iPad App Review - Feed The Animals

~ Posted on Tuesday, April 10, 2012 at 3:47 PM ~

Last year, I have a wonderful opportunity to review the "Buzzle" app and this time, Sonia of Walnut Labs contacted me again to review their 2nd app which is an educational app called "Feed The Animals". Anyway, my review as below...

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* Title: Feed The Animals
* Price: $0.99
* Category: Games
* Updated: Mar 30, 2012
* Version: 1.0.51
* Size: 11.4 MB
* Language: English
* Seller: Anshu Dhanuka
* Rated: 4+
* Requirements: Compatible with iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad.Requires iOS 4.0 or later

Description from the product page:

"Wouldn’t it be fun to feed a banana to a monkey or an acorn to a squirrel? Did you know that a hippopotamus is a herbivore animal? Think carefully to select an animal’s favorite food and feed it to the animal and make them happy!! They will merrily chomp away the food making a clatter of funny sounds and cute faces! You will even be awarded stickers for correctly feeding them. Watch your child squeal with joy and hear their uncontrollable giggles as they feed one animal after the other.

Feed The Animals aims to educate your child on the eating habits of different animals. They will be able to differentiate between carnivore and herbivore animals, without even realizing that they are learning. This app will improve their decision making skills and refine their motor skills.

Feed The Animals has been designed keeping a child’s interests and behavior in mind. It has been tested by several kiddos to ensure an effortless game play. The app endeavors to be enjoyable and educational at the same time. There are no complicated menus and options for kids to get confused or lost in. The sticker rewards are bound to encourage your kids to remember the correct food item of their favorite animals.

Feed The Animals attempts to strengthen your child’s cognitive skills, concentration and memory. It’s interactive and animated graphics will keep the kids engaged and bring them back for more!"

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

* This is a fun app where you get to feed animals with the right food and at the same time unlocks stickers for entertainment and decoration in the app!

* I like that there a variety of animals in this app and I personally learned a couple new things on what some animals eat!

* Some of the animals got my boy laughing such as the frog when it eats the fly with its long tongue and the fish with the worms since we have an aquarium at home. 

* The sticker screen is very sensitive, even the slightest touch or movement will prompt us to the next screen which is quite annoying as there is no way or button to go back to the sticker screen until we solved another set of animals and unlocked a new sticker.

Room for Improvement

* This app has so much potential! I'd love it if the objects (such as the food and animals) can be pronounced if we tap on the image. For example if I tap on the fly image, it'll make a buzzing sound with the word 'Fly' being announced.

* I would love for a button to allow us to go to the sticker page at any point of the game. Currently, you can go to the sticker page by pressing the Home button on the app and then look for the '+' button which will you can then choose the Sticker page. I find these steps too cumbersome and might be confusing for my boy as well, so it would be really great if a direct button is placed on every page of the game (probably a button called 'Stickers' or something)

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You can purchase the "Feed The Animals" app from the iTunes App Store.

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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"

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Food Review - Khapkeks

~ Posted on Tuesday, April 10, 2012 at 8:57 AM ~

My oh my! I am so blessed to be given this opportunity to review FOOD! To think how God has heard my ramblings (I was commenting on my FB page that I was down to my last bar of chocolates the other day) and here He sent me an offer to review CUPCAKES!

NUTELLA CUPCAKES!

6 of each flavors for Nutella, Nutella choc chips and Nutella raisins. All 18 of them! Yummmssss!!

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Since this is my first food review, I think I'll do the Q&A version so that you guys can know more about this brand and its products:

Q: Tell me a brief history on how you started Khapkeks.

A: I started Khapkeks because cupcakes is the rave now, but I never liked the icing or buttercream - and because I had a lot of friends who prefer their cakes without the beautiful SWEET cream topping. My main motivation to start Khapkeks was my hubby - who is very particular about food, could eat 5-6 of nutella cupcakes at once. So one wild SMS to my sister to ask if her friends want to order, and within ten minutes - I had my first two boxes order.

Q: How do you come up with the brand name?

A: Then it came to setting up a FB page, names suggestion started coming in eg "sweet sensation", "lovely delight" - No, people will forget the name the next minute. I need something people will remember, but never be confused and unique - Khapkeks was created on September 23rd 2011.

