as she grows.

* I am very excited to see the potential of learning opportunities from this app while our kiddos can still be having fun!

You can purchase the "Community Helpers Play & Learn" app from the iTunes App Store.

I received no monetary compensation for this review, I was provided with the promo code to redeem the application for free from iTunes Store in order to facilitate my review. All opinions expressed in this post are my own. Please do your own research when purchasing products, as your opinions may differ from mine. And if you'd like to read my previous iPad Apps reviews, you can do so by reading this post of mine called "My iPad App Reviews"

Ever since my sister in law got her 2 younger kiddos their own puppies, our 2 kiddos have been eager to go visit them every now and then! They just love playing with the puppies and even our 4.5 years old have been begging us to get him a puppy! Gaaaaaaaaa.. So when I received an email pitch for request to review this product, my first thought was a toy dog? Hmmm... although that would make a great play toy for our kiddos, I was more excited especially after reading the product details that it also has educational benefits as well.

Description about the product:
"The Fisher-Price® Laugh and Learn Learning Puppy is a cuddly play pal for baby that combines 2 modes of play – learning and musical games (with up to 10 sung songs). In the learning mode - five hot spots on the plush puppy will teach you the alphabets A-Z, body parts and colours through fun phrases and songs. Switch to the game mode for fun phrases and sung songs to play along your baby. Songs include 4 learning songs: the Alphabet Song, a colour song, a counting song and a song to teach body parts. The game mode has additional sung songs to encourage interaction such as “Head Shoulders Knees and Toes”, and “Pat-a-Cake”. A light up heart will twinkle to the music and puppy's response."

I had meant to give the Fisher-Price® Laugh and Learn Learning Puppy toy to our 2 years old Alyson, so the moment she saw what was in the packaging, she got all excited! When I took out the puppy toy and passed it to her, she immediately hugged it and sat on the bed with her new play toy.

I sat next to our girl and slowly go through the functions and features of the puppy toy, at the same time, teaching our girl the names of the puppy's body parts (ear, foot etc). You can view the video clip of us going through the toy here.

I also checked out the location of the batteries as well (it's at the back of the puppy), nicely secured behind velcroed cloth.

What I like about the Fisher-Price® Laugh and Learn Learning Puppy toy?

• I like that this toy has a varieties of fun and yet educational features. You can treat it like a teddy bear, bring it along wherever you go, cuddle it to sleep at night, treat it like your personal comforter and best buddy. You can dance along and sing songs as it plays along. You can learn about colors, body parts, alphabets etc.
  

• I like the vibrant colors of the toy, the material used is soft and comfortable to the touch.

  

• I like that the areas where the buttons were located are also comfortable to the touch unlike some similar toys with buttons underneath the toy's body which is hard and some even poke through the skin layer.

  

• I like that the buttons are easy to press. Look at the pictures below of our 2 years old girl pressing the buttons to find out what each button does! I hate toys with buttons that required you to press extra hard just for it to do something!

  

• I like that the songs played are fun and exciting. Look at the pictures below of our girl spinning and dancing along to the songs!
  

My Thoughts on Room for Improvements

• I feel as a puppy toy, the names for its body parts should be relevant to it, meaning instead of 'hand', it should be 'paw'. That way, it is more relevant and accurate.

• Instead of the word 'tummy', I would prefer it to be 'stomach' - of course, that word is longer but it is just my weird preference to be consistent. I mean, ever since young, we taught our kiddos to say 'stomach' so I felt that we should continue saying 'stomach' instead of 'tummy' although yes, it meant the same thing but again, like I mentioned earlier, I would prefer it for consistency reason.
  

• I would so much prefer if the songs being played are complete versions instead of just the first few lines of the songs being played (hubby found out it was on demo mode when the songs are played in shorter versions). It kinda frustrates me when I see our girl started getting excited and danced along to the song and then the song ended. And she had to keep pressing the button so that she can hear back the song. If you want to hear the whole songs, then you will need to pull out the tab at the back of the toy to remove the demo mode.
  

In summary, the Fisher-Price® Laugh and Learn Learning Puppy is a fun and yet educational toy.

The Fisher-Price® Laugh and Learn Learning Puppy is available in all leading departmental, toy stores, baby shops and hypermarkets.

I received no monetary compensation for this review, I was provided with the product in order to facilitate my review. All opinions expressed in this post are my own. Please do your own research when purchasing products, as your opinions may differ from mine.

How often do you get to review a story app with sing along song from Bob Marley's son, Ziggy Marley?! At first I was a bit skeptical but I was attracted to the beautiful illustration and the title as well. I'm glad I reviewed this app after we have gone through it!

* Title: I Love You Too
* Price: $2.99
* Category: Books
* Released: Nov 20, 2013
* Version: 2.5
* Size: 49.9 MB
* Language: English
* Seller: Oceanhouse Media, Inc.
* Rated: 4+
* Requirements: Requires iOS 5.0 or later. Compatible with iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch. This app is optimized for iPhone 5.

Description from the product page:

"Sing and play with Ziggy Marley as you explore his first children's book based off the song from his Grammy Award winning album "Family Time!" Explore pictures, learn new vocabulary, and personalize the story with your own narration. Complete with a sing-a-long and narration by Ziggy himself, your whole family will be singing "I Love You Too" when you dive into this interactive book app!" 

* It is engaging and interactive and I love that we can also touch the objects in each page on the screen and the words pop out to tell you what it is!

* The illustrations are very very good! I love drawings like this! 

* To be honest, the first time we went through the story app, I was kinda annoyed that the words 'I love you' were repeated WAY loads of time, but the moment I listened to the song, I realised why is it so. The story app is from the song itself (duh' to me!) And, yes, after listening to the song, I love it. I mean, our kiddos and I love it! The song is very mesmerising and catchy! It has a tinge of Bob Marley touch in it :)

* I used the opportunity to teach our kiddos that we love them and that we should love each other.

You can purchase the "I Love You Too" app from the iTunes App Store.

I received no monetary compensation for this review, I was provided with the promo code to redeem the application for free from iTunes Store in order to facilitate my review. All opinions expressed in this post are my own. Please do your own research when purchasing products, as your opinions may differ from mine. And if you'd like to read my previous iPad Apps reviews, you can do so by reading this post of mine called "My iPad App Reviews"