Author's product rating: 
| Advantages: |
good plat value, lots of buttons, virtually unbreakable, only 1 battery |
| Disadvantages: |
suction strength could be better on the cup |
| Recommend to potential buyers: |
yes |
This is a great little toy, which at £10 from the Early Learning Centre is not expensive if you are looking for a present for a little boy or girl.
It is designed with a rubber suction cap on the bottom of it, so you can stick it down to a hard, solid surface. The idea is that you stick to the tray of your baby's highchair, to keep baby amused while you're preparing dinner, finishing your own meal or whatever, but it has good play value on the floor or in the playpen too, at least in our house!
It is suitable for babies from six months - in other words they need to be able to sit up in their highchair unaided really and be ble to reach out to a toy, in order to get any play value from it, though, you can sit with a younger child on your knee and enjoy making the beeping noise and going "broom broom" if you want to - there is nothing unsafe about it for a younger child as far as I can see.
My son was given one for Christmas last year when he was 11 months old, and is still enjoying it, so it has good durability. His two year old sister likes it too! It is made of plastic and pretty robust - it has hit the stone floor in our kitchen countless times with no ill effects. THe mirror you can see on the left in the picture comes off very easily, and reattcehs easily too - though I think ours might be at the bottom of a toy box somewhere - I'm not sure why it is so detachable - perhaps it's a safety feature, but it does mean they tend to get separated.
The play value is high because of the different things it does - the mirror twists (and it is not a glass mirror obviously so it's unbreakable and safe), the red handle on the right pulls forward with a ratchet noise, the button in the middle beeps in a very satisfying manner and the three coloured buttons on the front also make noises - one plays a tune, one makes the sound of an engine starting and the other one is the sound of a car driving away. My boy loves pressing those over and over.
Here's the good bit - it rates quite low on the annoying toy noise scale - it is not too loud and the noises do not get on my nerves. I have several toys with batteries strategically removed, and this is not one of them. I think it only takes one AA battery too, so isn't expensive to run, unlike a real car!
My son is now strong enough to overcome the suction, even if I use water, which is why it hits the kitchen floor so often, but as I said earlier, he still plays with it even if not always on the highchair any more.
It's a good little present and gets the baby vote!