Q: Any secret ingredients or techniques in making it?

A: Khapkeks are made of pure butter, omega eggs, sugar & flour. Secret ingredient? They're homemade with love :)

Q: What is special with your cupcakes or different selling points which you want people to know about your cupcakes?

A: I make cupcakes without icing - so customers get to eat what they paid for. Looks can be deceiving, it is more important about how you are within - same goes to cupcakes. We wouldn't want a beautiful cake - only to realize the cake is too hard, or doesn't use butter. If there are request for buttercream cupcakes -I will gladly accommodate but my main business is still on my classic Khapkeks. I use purely butter, and omega eggs - that's something that you don't always get in your cakes as some bakers use margarine or dairy spread to lower their costing.

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I hope it's not because I was deprived off chocolates for a day or two, but the cupcakes are REALLY GOOD! In fact, I was already highly anticipating the cupcakes arriving at my doorstep and I kept telling myself, don't get my hopes so high, just in case it doesn't taste as good as I imagined it would be...

But the moment I got it (and profusely thanking Su Yi, the friendly cupcakes seller) I carefully peeled open the tape on the box and saw it:

Oh my glorious Nutella cupcakes! (** insert trumpets and all sorts of harmoniously playing musical instruments here for sound effect**)

My eyes went straight to the one with Nutella in it of course. Did I tell you one time I bought a big bottle of Nutella and almost whacked it finish just like that? No spreading on bread or anything... just a spoon and a happy me, happily scooping it away.. yummssss....

Okay, back to my review... see that glorious and yummylicious looking cupcakes on my hand? It looks good, and taste even better! Don't believe me? Let's see what my guinea pigs gotta say after they tried out these cupcakes:

ME
"Mmmm... nice! It's not dry and the buttery fragrant is nice too!"
(I had 4.5 cupcakes)
BEN

"Mmmmm!! I want!! I WANT!!"

(Ben had 1.5 cupcakes)

HUBBY
"Nice and moist, not like the ones you made last time!" 
(Hubby had 2 cupcakes)
MY MIL
"Nice, not oily and not dry. I like it!" 
(MIL had 1 cupcake)
MY SIL
"Too compact for cupcakes" 
(SIL had 1 cupcake but she received it the next day evening)

The rest of the cupcakes were eaten by SIL's children, all saying "Nutella inside? Yumsss!" Enough talking, one last picture for you to look at... hahaha... see how my Alyson is eyeing the cupcake in her brother's hand? Ben looks distracted as he was watching Kungfu Panda on the TV, but trust me, he is enjoying the cupcake!

To sum up my first (hopefully many more to come!!) food review, all I can say is:

YUMMYLICIOUS TO THE MAX!

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You can find out more at https://www.facebook.com/Khapkeks

I'm a full-time mummy

I received no monetary compensation for this review, I was provided with 18 yummylicious cupcakes by Khapkeks 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.

I'm a full-time mummy

Again... Why You Should Not Force Your Son To Take Picture With You...

~ Posted on Monday, April 9, 2012 at 8:32 AM ~

Last year, I posted a picture of me ehem.. trying to have a lovey-dovey caring mummy picture with my boy and this is what I get:

The lesson is I should not force my toddler to take picture with me!

And now, with 2 kids, I'm doing it again... In case you don't know, I've got a new handphone (it was a birthday gift from hubby since my previous handphone was 4 years old already) and I like using it to take pictures nowadays. So, one day I thought, hey, I should take pictures of me and my 2 kids and show to my blog readers how cute and happy we are huh?

WRONG....!

My toddler strikes again with his nose digging pose! Arghhhh!! Look at my curious little girl looking at her big brother!

So I tried again, telling him to behave and just let mummy have ONEEEEEEEEE pretty picture of us pleaseeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee....

And nope... not happening... but at least he's smiling huh? He seems to be enjoying it! ARghhhh!!

So I said 'Ben, come on, one last shot please! Ready?'

Still no... and my girl is getting really really curious at her big brother already!

Argh... this is the best shot I can get... I mean, I never learned huh?

So, does it mean, when my girl is older a bit, I'm gonna get 2 kids digging nose in the picture with me?!