Kiwi Crate is a subscription box for kids ages 5-8 from the parent company KiwiCo. It arrives every month with all the materials and instructions needed to complete 2-3 crafts centered on a theme, plus additional materials to help educate young learners!
This review is of KiwiCo's Kiwi Crate (for ages 5-8), which costs $19.95 per month.
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.)
First Impressions
This box looked like it would be a lot of fun! The idea of exploring pumps not only sounded educational, but when I saw that we'd be using balloons and doing a little bit of water play, I knew that it would be a hit with all of my kids. We had so much fun making the pumps and using them in different ways!
Read on to learn how we explored these powerful pumps!
What's Inside This Box
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This booklet highlights our theme for the month and it includes colorful, detailed illustrations to go along with our easy-to-follow instructions. It looks like this month we have quite a few different builds to explore! On the back of the booklet, they include their social media links and a sticker for this month’s project.
This is the little sticker chart we received in our first Kiwi Crate along with our welcome note that we can add our sticker to.
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Our Kiwi Explore! magazine is always a nice bonus complete with a comic and some extra activities that really enhance our lessons each month! It's educational and full of fun and useful activities for us to try.
Activity 1: Air Pump
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The first activity was to create our air pump. They provided a duckbill valve, some rubber stoppers with holes in them, adhesive foam, plastic tubing, a squeeze bottle, a plastic bottle, some balloons, and some plastic tubing connectors.
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First, we tested out our different valves and the tubing by assembling them and then blowing through them to see what happened. Then it was time to put the actual pump together by adding the tubing and duckbill valve to one of the rubber stoppers and placing that on top of the squeeze bottle.
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Then it was time to test out the pump with some balloons! Liv placed the balloon over the valve and then pushed down on the squeeze bottle to pump air into the balloon. They even provided some little plastic balloon clips to hold the air inside of them.
Activity 2: Balloon Art
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Now it was time to use our balloons to make some balloon art! How fun is that? They provided several paper shapes, some stands, sticky foam pieces, and a few markers for us.
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The kids were eager to get started and even though we had one balloon pop, my son was excited that he got to blow up a new one to replace it with!
Here is one of our finished balloons. Cute and fun!
Activity 3: Water Pump
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Now it was time to make a different pump. They provided some plastic tube connectors, a straight tube, and a little plastic car mold.
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I got a pan out for us to work on so we could keep the water contained, and then we filled up the water bottle. My daughter then added the plastic tubing to the rubber stopper and placed that on top 0f the bottle. We then placed the pump with the other connector over top of that and now when she pushed down on the squeeze bottle, the water would spray out.
Activity 4: Car Wash
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The last step was to add the long plastic tube with holes in it to the end of one of the connectors. Then she used the markers to decorate the car and when we placed it underneath our tubing, it acted as a car wash and rinsed the marker away!
Of course, no one was more thrilled than my 3-year-old who loves cars and loves nothing more than to play with water and wash his cars!
Value - Was This Box Worth It?
The Cost: $19.95
Value Breakdown:
This box provided us with a fun and educational experience and it was presented in a well-organized way that way made it so easy for us to just open the box and get started. I think $19.95 is a great value for the entertainment and learning that took place with this box!
Key Takeaways
KiwiCo really knows how to make things fun for kids and get them engaged! Not only did we get to explore different pumps using a variety of tubing and other materials, but we also got to turn them into fun, real-life applications. Using the pump to blow up the balloons and then turn the balloons into art was such a well-rounded and complete experience! Then we also had the added bonus of making the water pump and turning it into a car wash, which was just as exciting and just plain fun!
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To Wrap Up:
Can you still get this box if you sign up today? It is possible you might get this crate, but it is not a guarantee. From KiwiCo:
Crates are assigned each month based on availability and your crate history - not all subscribers receive the same theme each month.
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