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Kiwi Crate from Kiwi Co is a monthly STEM subscription ages 5-8. Each package comes with a project, other creative learning activities, an Explore! magazine as well as online DIY ideas. Subscriptions are $19.95 monthly with free shipping. In addition to the Kiwi Crate Kiwi Co also offers Panda Crate for children 0-24 months, Koala Crate for ages 2-4, Atlas Crate for ages 6-11, Doodle Crate for ages 9-16+, Tinker Crate for ages 9-16+, Maker Crate for ages 14-104 and Eureka Crate for ages 14-104. NAT received this package at no cost for review purposes.
Subscription Box Unboxing
Subscription Box Review
Our first glimpse inside the Kiwi Crate for February. We are building a Pinball Machine!
Everything that came in our package from Kiwi Co. I love how they have the small things organized neatly on the sheet of paper.
So what is all this stuff?
First up we have our Explore! Magazine. This edition goes over moving and rolling.
Inside you’ll find puzzles, comics and other activities that help your child to better understand the physics concepts that are being taught for the month.
Our other insert is the instructions on building the Pinball Machine.
Inside our instructions we do a preemptive dot drawing practice as well as pixel drawing. Then we get right into building our Pinball Machine. The instructions are simple and there are images to accompany them.
The paper markers will be used to identify your different bonuses on your Pinball Machine.
These two pieces of graph paper were included to use as a backdrop for your Pinball Machine. We get to design them ourselves.
All of our little pieces are conveniently attached to this paper – from top left to bottom right we have brad pins, rubber bands, pegs, marbles, washers and stickees.
This bag includes all the plastic parts we’ll be using to define and embellish our pinball machine. That orange piece is going to be our shooter!
That little yellow key is what we’ll be using to shoot off our marbles!
These two foam sheets will be used underneath our pinball machine.
There are two of these foam feet that came in our box but at the time that I took these pictures I could only find one (thanks kids). It has since resurfaced. These will give the back of your Pinball Machine height.
These two plastic pieces will attach to the two foam pieces pictured above and then clip together to create the base of our pinball machine. I really like the color that they used! It’s fun!
Okay so now what?
Now we get to making!
First we try our hand at the dot drawing… OK! Not bad I guess.
Vivienne enjoys drawing much more than Oliver does so she couldn’t wait for her turn!
For the pixel drawing I tried to give them an idea of what they should be shooting for by doing a pixelated heart.
Alright, that’s a start.
Oliver tried his hand at it… and it was something.
Here’s what we’re left with!
Now we move onto actually creating our Pinball Machine.
First we get the pieces of foam and plastic that have the slits on them.
We line them up and attach the two with the adhesive on the side.
We then go ahead and do the same thing with the second side.
Then we attach an L shaped piece on the lower left corner of the piece with the slits.
Once we’ve done that we’ll insert two brands into the slits and place a washer underneath. Then you’ll split the legs.
Once you see it coming together it gets really exciting!
Now we’ll repeat that step on the other corner.
Then we start the same process on the other piece.
And of course since the process is the same we’ll do the same with the brads and washers on the underside.
Finally to border the pinball machine we’ll attach our two straight pieces to the bare areas at the centers.
Here’s our completely pinball base.
Next we create the shooter. This is probably the most difficult part because it involves lining up numerous pieces with the brands and then wrapping a rubber and around them.
The kids needed help getting that pin in but that’s what Moms are for! I have to say this is really interesting to see it come together!
To complete the shooter we will attach it to our Pinball Machine. It’s loose so that we can use it to shoot and aim which I thought was pretty interesting!
Now we move on to the feet. We insert a peg into each and then attach that underneath in the foam on the two back corners.
Once you’ve done that you’ll decorate your backboards and attach using the stickees that came with your package. Here is ours… I added the “Winner” in block letters as an afterthought as I thought it could use a little something extra.
Then we add pegs and rubber bands to each of the top corners so our marbles can bounce off of them!
They’ll look a bit like this!
Now we make a divider between the shooter and the board with pegs and rubber bands. The different colored rubber bands that were included are all different sizes – these are the medium sized bands!
Then we start adding our game pieces. This one is a spinning kind, so when the marble hits it, it can bounce around and spin!
We then add non spinning pieces, the point spots as well as more pegs with rubber bands to increase the fun!
Here’s our completed Pinball Machine.
And here is Viv playing pinball!
So in summary
Presentation: Everything is package well and arrived to us in perfect condition in our Kiwi Crate!
Quality: I felt like all the items that we used to make our pinball machine were durable and sturdy… and FYI the kids are STILL playing Pinball!
Curation: I felt like this was a bit of a stroke of genius on Kiwi’s part. Not only do kids learn great physics concepts but they also get to see them in action and play a game… what better way to solidify the learning experience!
Kiwi Crate
The post Kiwi Crate Subscription Box Review + Unboxing | February 2020 appeared first on Not a Tree Subscription Box Reviews.
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