Sago Mini Box is a monthly make-and-play subscription box for 3-5-year-olds. Each box contains creative activities and collectible characters for your child to play with and encourage their imagination!
Sago Mini Box supports the power of play, and also creates its kits from responsible sources! All of the paper products are made from recycled materials and all activities and the box (not the figurine) can be recycled. The shipping box even transforms to be used as part of the play.
This box was sent to us at no cost for review. (Check out the review process post to learn more about how we review boxes.)
About Sago Mini Box
The Box: Sago Mini Box
The Cost: $19 + $3 shipping
The Products: Three educational make-and-play activities for preschoolers revolving around a monthly theme in a transforming shipping box, as well as a collectible figurine, and letters to read aloud to your child.
Ships to: the continental U.S.
Sago Mini Box "Space Explorer" Review
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Each Sago Mini Box contains a card that explains the theme and lists the activities included that month. This month's theme is "Space Explorer"
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Each box also comes with a little collectible figurine to use in the activities. This little guy is "Space Explorer Neville," an Astronaut Penguin.
The first thing my son did was to get Jinja the Cat from our last box and had them play together!
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Activity #1: Exploring Outer Space
Every box comes with three activities. This month's first activity was for my son to explore outer space! It also included some things to dress up with...
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It included little cardstock planets with a holder so you can have the planets lined up in order -- they're designed to play planetary hide-and-seek! Each one has a picture on the back of where to hide/find the next planet, like a scavenger hunt!
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How great is this? The box turns inside out to show the jet pack design, and then you can attach the straps into slots on the back. Lastly, there are little flaming jets that you can peel and stick to the bottom. The cherry on top is a little felt astronaut helmet!
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I mean seriously, how adorable is this?! My son loved it and did "astronaut poses" and enjoyed running around the house like this basically all day.
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Activity #2: Build Your Own Rocket
The next envelope had some pop-out cardboard pieces to assemble and make a rocket and a launchpad! Plus stickers to decorate.
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The engineering and design of this box fascinate me. It's brilliant to have the flat, cardboard shapes that you just peel off adhesive strips and assemble into a toy. This see-saw launchpad came with a little plastic screw to hold it together at the joint. The rocket top can come off and you plop Neville inside and see him looking out one of the circle windows. This was a big hit with my son! My only gripe is that the launchpad at rest was at a steep enough angle that it made it tricky to balance the rocket on it, especially with the Neville figurine inside adding weight and with my 3-year-old trying to set it up himself. But we figured it out!
Action shot!
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Activity #3: UFO Kitty Collector
This game also had lots of cardboard pop-outs and pieces to assemble. My son enjoyed that almost just as much as the game itself!
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To play the game, you place all the stars on the table and then flip one. The number underneath is the number of cats you have to try to hook on the space ship's tractor beam using the green wand to hold the space ship. This was a cute game, but it was hard! Even I found it hard to hook the cats. My son thought it was funny, and when he got frustrated trying to play the game as it was supposed to, he had fun making all the astronaut cats talk to each other and jump around on the stars and run from the alien.
Verdict: This was our second Sago Mini Box and my 3-year-old loves this subscription! I am absolutely charmed by the design aesthetic and the thoughtful details that surprise me with every activity. I'm also fascinated by the ingenuity and cleverness of how they create all these activities and toys from cardboard pop-outs. It's actually quite helpful that the box contents are split into envelopes because it kept "the magic" alive much longer because I could keep pulling something out to add to the fun. Another aspect that I appreciate about this box is that it seems useful while I am currently trying to declutter and purge our toys and belongings because it has a lot of playtime value, does not take up much space at all, and if any pieces get damaged or are no longer used we can recycle them.
I know not every kid plays the same way or is interested in the same things, so there is a fair level of subjectivity that goes into evaluating the value of the Sago Mini Box. I knew this would be a hit with my son because he has such a great imagination and can sit and play with something simple forever, creating all these stories and adventures in his head, and Sago Mini Box plays right into that creativity. This box costs $22 ($19 + $3 shipping), and we had so much fun with this, I am happy with our experience for that price.
To Wrap Up:
Can you still get this box if you sign up today? Maybe! When you sign up, you can specify theme preferences and pick one of the characters you think your child will like. After that, you receive boxes based on availability and your crate history – not all subscribers receive the same theme each month.
Keep Track of Your Subscriptions: Add this box to your subscription list or wishlist.
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