So MAGIC DIY Wonder Magic Garden Review
Reviewed by David Ashworth
First of all, I was never going to have a “girly” girl! I’d decided long ago that Princesses and Unicorns were never going to be a factor, if I ever had a daughter, she was going to be a tomboy all skinned knees, ripped jeans and beating up the “smelly boys”.
You may have heard the expression about ‘best laid plans of mice and men’ or something to that effect, well fate is a cruel mistress because not only was I blessed with a ‘girly girl’, but I actually was blessed twice. Now my house is filled with pink sparkles, paper flowers and all manner of My Little Pony this and princess that and I’ve got to say… it’s not totally unbearable, in fact we can have a lot of fun making things and doing little craft afternoons and my two girls absolutely love the attention and creativity they get from it. So imagine their delight when I brought home the So MAGIC DIY Wonder Magic Garden.
But before I get ahead of myself, let me just explain the Wonder Magic Garden to you a little bit.
The Wonder Magic Garden comes in a cardboard pack sized: 31 x 34 x 10.5cm (12.2 x 13.4 x 4.1 inches) and is beautifully illustrated with examples of the kinds of magical gardens kids can create. It’s perfectly appealing for little girls due to the pinks and blues, highlighted by stars and whispy pink letters.
The box includes a bright pink garden base with flower motif around the side, sand bags, coloured and glitter stones, four characters (including a flamingo, panda, horse and unicorn), two decorations, two magic trees and two tools for shovelling, pouring and raking the sand.
The garden base is divided into sections to make planning and making your garden easy and aesthetically pleasing (it’s also good for keeping the clean up time to a minimum). The tools are made of sturdy plastic and could be re-used for other projects, we particularly found the sand scoop/pouter very handy and it would be great for glitter and other crafty bits too.
So after we got the bits out of the box, my girls couldn’t wait to get their hands to work creating their own magical Zen garden. They loved spreading the sand and making intricate little patterns in it as well as placing the characters and stones. They even had the little characters talking and interacting with each other, encouraging creative play.
Another feature of the Wonder Magic Garden is the trees. I’m sure any parents will be familiar with the concept of this product and have probably bought something similar for your own kids but basically the idea is you add water to the branches of the trees and watch them grow. According to the box this takes about 12 hours but we started noticing some small areas of growth within just a few minutes.
Unfortunately, as any parent who has bought something similar to this for their kids will verify, expectations don’t live up to reality. The box shows images of beautifully lush little trees with flourishing branches. Either I somehow “added water” wrong or the artwork was a bit of an exaggeration. Our trees turned out patchy and as soon as it had reached its full flowery potential the fluffy bits began to fall off the tree leaving the main feature attraction of our garden looking like a particularly unkempt tree from a horror movie garden. Luckily, the garden does come with a second tree to try but, alas the results weren’t much different.
Overall, my girls and I really enjoyed this product and spent a lot of time playing around with the characters and making different patterns in the glitter sand. The trees were a bit of a disappointment by the time they’d reached full maturity but to be totally honest we’ve tried dozens of these “just add water and watch it grow” products and they never turn out like they look on the packaging.
Because you only get two trees the replay value of the product is limited as well, shovelling the sand around can only hold a child’s attention for so long, however it did a great job of keeping their minds and hands occupied for a solid rainy afternoon.
Overall, I’d give the Wonder Magic Garden 4 out of 5 stars. It’s an excellent gift idea for any child who likes crafting and designing and once it’s created they can incorporate it into other areas of imaginative play. It can also make an excellent decorative piece for a child’s room, so long as you have more luck growing the trees than we did.
Rating: 4/5
RRP: £19.99
Available to buy from www.smythstoys.com.
