Crayola Marker Maker product reviews

My daughter had been wanting this for so long and as her birthday is straight away christmas I was kind of stuck what to buy her. Reading the reviews on KIWIreveiws it sounded promising but my biggest concern is she likes the idea of having something not necessarily playing with it. I thought it could be potentially a little advanced for her and it would just sit on her desk in her room collecting dust and doing little else.

But as soon as she unwrapped it she was squealing and begging us to use it straight away. We relented and my husband read the instructions and sat down with her and explained what to do. I was amazed at how fast she picked it up and in no time at all was making her own colours like a pro. She loves to colour in and could not wait to use her own pens.

Her younger sister was dying to have a go also but unfortunately finds the bottles to hard to squeeze so on the occasions she is allowed to touch it instead instructs Miss Seven on what colours to use and how much quantity is required. We have since had to buy more felt tubes as they have made so many and they use them all the time. This is one of the best investments I have made as the eductational benefits are also extremely rewarding.

I am still blown away with how much pride and care she uses when making her own colours and how proud she is of the art work it produces. They both avid competition buffs and use there special pens to colour in the pictures and I am so proud of them as they have both won using these pens. A fantastic gift that keeps on giving.

I was very excited to be selected to review Crayola's Marker Maker. My girls (5 and 7 years old) were just as excited. Mean Mum used the set as an incentive to get chores completed. It definitely worked. For that alone this product deserves a high score. The box said it was designed for ages 8 plus but I think it was perfect for my kids although they probably needed a bit more supervision than older children just for the sake of the carpet.

I was surprised to see that the kit had enough components to make 16 markers. This was more than enough to keep my girls enthralled over a couple of sessions. It is obviously designed for two children to use as there are two cardboard boxes to decorate and store your new markers in. This was great as there was no arguing between my two.

There were a couple of small things that could easily be improved to make this kit even better. Firstly the storage caddy does not fit all the marker components neatly in it. Once we had made up three or four felts this was no longer a problem. The instructions and colour mixing chart were fractionally too big to fit into the storage caddy too. I found the instructions were a bit hard to follow as the diagrams were tiny and unclear and used terms that my children didn't know. This was only a problem the first time. It was so simple that after we had done it once we all knew what to do. The colour mixing chart was not accurate. The colours we created were very different to how it was described but we had fun doing it and in the end made up our own combinations.

We all loved it. My girls were so pleased with my creations. As well as colour mixing to make their own makers they enjoyed naming their creations and decorating their box. This kit had so much more to it than what I saw in the TV advertisments. I made the mistake of leaving the kit out and while I wasn't watching Miss 7 decided that she would use the ink straight out of the bottles to create her art. It worked well but it also means that I can't comment on whether there is enough ink to make 16 felts.

It is good to note that refill kits are available for around $20 that will make 12 markers. I will be getting a refill kit when we run low but at the moment my girls are happy to make a marker or two each time I get the kit out so we still have plenty left..

Even just the sound of this kit sounded too fun for words, so I was so excited to be selected to try it out with my kids. Now, first off I thought - this is definitely something that Miss 3 will not be able to do. So I told my 8 year old, that we would wait for a time when Miss 3 wasn't awake to do this. That opportunity came on Sunday morning.

We opened the box relatively easily and following the instructions put together the marker maker. There is one thing to un-clip and one thing to clip in. It was surprisingly super easy to do. We set ourselves up with a table surface, had a quick look through everything we had, and how to use everything and then got into it. In this box is enough marker bits and things to make and name 16 markers! And even little boxes to make up that hold 8 markers each. This is perfect for a 2 kid family, because they can each make their own markers and have them in their own boxes. They even come with labels so you can name your own colours!

Miss 8 was so ridiculously excited about this whole experience, she didn't get bored as I expected she might after the first 4 or so. She was with me right til the end of her box and really wanted to start into the other markers too. But I'll get to why she couldn't soon. In the meantime, her first marker was her just going in blind. She wanted to design her own colour without any colour charts (which are also included). She ended up with a really cool charcoal black colour. She made a monstrous red that she called Zombies. About the time of her 8th marker, she was finishing up and naming her marker box, when her sister appeared.

Despite the ink bottles being a little too hard for Miss 3 to squeeze, she was able to help put together her own markers, by putting the tips in. She could also select the colours she liked off the colour chart, and she LOVED dunking the marker core into the ink. She helped with the final process and especially enjoyed watching the ink soak into the tip on each of her own markers. Meanwhile I had Miss 8 desperately trying to talk Miss 3 into giving up one or two markers! No way was that happening.

Although this kit is $39.99 I would absolutely pay that again for an experience like this. It was science, technology, art and experimentation altogether. I couldn't put a price on the pride that came with doing it themselves. These would be amazing Christmas presents, and I am already planning a purchase or two with that in mind. Seriously, give this a try. Even the clean up was easy. I just used a paper towel twisted up and cleaned out the little ink mixing tubes after each mixing, and it cleaned up so easily. We didn't have any spills though, so I don't know what it would be like on carpet.